Everyone makes mental errors.

From adding 93+78 wrong in your head, to forgetting to pay your bills on time, mental errors are a part of life.

But for 60 minutes on Saturday, college football head coaches demand that their players eliminate mental errors.

Yet this wasn’t the case for NIU this weekend as it lost to Western Michigan by a score of 29-26.

“The only thing is we made some mistakes at some crucial times,” NIU head coach Jerry Kill said. “You got to score every time you get in the red zone, you got to do all the little things.”

The Huskies (0-2 overall, 0-1 MAC) originally benefited from mental mistakes, as the Broncos (1-1, 1-0) allowed a 45 yard flee-flicker – in a cover three – on the first play of the game.

“The thing that bothers you is you’re in a three deep coverage when that happened,” WMU head coach Bill Cubit said. “That shouldn’t happen.”

However, NIU couldn’t escape the mental lapses, as it failed to score after another WMU error. Huskie quarterback Dan Nicholson failed to convert a third-and-nine on the WMU 19. But NIU received new life on a first down due to a roughing the passer penalty on the Broncos.

With a fresh set of downs at WMU’s nine yard line, NIU failed to score any points. After three plays, NIU was forced to kick a field goal. However, a botched snap prevented the kick to even be attempted.

Other mental mistakes for the Huskies included a fumble on third-and-goal from WMU’s one yard line, a defensive offside penalty on a play where the Huskies picked off Bronco quarterback Tim Hiller and turnovers.

Yet the biggest mental error for NIU came on an on side kick with 40 seconds left in the game.
The Huskies had just scored a touchdown, driving 80 yards in 1:48. Down by three, NIU prepared to give its offense a chance.

Four seconds later, the Huskies had recovered the kick. Yet, the refs waived it as no good while the players were still celebrating. The Huskies, forced to kick again, couldn’t recover their second attempt.

The reason why the kick was called back was because NIU wasn’t aligned correctly, as it didn’t have four players on one side of a hash – a mental error.

“One of the guys was not aligned. It was a good call,” Kill said. “That’s a mental error. A week ago we didn’t make a lot of mental errors, we made some mental errors tonight.”

However, NIU linebacker Tim McCarthy is sure that his team can learn from this game and be ready in two weeks for their next contest.

“We know we have a good team,” McCarthy said. “We have to put this behind us and keep working to Indiana State.”

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