March 02--DEKALB- Rod Carey has his starting quarterback in place, unlike this time last year.
With spring practice slated to begin a 6:50 a.m Tuesday, junior Drew Hare is the proven incumbent after winning the starting job a quarter of the way through last season.
Hare completed 194 of 326 passes (59.5 percent) for 2,322 yards and 18 touchdowns. He had just two interceptions. Hare also rushed for 900 net yards and 8 TDs.
"It's a good thing," Carey said Monday, even though he doesn't want any of his players to feel too comfortable.
"Drew obviously grew a lot last year. He will be the first one to tell you- so I am not speaking out of school here--that he's got improvement to do. He has to get better. He is not satisfied with where he was at the end of last year. He wants to move forward. And he already has, from what I have heard and what I have seen in the weight room. But it is obviously a good thing to have your quarterback back."
The Huskies are coming off an 11-3 season and their third Mid-American Conference championship in four years. But a 52-23 loss to Marshall in the Boca Raton Bowl ended the season on a sour note.
"Coming off the bowl game, I'm a broken record and I'm sick of it. I've had enough," Carey said. "We have a bad taste in our mouth. We didn't play well enough in that game. I give Marshall a lot of credit. I am not taking anything away from them. They are a good football team.
"But as I look at that game, we had an opportunity in the first half with five trips in the red zone to have only 13 points. Really that was the story of the game."
Still, NIU remains the winningest FBS program in Illinois and in the MAC over the last decade. The Huskies have played in seven consecutive bowl games.
"Looking back on the entire year, I am very proud of the fact that we won the MAC. I am very proud of the group that we had last year that was able to achieve that," Carey said. "They said that was what they wanted and eventually backed their words up with their actions by how they went about doing their business. So it was overall a really good year, a great year. I don't know how you could say it any other way. It was a great year."
Extra points: The Huskie Bowl instrasquad game will be held 2 p.m., April 11...Carey said wide receiver/kick returner Chad Beebe, who suffered a broken arm in the MAC Championship game last December "is almost completely healed." Wide receiver/kick returner Tommy Lee Lewis, who was red-shirted last season because of injury, was recently cleared to fully train with the team...NIU will be headed to Columbus, Ohio, to face defending national champion Ohio State on Sept. 19. "UNLV is the only thing we will talk about," Carey said of the Huskies' season-opening opponent.
fmitchell@tribpub.com
Huskies own winningest program in the MAC over past decade
