Date posted: 12-13-01

Editors: You are encouraged to use this story in your publication. Please credit the author and DeKalb News Service as shown. And, please send two tearsheets to: Jim Killam, Department of Communication, Watson Hall, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL 60115.

One magical season

By Andy Tavegia
DeKalb News Service

DeKALB -- It hasn't always been this way.

Nov. 17 was a picture-perfect day in DeKalb, with temperatures in the low 60s and not a cloud in the sky. NIU got its biggest football victory in years, defeating Ball State 33-29 to clinch its second consecutive winning season and a share of a divisional title. But only 11,795 people showed up at 31,000-seat Huskie Stadium to witness the crowning achievement of coach Joe Novak's six-year tenure.

It hasn't always been this way. In fact, Novak himself remembers a time where College Football Saturday was something special in DeKalb A time where the only colors seen in the bleachers were red and black, as opposed to the blinding gray light from the sun reflecting off the metal bleachers.

The year was 1983, and Novak was an assistant to coach Bill Mallory. Not only did NIU shock the Mid-American Conference by coming out of its sixth-place preseason ranking to win the conference title, but the season's bookends were victories over Kansas and winning the California Bowl.

"Each game was a big stepping stone," said former split end Curt Pardridge, one of seven National Football League draft picks from that Huskie team. "We just seemed to continue to gel more and more with each game. It really was like a snowball effect."

Impressive as it was, it was just as unexpected. Even after ending the previous season with three straight victories, nothing such as this was expected.

"I can't honestly say that we were expecting that," said student coach Dan Roushar. "As players, we thought we would be pretty solid, especially with Tim Tyrrell (starting quarterback) coming back, but we had no idea we would be that good. But the football staff and coaches saw something with us. I think they eventually led us to believe we could make something special."

What the coaches saw was raw grit, determination and energy, starting with the final day of two-a-days on Aug. 29, one week before a clash with Kansas of the powerful Big Eight. It was a night practice, with blistering hot temperatures and no shortage of sweat. This deadly concoction meant short fuses.

Five separate altercations involving team members occurred that day. Fists were thrown and heated language exchanged. Mallory did in fact break up each fight; however, no punishments were dealt. Instead, he used it to advantage.

"We're ready," he said to a few select coaches with a smirk on his face. "We're ready for something special."

Indeed, they were. And there certainly was something peculiar about this team. Possibly the thought of expecting the unexpected.

Take for instance that same week against the Jayhawks in Kansas. With eight seconds remaining and the score knotted at 34-34, Vince Scott tried a 31-yard field goal. The kick shifted left, missing the upright by just a few feet. Northern Illinois would have to settle for a tie in its first competition with the Big Eight conference that, if you asked some of the more than 40,000 on hand, was already proof enough.

But, laying on the ground to the side of the scrimmage was a yellow flag. The Jayhawks had been offside, providing Scott an even closer second chance. From 26 yards away, his kick split the uprights and sent the NIU sideline into jubilation, as well as to 1-0 on the season.

"At the time, many considered Northern Illinois beating a Big Eight school to be a major, major upset," Pardridge said. "I don't think this team could've played much better than we did in that game. It was an all-out war, fought out very well on both sides of the field."

The bandwagon was beginning to grow. But the feeling of absolute power nearly was crushed the following week against Wisconsin, in the form of a 37-9 shellacking in Madison. The Huskies had been welcomed harshly back to reality. With two more road games upcoming, the bandwagon took its lone hit of the season. This team couldn't take a 3-1 record home following four straight road games against stiff competition, could it?

But this was a team in an abnormal season. Expect the unexpected.

NIU claimed its next two games over Kent State (38-7) and Ball State (27-14), meaning it would come home to Huskie Stadium the following week with a 3-1 record from a rare four-game road trip. Skeptics had been transformed into believers. Dorm-room windows donned NIU logos. Second-hand conversation echoed sentiments of pigskins and first downs. DeKalb had begun to experience college football fever.

