The days of 6-6 BCS teams getting bowl games over mid-major schools — see NIU football 2003 — are over.

Well, somewhat.

The new NCAA rule requiring bowl committees to choose 7-5 teams before 6-6 schools for at-large bowl bids has some of the six BCS conference schools and their fans in an uproar.

NIU accepted an at-large Poinsettia Bowl bid Tuesday, but NIU coach Joe Novak doesn’t care if his mid-major school was picked over one of the “big boys.”

“It bothered me in 2003 when we went 10-2, but a 6-6 team got a bowl game and lost,” Novak said. “Teams in the MAC are playing BCS teams. Look at BCS teams’ schedules. They go 2-6 in their league and go to a bowl game? That’s baloney.”

“I’d probably if I was a coach at Ohio State, but I’d hold the same belief.”

There are 10, potentially 11, 6-6 NCAA football teams from BCS conferences this season.

Some will get bowl games because their conferences have more tie-ins than the Western Athletic, Mountain West and Sun Belt conferences combined.

But due to the new rule, mid-major schools like NIU and Middle Tennessee State from the Sun Belt have and may receive bowl game opportunities this year. Central and Western Michigan, and Ohio have also accepted bowl game invitations for the MAC this year.

Since 1999, the collective 10-5 record of all MAC teams in bowl games gives the MAC the winningest percentage (.667) among all Division I-A conferences.

“I think we’re going to play the best [opponent] out of all the MAC teams,” Novak said. “We don’t want to go to a bowl game and play Lafayette-Tech.”

Meanwhile, Big 12 teams like Kansas or Oklahoma State, Pac-10 teams such as Arizona or Washington State, or a Big East school like Pittsburgh could stay home for the holidays.

Regardless, the Huskies will be soaking in the sweet sun of the West Coast for the second time in two years. And here’s what NIU Director of Athletics Jim Phillips and his staff did to make it happen.

First, Phillips leaned on the experience of Senior Associate Athletics Director Glen Krupica, who worked on the Independence Bowl’s staff before coming to NIU.

Then came the physical labor.

Over the summer, Phillips said NIU athletics sent out weekly letters containing information about the Huskies that would catch the eyes of the bowl committee members.

Stats about NIU alumni and individual or team achievements was information Phillips said bowl committees needed to have, but may not have known or researched.

In August, Phillips and Krupica visited all the cities in which the MAC had a bowl game tie-in.

Then came the easy part: letting everyone make note of the mighty mouse known as NIU running back Garrett Wolfe.

“Every athletics director in the country has a responsibility to market their school,” Phillips said. “Garrett was really important.”

But whether the Huskies could bring enough fans to generate revenue for the bowl game was also an issue.

But NIU led the MAC in attendance this season, while averaging 20,770 fans at home games.

And in 2004, the Huskies brought 7,000-plus fans to the Silicon Valley Classic bowl game in San Jose, Calif.

“We still got some things to play for. We want these kids to finish their career on a high note,” said Novak before the Huskies’ 31-10 clubbing of MAC West champ Central Michigan.

Opportunity granted.