DeKALB | Before Dec. 19, being a student at NIU made you just another face in the crowd at a state school. But on Dec. 20, all that changed.

Suddenly, saying you were an NIU student brought back a reply of, “Oh, you guys didn’t do so well in that football game, did you?”

A 37-7 loss against Texas Christian University (11-2) in the Poinsettia Bowl was the grounds for consolation from random strangers on the street.

The Huskies struggled the entire game to break free from the nation’s second-best defense. At halftime, NIU had as many first downs as interceptions: one.

NIU coach Joe Novak tried to joke about the situation when explaining the focus of his halftime speech to the media.

“Try to get a first down — we didn’t do a very good job of that,” Novak said. “We ran about everything we had. We tried it all: the flee-flicker, the reverse.”

The Huskies’ only score of the game came on a blocked punt that was returned by linebacker John Tranchitella.

Things didn’t get brighter for the Huskies when offensive line/assistant coach Sam Pittman left NIU to become North Carolina’s offensive line coach.

“I got this job because [the coaches at NIU and I] did a lot of things with less talent than our opponents,” Pittman said.

Numbers

TCU’s defense held NIU running back Garrett Wolfe to 28 rushing yards.

NIU had only five first downs the whole game. Quarterback Dan Nicholson was sacked five times.

Punter Andy Dittbenner recorded 365 yards on nine punts.