It refused to halt as 26,250 fans re-energized Huskie on Parents Day against Western Michigan. The Broncos provided little more than a yawn as NIU rolled to a 27-3 victory, running their record to 4-1. At that time, the attendance figure was the second largest in Northern Illinois history.

And the bandwagon just continued to expand.

"Everybody was excited," Novak said. "The community was excited the staff was excited. Everybody was into this football team. But nobody was excited as the students. They were awfully loud the entire season. They were into it, and it was exciting for us."

That tends to happen in a season full of surprises, which again came into play just two weeks later.

A week after downing Eastern Michigan on the road to go to 5-1, NIU arrived home for homecoming. Oct. 22 was a miserable day, with cloudy skies and frigid temperatures. A steady drizzle occupied the entire afternoon kickoff, scaring a few weak souls from attendance, yet a decent crowd still found its way into the stadium, figuring an intense Huskie offense not only would warm their bodies, but also their spirits.

But for one half, the story was quite the opposite. Bowling Green, a formidable opponent, held the Huskie running attack led by Darryl Richardson to nary a yard. For the first time all season, Huskie Stadium was silent as the Falcons secured a 20-0 halftime advantage.

"They came out and played very well," said Roushar. We couldn't run the ball at all."

But remember the unexpected.

Following the kickoff, a pulverizing hit on BG's first play from scrimmage forced a fumble with NIU recovering deep in BG territory. One play later, Tyrrell, known more for his athletic prowess and gritty toughness than his power and strength, swung left on a quarterback sweep where he ran into a Falcon defensive back. Tyrrell lowered his head, toppled the defensive back and galloped into the end zone for NIU's first score of the day.

And as poorly as the Huskies had performed in the opening half of football, they dominated as much in the second half, rattling off 17 unanswered at one point, leading to an amazing 24-23 victory, in what stands as one of the greatest comebacks in NIU football history.

Moments before the final gun sounded, the forest green Astroturf turned into a sea of red and black as thousands of students and supporters fled the stands for a better view … of sorts. The goalposts were torn down as Northern Illinois moved to 6-1.

"I think that game more than anything told us how good of a football team we were," Pardridge said. "Each game was a simple stepping stone to the next. With each passing game we just gelled more and more. It was amazing."

But even the most memorable of teams hits an occasional bump in the road. The media circus had begun. Rockford television stations were on campus almost daily, with Rockford and Chicago newspapers joining in the frenzy.

Cockiness and an aura of invincibility began to invade this group of athletes at exactly the wrong moment. After posting a 17-0 shutout at Miami of Ohio, NIU had back-to-back meetings with its top competition, Central Michigan and Toledo. Up to this point, the Huskies stood atop the conference with a 6-0 mark, followed closely by the Rockets (5-1) and the Chippewas (5-1).

In Mount Pleasant, the Huskies returned to the form of a year prior with sloppy tackling and difficulties scoring. By the end of the afternoon, the bubble had been burst as the Chippewas dismantled NIU 30-14.

"Those losses (at Wisconsin and CMU) were a blessing in disguise," Novak said. "They brought us back to reality. I think we were beginning to feel too good about ourselves and bad play took over. We really responded well after those games."

Northern Illinois was now in a critical state. In order to have dreams of California, the Huskies had to beat Toledo and Ohio and have Central Michigan fall once.

With a pressure placed on their shoulders not very often seen in DeKalb, the Huskies returned to their former ways in what was considered to be the best week of practice that season. Guys were hitting, energy was popping, curse words flaring. This team wanted Toledo.

"There was some real intense hitting going on there," Roushar said. "These guys knew what was at stake."

Nov. 12 finally arrived. With a chill in the air, DeKalb readied itself for a wild pregame party. Reports had traffic on Annie Glidden Road backed up a half-mile. The smell of cooked hot dogs and baked beans occupying the air. The Huskie Stadium press box was filled beyond capacity, including a Sports Illustrated crew.

The town was ready. The team was ready.

Twenty minutes before kickoff, Huskie Stadium began to transform into an energy box. And as the opening kickoff skied into the air, the temperature in the stadium seemed to rise 10 degrees. That tends to happen when a crowd of 27,700 - only the second above 27,000 in NIU history - swells into a stadium not built for much more. The bandwagon may have overbooked.

