COLUMBUS, Ohio | It’s hard to be positive about giving up 21 points in 12 minutes, even if it is to the No. 1 team in the nation.

Ohio State — er, excuse me, The Ohio State — shredded through NIU’s pathetic-looking defense as if it were tinfoil, and halted the Huskies’ touted offense with a brute force that only the No. 1 team in the nation can dish out. NIU was beaten by a clearly superior team Saturday, but the loss could have been much worse.

During the first quarter, NIU athletic director Jim Phillips had his head in his hands in the press box. Rightfully so: with the way NIU was playing, Huskie fans should have been hoping for a mercy rule.

Not that Ohio State’s level of play didn’t make NIU look even worse. Buckeye quarterback Troy Smith could’ve taken a lunch break in the pocket, then lobbed the football to one of many wide-open receivers.

Yeah, the first quarter was pretty bad.

Even NIU coach Joe Novak thought so. In the post-game press conference, Novak compared his first-quarter Huskies to a collective deer in headlights, saying “there was no phase of our football that was good.”

Of course, let’s not be hard on the fellas. Any mistake the Huskies made in the first quarter was magnified tenfold because Ohio State looked nearly perfect in every aspect of its game.

But after the forgettable first quarter, the Huskies settled down and played the way they’re capable of playing, holding OSU to 14 points after the first quarter and just 7 points for the final 44:55 of the game. Maybe OSU let off the throttle a bit, or maybe NIU really can play competitively against top teams.

Either way, the Huskies got to see how they stack up against the best team in the nation, and now they can head back to DeKalb and pinpoint what they need to work on.

The OSU game is in the past. The Huskies need to look toward Saturday’s home opener against The Ohio. Comparing the Buckeyes to the Bobcats is like comparing prime rib to ground beef, but this week’s game against the Bobcats is far more important to NIU’s season.

Sure, the first quarter was embarrassing for Huskie fans, but if the team can take something away from it, tighten up its defense and find someone other than Garrett Wolfe who can create offensive yards, the first-quarter slaughter wasn’t so bad after all.