Charlie Sadler appears to be in a dilemma.

He has seen enough spring intersquad football games in his coaching career to know that they aren’t particularly pleasing for the eye to see.

Usually, because the team is just beginning to work out the kinks, these games feature their share of stumbles, bumbles and fumbles.

But Sadler, NIU’s first-year head football coach, has another problem. He is incorporating a new offensive and defensive system, so one can understand why he might be a little leery about Saturday’s annual Red-White game.

But Sadler is optimistic. He fully expects his new pupils to play competent football in their annual Red-White game Saturday.

NIU players have had since April 6, the start of spring practice, to get familiarized with Sadler’s system. These practices have included scrimmages, so this weekend’s game won’t be the first time the players have extensively used their new system.

“We’ve had some pretty extensive Saturday scrimmages,” Sadler said. “I don’t think it’ll be error free,” Sadler said about Saturday’s 1 p.m. game, “but the less errors shown will show that the players have made an adaption to the new system.

“This (game) will allow them to be more in a game-day situation. What I hope to see is our players compete hard with each other and have some fun. I want to see two finely tuned football teams.”

Individually, Sadler isn’t really counting on seeing dazzling performances. He realizes this game is just a warm-up for the regular season.

“We’ll just see what they can do,” Sadler said.