You have got to be kidding. Only 19,341 fans showed up for NIU football’s home opener Saturday?

I know Ohio isn’t exactly Ohio State, and Band Day isn’t the most celebrated date on the calendar, but come on.

The fact that the Huskies didn’t quite play up to standards against No. 1 OSU shouldn’t have done that much damage.

We’re talking about an NIU team that set a MAC record in attendance with 27,052 fans per game in 2004. Mind you, Huskie Stadium only holds 28,000.

It was 72 degrees outside Saturday, and NIU was picked not only to win its division again, but the MAC itself.

Until its loss to Ohio, NIU still had a chance to crash the joke of a playoff system that is the Bowl Championship Series, which added one more game this year.

Oh, and if you haven’t heard, there’s this 5-foot-7 guy named Garrett Wolfe on NIU’s team who leading the nation with 183.5 rushing yards per game.

Yeah, it always takes NIU football fans, especially the students, a good portion of the first quarter to find their seats at home games.

Why exactly? Well, let’s just say tailgating outside Huskie Stadium becomes a popular cocurricular activity in the fall.

However, as the opening quarter winded down Saturday in NIU’s loss to Ohio, the stands looked like this reporter’s golf game: there were a lot of holes.

I understand that NIU students and alumni were given an excuse to not show up on Saturdays from 1996-98.

And those who did show up to watch NIU lose 23 straight games are the same lunatics who still show up to Wrigley Field.

But that era is over now. And besides, the student section had sold out of tickets as of game time. Then again, it helps when groups of high school bands take up two sections.

So, now that NIU is 0-2, what’s the fan base response going to be at Saturday’s 6:35 p.m. home game against Buffalo?

Of course, you also ask who’s going to show up this weekend to watch the Huskies play a team that finished 1-10 last fall.

Not to mention Buffalo’s only win this season is a 9-3 victory over Temple.

And for fans’ sake, the last time Temple won a football game was when former long-time NIU Sports Information Director Mike Korcek was in diapers.

What has happened in the past shouldn’t matter. Fans wanted a team to be proud of, and they have one.

Now if only the team had fans they could be proud of too.

Sean Connor is an NIU football beat reporter for the Northern Star.