New deal long time coming
April 19, 2004
NIU scored a great victory last Thursday by extending football coach Joe Novak’s contract.
NIU fans and administration should hold on to any coach who can take a team that went 3-29 over three seasons and turn it into a top team in the nation only five years later.
There’s no question about it: Novak is the single best coach NIU could have. So with this fact stated, why did the administration wait so long to offer him a decent contract extension?
Novak recruited the likes of Michael Turner, Steve Azar, P.J. Fleck, Randee Drew, Nick Duffy and countless others. Novak knows recruiting and finds quality athletes who evade surrounding Big Ten schools that have more money and larger, more impressive facilities.
Next year, for example, many are thinking NIU will flop without Turner. Novak’s solution? There is A.J. Harris, Adrian Davis, Garrett Wolfe, Cas Prime and others fighting to take Turner’s vacant spot.
After NIU basketball coach Rob Judson’s first season of coaching in 2001-2002, he received a raise. Judson took the reigns of a 5-23 team and turned it into a 12-16 team in his first year – an admirable feat.
Novak tied for first in the MAC the same year but didn’t receive a raise. In fact, Judson was the highest-paid coach at NIU until Novak’s raise on Thursday.
The point is not to compare Novak to Judson but to say that after losing an athletic director, defensive and offensive coordinator and several other football coaches to other, better-paying schools, NIU should have been twisting Novak’s arm to stay.
It’s about time Novak got a raise and contract extension because he’s given the university more publicity and money than it could get on its own.
The nationally spotlighted success of the NIU’s football team led to increased applications for fall 2004. And the attendance for games broke records last season, meaning more ticket sales for the university.
Novak deserves more than a pat on the back or a good word for the work he’s done in building a national football program. It’s about time he was shown the respect of one of the best coaches in the nation.
He’s been loyal to NIU and hasn’t accepted a better paying job elsewhere, and because of that the Huskies landed their biggest win of the year by getting Novak to stay for another four seasons.