You might be surprised to learn that Northern Illinois has the longest current winning streak in all of FBS football right now. Northern Illinois has won nine straight games heading into this season. The Huskies won the MAC Championship and their bowl game in Dave Doeren\u2019s first season as their coach. <\/p>\n
MAC 2012-2013 College Football Previews: Northern Illinois
\nHead Coach: Dave Doeren
\n2011 Record: 11-3
\nNorthern Illinois Gambling Odds from JustBet to win BCS Championship: (Part of Field) +1,800
\nNorthern Illinois Gambling Odds from 5Dimes to win MAC: +600
\nNorthern Illinois Gambling Odds from 5Dimes to win MAC West: +260<\/strong>
\nNIU Team Page \u2013 Players Stats \u2013 Roster \u2013 2012 Schedule \u2013><\/a><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\nDoeren\u2019s team lost a bunch of key players after last season, so repeating as MAC champions won\u2019t be an easy task. Still, Northern Illinois has built up a nice reputation for winning; and these plays are supremely confident. How will the team respond to losing star quarterback Chandler Harnish? He was the team\u2019s heart and soul last season. Let\u2019s take a look at this year\u2019s roster for the Huskies.<\/p>\n
Team Strengths:<\/h3>\n
The secondary is the strength of the defense, and maybe even the biggest strength of the entire team. Five starters return in this group, led by star Jimmie Ward. Ward plays the safety\/nickel spot for the Huskies, and he is a real play maker at the back of the defense. The Huskies feel good about their depth at every single spot in the secondary, which is a huge plus in case injuries occur throughout the year.<\/p>\n
While he can\u2019t be expected to put up Harnish-type numbers, Jordan Lynch should be very good for Northern Illinois at quarterback. Lynch is an even better runner than Harnish, and the coaches really like what they\u2019ve seen from him in the passing game during the offseason.<\/p>\n
There are tons of pass catchers for this Huskies team. Northern Illinois has two very good tight ends to go along with their terrific group of wide receivers. On the outside, wideouts Martel Moore and Perez Ashford can make big plays out of almost nothing. [soliloquy id=”82219″]<\/p>\n
Team Weaknesses:<\/h3>\n
As good as the running game has been in the past few years, there is some real concern about the offensive line this season. Four senior leaders from the line graduated after 2011, and Northern Illinois is going to have a ton of inexperience in this all-important position. If Northern Illinois can\u2019t keep its terrific running game going, they will definitely take a step backward.<\/p>\n
Northern Illinois needs to get a better pass rush this year. They got in some major shootouts last year because they weren\u2019t disruptive enough in the backfield. This team won\u2019t score as many points as last year, which means they are going to need the defense to tighten it up a little bit this season.<\/p>\n
2012-2013 Northern Illinois Football Prediction: 9-4<\/h3>\n
There is no dominant team in the MAC West this year. Ohio looks like the best team in the MAC overall, but Northern Illinois doesn\u2019t have to play them in the regular season. The season opener at Soldier Field against Iowa will be a great test of where this team is right now. Inside conference play, look for the game at Western Michigan in late October to be a battle for the top of the MAC West.<\/p>\n
A small step backward is likely here, especially since the offensive line is such a major concern heading into the 2012 season.<\/p>\n
2012 NIU Schedule<\/h3>\n
9\/1\/12\t 3:30 PM ET\tIOWA
\n9\/8\/12\t 7:00 PM ET\t TENMA
\n9\/15\/12\t 12:00 PM ET\t @ARMY
\n9\/22\/12\t TBD\tKANS
\n9\/29\/12\t 3:30 PM ET\tCMICH
\n10\/6\/12\t TBD\t @BALST
\n10\/13\/12\t 3:30 PM ET\tBUFF
\n10\/20\/12\t 12:00 PM ET\t @AKR
\n10\/27\/12\t 12:00 PM ET\t @WMICH
\n11\/3\/12\t 3:30 PM ET\tMASS
\n11\/14\/12\t 9:00 PM ET\tTOL
\n11\/23\/12\t TBD\t @EMICH<\/p>\nGRAB OUR BEST Expert CFB Picks for 2012 NCAA FOOTBALL Betting! \u2014\u2013><\/strong><\/a><\/h3>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
2012-13 Football Previews \u2013 (MAC) \u2013 NIU You might be surprised to learn that Northern Illinois has the longest current winning streak in all of FBS football right now. Northern Illinois has won nine straight games heading into this season. The Huskies won the MAC Championship and their bowl game in Dave Doeren\u2019s first season […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":190,"featured_media":25390,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[44530,56043,49957,50743,51097,50553,50518,50519,56059,50739,50740,4305,50742],"class_list":["post-53808","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ncaa-football","tag-2012-bcs-lines","tag-2012-mac-conference-football-previews","tag-bcs-sportsbook-odds","tag-huskies-bcs-futures","tag-huskies-predictions","tag-mac-conference-football-predictions","tag-mac-conference-odds","tag-mac-conference-picks","tag-northern-illinois-football","tag-northern-illinois-football-predictions","tag-northern-illinois-gambling-odds","tag-northern-illinois-huskies","tag-northern-illinois-schedule"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53808","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/190"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53808"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53808\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53959,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53808\/revisions\/53959"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25390"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53808"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53808"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/capperspicks.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53808"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}