Each week during the college football season, the Northern Star will recap the most interesting NIU grades published by Pro Football Focus, a sports analytics company that evaluates every player on every play of every game. Season and single-game grades are based on a 0-100 scale. To learn more about PFF’s grading system, click here.
When a football team can’t score after the first quarter, they tend to lose games, and that’s exactly what happened to the Huskies in their 118th Homecoming game on Saturday.
NIU suffered its fourth straight loss with a 25-14 defeat by Miami, with the offense staying silent after opening the game with back-to-back touchdown drives. Naturally, the powers that be at Pro Football Focus punished the Huskies accordingly while giving some well-deserved kudos to the standouts.
NIU (52.8 offense): The Huskies may have scored two offensive touchdowns for the first time all season, but their offensive marks still aren’t up to snuff. Offensively, NIU graded in the bottom quarter of the Football Bowl Subdivision in Week 6. PFF issued the Huskies a 41.6 passing grade, 33.9 pass blocking grade, 55.8 receiving grade, 68.4 rushing grade and a 60.5 run blocking grade.
Donte Harrison (79.4 defense): The senior cornerback turned in some of his best marks as a Huskie on Saturday. Harrison earned NIU’s highest defense grade and pass coverage grade (79.2) and fourth-highest tackling grade (79.3). He played 66 of 80 defensive snaps, making four tackles while allowing just two catches on seven targets against him.
Muhammed Jammeh (82.2 tackling): Despite posting his worst defensive grade of the season (60.3), Jammeh was among NIU’s best play-stoppers against the RedHawks. Jammeh played 52 snaps and finished with seven tackles — third-best behind Quinn Urwiler (14) and Jasper Beeler (8).
Landon Hron (83.1 pass blocking): Even amid NIU’s offensive struggles, Hron shined with the team’s highest pass blocking grade in only his fifth career start. The center played all 53 snaps — 33 as a pass blocker — and kept a clean pocket for quarterback Brady Davidson to work from.
Danny Vuckovic (43.0 special teams): The former walk-on received the Huskies’ lowest special teams grade after getting blocked twice on six punt attempts. The first blocked punt went out of the back of NIU’s end zone for a safety that gave Miami the lead early in the second half.
