Saturday afternoon in Philadelphia, the NIU football team ended up on the wrong side of history.

Despite not letting the Owls score an offensive touchdown, the Huskies missed two extra points, and lost 16-15, giving Temple its first ever MAC victory.

“You tell me that our defense doesn’t give up a touchdown, I’m feeling real good and that’s what they did today,” head coach Joe Novak said. “It was enough for me, but we couldn’t generate enough on offense.”

NIU starting quarterback Dan Nicholson left the game early in the fourth quarter with an ankle injury, leaving it up to backup quarterback Ryan Morris to lead a Huskie comeback midway through the fourth quarter.

However, Morris didn’t have to do much as running back Justin Anderson gained 68 of his 163 yards on a 95-yard drive that culminated with a 39-yard Anderson touchdown run. But for the second time in the game, Lou Groza Award candidate Chris Nendick missed an extra point, and NIU was up 15-13.

“The first one was a high snap, a real high snap. [Jeff] Fontana did a great job getting it down and Chris just couldn’t get a really good kick on it,” Novak said.

“The second one, I don’t know what happened. It looked good, but I don’t know what happened. It’s a shame two missed extra points were the difference in the game.”

The NIU offense failed to run out the clock and the Owls got the ball back at their own 22-yard line with 3:47 left. After three third-down conversions, kicker Jake Brownell hit a 39-yard field goal with nine seconds left to give Temple the win.

“The quarterback made a couple crucial plays here today, a couple passes, a couple scrambles,” Novak said about Temple quarterback Adam DiMichele.

“You know, we didn’t do a terrible job today against them, but he got them when he needed them.”

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