NIU coach Joe Novak admits he isn’t one to take a lot of stock in halftime speeches.

He knows if his players are capable of making the changes necessary to win a game and he lets them do just that.

On Saturday, the Huskies went into the locker room up 7-3 with 169 yards of total offense.

Seven minutes into the third quarter, the Huskies had compiled 184 total yards and quickly turned a four-point lead into a 28-3 advantage.

“I don’t know; we talked about playing 60 minutes,” Novak said about halftime. “All the corny stuff. Nothing fancy, these kids knew what they had to do.”

After just 36 yards passing in the first half – mainly due to wind conditions – NIU opened up the game on the fourth play of the third quarter, hitting receiver Dan Sheldon for a 60-yard touchdown pass.

“I think coming out and getting the big pass to Danny [Sheldon] there at the beginning of the third got [CMU] to back out a little bit, because he is certainly a threat,” Novak said.

The scoring continued after CMU’s Anthony Tyus Jr. fumbled the ensuing kickoff, giving the Huskies possession at the Chippewas’ 27-yard line. Garrett Wolfe later scored one of his four touchdowns in the game to give NIU a 21-3 lead.

“I wish the game ended at halftime,” CMU coach Brian Kelly said. “The third quarter was the key quarter. Northern Illinois came up with the big play, obviously, with the double post.”

Wolfe also scored the final touchdown of the third quarter for NIU.

Kelly was not happy with the way his team reacted to the quick start by the Huskies and gave some of the credit to Novak’s halftime words.

“Our football team, when they were faced with adversity for the first time, did not respond in the way that a good football team needs to respond,” Kelly said.

“Let’s not take anything away from Northern Illinois’ execution in the third quarter. Coach Novak probably had a nice halftime talk and those boys came out and played very, very well and put the game out of reach for us.”