Players on the sidelines had to remove helmets and scream in each others ears just to be heard. It was a madhouse, but a controlled one. That was, until the clock ran under a minute remaining in the fourth quarter with the Huskies leading 26-10. Again, a set of goalposts, this one just three weeks old, was destined for the east lagoon, ironically adjacent to the former Glidden Field, the sight of many other happy Huskie memories.

Players such as Tyrrell and Pardridge and Richardson stood along the sideline, silenced. Smiles were plentiful as players returned to his respective dorm or apartment, exchanging high fives and feelings of joy along Lucinda Avenue.

"It was so exciting as a player," Roushar said. "There was just a tremendous amount of pride that day from the students and community for this university, and it was all about what we were doing and how we were doing it. There was no better feeling."

The following week against Ohio seemed to be nothing but a curtain call. Another decent crowd arrived, giving NIU an average of 23,488 for the entire home slate. Despite sub par temperatures, dreams of warmer climates rang true in the minds of thousands as Northern Illinois chased a berth in the California Bowl.

And there were signs of a culture clash - literally and figuratively. In DeKalb's freezing November temperatures, surfboards are not commonplace - at least not until 1983. One student's sign read quite clearly "California Bound" while another chose poetic rhetoric to explain her sentiments: "Roses are red, violets are blue, Toledo is gone, so is O.U. California, here we come."

Ohio certainly was gone. From the opening kickoff, the 4-6 Bobcats had little hope, falling behind by two touchdowns early and slouching all the way to a 41-13 defeat. The win, accompanied by a Central Michigan loss, gave NIU the title of Mid-American Conference champions, its first ever.

With just 27 seconds left on the clock, the green surface of Huskie Stadium again disappeared. For the third time this wacky season, athletic director Robert Brigham would need to purchase new goalposts.

In the midst of a wild locker room frenzy, not necessarily equipped with champagne, the bowl sponsors worked their way to the center of the scrawny room. As the two sponsors and coach Mallory slowly were bombarded with microphones and players, the fourth-year coach accepted Northern Illinois University's bid to the California Bowl against California State-Fullerton, champions of the Pacific Coast Athletic Association.

"There was absolutely no question we were going to win that game," Pardridge said. "We knew what was on the line, and what we had to do. How we performed that day was probably as good as we could get."

For the next month, the cold winter air played havoc on NIU's practice schedules. Forced indoors on many occasions, the Huskies worked out at Chick Evans Field House on campus, or took a ride to the Illinois National Guard Armory in Sycamore to prepare for the warmer Fresno air.

After a plane voyage, the focus was purely on Cal. St.-Fullerton, despite a brief journey to Yosemite National Park and a visit to a local hospital. Then the day came.

Dec. 17 seemed to arrive sooner than expected. But the Huskies knew they were ready for a challenge in what was deemed "America's Most Exciting Bowl" at the time. It was just like NIU to participate in a bowl game with such a title.

The game lived up to its billing. As NIU held a 20-13 lead with 35 seconds remaining, CSFU held the ball at its own 48-yard line, facing a fourth-and-one situation. But defensive back Jeff Sanders would chase Cal State-Fullerton's athletic quarterback Damon Allen out of bounds short of the first down, securing the perfect end to an incredible season.

Said fullback Lou Wicks, who was named the most valuable player after a career high rushing performance of 119 yards on 14 carries, "This was my last game of my senior season and I don't think you could end it any better."

It's too bad the folks back home couldn't witness it. Subzero temperatures in Chicago froze WPWR-TV's transmitter in the third quarter, taking the station off the air. Within minutes, the switchboard was lit up with thousands of unhappy viewers, demanding immediate attention to the problem.

How typical for this 1983 football season. A season of unexpected pleasure.

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Sources:
Joe Novak, defensive coordinator in 1983 and current NIU football coach, 753-1825
Dan Roushar, student coach in 1983 and current offensive coordinator, 753-8408
Curt Pardridge, former NIU split end. Phone number available on request.