No more will NIU football coach Joe Novak have to use the Convocation Center as the prime recruiting venue.

No more will NIU athletes have to weight train in Huskie Stadium’s junior college-type weight room.

And no more will NIU be at the butt-end of athletic facility jokes. Or will it?

Before Saturday’s spring football game, Novak, NIU Athletics Director Jim Phillips and President John Peters revealed plans for a $9.5 million Academic and Athletic Performance Facility.

Novak and the football program, not NIU or the athletics department, have raised $5.1 million thus far through private donations. The facility is not drawing on other university money yet.

Once donations reach $7 million, the rest of the project will be raised by NIU athletics.

The price almost doubles that of Miami-Ohio’s $5 million facility.

But the structure itself still isn’t all that NIU needs to become at the very least a mid-major powerhouse.

Nicknamed “the jewel among athletic performance centers in the MAC” by Phillips, the 60,000 square foot project will be located beyond the north end zone.

Outside of a strength and conditioning center, the building will house athletic training and equipment rooms, coaches’ offices, meeting rooms and a football locker room.

There is no doubt this building is needed ASAP. However this should not be “the jewel,” but “a jewel.”

Because of NIU’s geographic location, an indoor track and fields facility is still needed for year-round training and recruiting. Four teams in the MAC have such indoor facilities.

Yes, a “fields” facility so not just football, but baseball, softball, soccer, track and field, cross-country and even golf can work on their games during the winter months.

NIU football has lost recruits like University of Illinois quarterback Tim Brasic, the predecessor of NIU quarterback Britt Davis when at Riverside-Brookfield High School, and holder of numerous IHSA state passing records.

Brasic didn’t come to NIU because there was not an ideal place, or indoor football field, for him to throw on during the winter months.

It cost Western Michigan $8.2 million to build a similar facility to NIU’s. WMU also added a $25 million building that included additional offices, meeting rooms, weight rooms and, most importantly, a 70-yard indoor football field and indoor track that services seven teams.

Then there’s Toledo, who’s better known as the dog catcher in Huskie country. UT spent $18 million on their similar complex in 1990. The Huskies haven’t beat them on the football field since, losing 11 straight games.

The athletics department needs to strike while the iron is hot. The football team’s success can be used to upgrade all of NIU’s athletic programs.

Yes, the new facility is great, and baseball and softball may finally get locker rooms after football moves out.

If NIU wants to be a big-time program, it needs to think big. Not think “this facility is exactly what we needed.” Because it’s not all that it needs.

Otherwise the proposed facility is just a band-aid on Huskie Stadium’s big, gushing wound.