Dave Schrage hopes the NIU baseball team can continue with its early-season success. After sweeping Tennessee-Martin in the three-game series last weekend, the Huskies will face Murray State in another three-game series starting Friday. The sweep over...

Dave Schrage said if the NIU baseball team was going to win games this season, it would be because the infield played great defense. In the first series of the season, the Huskie defense was to the coach's liking as NIU swept Tennessee-Martin in the three-game...

Sycamore Speedway owner Joe Fabrizius remembers the Alabama Gang, a group of NASCAR racers who came to the Rockford Speedway in their 20s, with a combination of talent and love for the sport of auto racing. He remembers watching the group of southern...

I remember when I was a kid my dad told me great stories about Ernie Banks, Minnie Minoso and the Chicago baseball teams of the 1960s. He always said that baseball and life were a lot simpler in those days and that athletes weren't paid much more than...

NBA All-Star Weekend was a pure indication of The Good, The Bad and The Ugly of professional basketball. The weekend kicked off with the Rookie vs. Sophomore game featuring Wally Szczerbiak's flame-throwing act of 11-of-13 shooting from the field, and...

NIU baseball coach Dave Schrage said the Mid-American Conference has a lack of respect for the Huskies. Even though the Huskies finished 24-33 last season and in third place in the MAC West Division after a 4-51-1 season the year before, the MAC responded...

Dan Badgley could not stand the fact he went from a sure Major League Baseball draftee to not being drafted at all. The fact that he did not get drafted last season has added fuel to the fire this season in his quest to be the best pitcher in the Mid-American...

Picking a single player as NIU's biggest football recruit may be a bit difficult. Of the 19 players head coach Joe Novak signed Wednesday on the first official day recruits could commit, all could make an impact on the program. California junior-college...

The fall semester produced 85 student athletes with grade-point averages above 3.5 — each winning recognition from a phone-service provider. Each year, student athletes from select schools are honored by Verizon Telecommunications for their academic...

Kirby Puckett's name is synonymous with baseball, but what if he chose a career on the basketball hardwood instead? Twenty years ago, NIU associate athletic director Robert Collins put to rest any of those thoughts for the Hall of Famer. As the varsity...

Sports Editor Walt Owens keeps a stack of pictures in his desk. Not just of his family, like his son, Mel, who played football for the St. Louis Rams and now works for the XFL. "It was nice watching my son turn pro," he said. Nor is the stack limited...

Sports Reporter While the NIU football program celebrated its first winning season in a decade, it lost a member of the Huskie football family last month. Former NIU Hall of Fame player Bob Fowlie, 74, died in Carrollton, Ga. As a two-sport athlete for...