MAC Football

MAC Basketball

The View: Northern Illinois brought in another fine class under Coach Joe Novak as he welcomes 20 players from six different states. Most NIU experts believe that this class may be even better than Northern’s highly touted 1997 class which included Ryan Diem and Justin McCareins, both of which are now in the NFL. NIU signed six of the top 20 players in Wisconsin and did very well in their native Chicago area. Noah Washington is an impact player on the O-laine. This JUCO All-American was highly recruited and should start this fall. The RBs in this class are phenomenal. Take a look at these guys; Adrian Davis - 3,422 rushing yards and 5,742 career yards; AJ Harris – speester recruited by Illinois, Purdue & CMU; and Ken West an explosive runner recruited by Illinois, Minnesota & South Carolina. The defensive linemen in this class are very strong in Jasen McDonald, Mychael McKay, Eric Pittman and Indiana transfer Steve Williams. Although Williams will sit out this season, take note that he was regarded as a top-10 college prospect in all of the Midwest out of high school and had offers from Michigan and Florida State. The skilled perimeter players in this class all have great speed and game breaking abilities. Keep your eye on Travis House, a highly recruited player from Texas who turned down Arizona, UCF, Houston and Iowa State to become a Huskie. Also, this class may get even better if Tim Brasic from Riverside, Illinois signs with NIU. At the time of this publication, Brasic gave a verbal to Minnesota, but did not commit on national signing day. He is rumored to be joining NIU for both football and basketball and if that is true, this could really become the school’s best class ever.

Analysis: NIU has continued to bring in some high quality classes since Novak arrived in DeKalb six years ago. Once again Northern has beaten out Big Ten and Big Twelve schools for wonderful talent from Wisconsin and the Chicago area to fill needs with high impact players. I love this class and rate it as OUTSTANDING. Also, I will go on record to say that Novak might be right that this class could even be better than his 1997 class, which was widely considered to be in the national top-50 that year. If QB Tim Brasic does in fact sign with the Huskies, NIU will be a major contender to the win the MAC over the next few years.