A 1-3 team that’s a 22-point underdog on the road has made for quite a week of preparation for NIU football coach Joe Novak.

While fans see a one-win team, the coach sees an endless array of offensive misdirection and trickery that makes his head spin.

This is the mindset of a coach preparing for option offense.

“I hate it,” Novak said. “It’s my worst week as a coach. We only have two days to prepare for it, and it’s hard to simulate the speed in practice.”

The once-prominent offense used from coast to coast has died down in popularity in recent years, but a few teams, like NIU’s Ohio opponent this weekend, still use it.

The option is an offense based on running the football from a variety of formations using a variety of personnel.

One of the main formations is the wishbone.

This formation uses a fullback lined up right behind the quarterback. Two halfbacks then are split behind the fullback, usually 2 yards back, resembling a wishbone.

Ohio used nine different ball carriers with this offense during last week’s loss to Western Michigan.

“In option football, everyone touches the ball,” Ohio senior quarterback Fred Ray said. “If a guy gets hot, we find a way to get it to him.”

Ohio coach Brian Knorr said there are three phases to the option: the fullback, the quarterback and the pitch.

The fullback will take the ball right up the middle on a dive play.

But, if Ray doesn’t like what he sees up the middle, he can keep the ball and run parallel with the line of scrimmage until he finds a hole to run through. If this option fails, he can pitch to a running back who is just a few yards behind him.

This is the basis for the triple option.

“Option football is identifying the primary way of running the ball,” Knorr said.

Identifying that primary way rests on the shoulders of Ray.

The senior didn’t use the option in high school, but rapidly picked up the offense once he got into Knorr’s system.

Last year, Ray rushed for 355 yards and nine touchdowns, while completing 56 passes for 712 yards.

With all of the fakes, handoffs and pitches, Ray is in charge of making good decisions and keeping the ball off the ground.

“The key to the option is keeping the ball secured,” Ray said. “We’ve got to have good connections with the ball.”

Ray, who used another running formation in high school, the Power I, likes running the option, but doesn’t mind throwing every now and then.

“It’s a fun thing to run the option,” Ray said. “But it’s always fun to drop back and throw it down the field.”

Throwing is something Ohio does more than most option teams, but it doesn’t do it often.

The Bobcats rushed an average of 54 times a game last season. In five of Ohio’s 12 games, it attempted less than 10 passes.

Knorr got his offensive philosophy from Air Force, where he lettered three years as quarterback on a team that won four straight bowl games.

The styles of the two programs, Ohio and Air Force, are slightly different.

“The fundamental three positions are the same,” Knorr said. “We do more formations, and we throw it more than Air Force. No one does it as well as Air Force.”

Air Force and Ohio are two of the few remaining schools that use the triple option.

Nebraska won national championships in 1994, 1995 and 1997, but used the option out of the I formation, utilizing just two running backs instead of three.

Knorr sites the reduced number of scholarships as a reason for the decline of this once-prominent offense. With all the abuse the players, especially the quarterback, take, it’s hard for the players to stay healthy, Knorr said.

Novak said the option is a system in which it is hard to score points fast.

When a team gets down early, it is hard to catch up because its whole offense relies on running, not throwing.

“There is definitely a place for the option in college football,” Knorr said. “We take pride in running the football.”