Last week, I advised the new coaches at NIU to have faith in their school, to not abandon it overnight, like some of their predecessors have done.

Now, I am not so sure in what I said. It might not be so unwise for head football coach Charlie Sadler to exit town as fast as his two feet allow him; his teams’ schedule is unrelenting.

Ideally for NIU fans, last Saturday’s game was to be a joyous inauguration. The new guy was here, fresh from the University of Oklahoma with big plans and ready to make his first kill.

Assured and seemingly prepared, the Huskies boarded their charter to California, merrily anticipating their scuffle with the Fresno State Bulldogs.

“I think our team is where we want it to be,” Sadler said a couple of days before the game. “Whether we’re where we need to be, we’ll find out Saturday. To go into the first game and say we’re where we need to be, I don’t know.”

He found out soon afterwards.

FSU 55, NIU 7.

Promised a new, exciting offense, and a ferocious, penetrating defense, instead NIU fans saw the Huskies take the standing eight. They garner 188 yards and relinquish 638 in an ugly, forgettable farce that surely raised the bile in anyone who witnessed it.

“I don’t think we played that badly,” NIU fullback Adam Dach said bravely. “A lot of guys got their feet wet for the first time.

“As far as the offense goes, we were a block away, a step away. I think this Saturday (against Arkansas State) we’ll execute better.”

Dach is not the only player to cite inexperience as the leading cause of their defeat. They are right in that claim; they are a fuzz-cheeked bunch.

But if they expect to make even a whimper this season, that fuzz had better grow, because the Iowa Hawkeyes and Florida Gators lurk.

“No sense in thinking about those two now,” Dach said. Instead, he, his teammates and his coaches have centered their thoughts on 0-2 ASU, their home-opening opponent.

One can excuse Sadler if his thoughts stray. It wasn’t too long ago that he was on the side of the squads administering the whippings. He must be longing for Normal, Okla. Unfortunately for Sadler, winning here, unlike there, will not come as easily.

“Hopefully,” Sadler said of Saturday’s loss, “we will grow from this.”

They have no other choice.