(12-05-2021 10:29 PM)jjj Wrote: Can someone cut and paste the article? One needs a subscription to read it.....
Here you go
DETROIT — In an empty hallway somewhere on the lowermost level of Ford Field, still riding the high of a conference championship win and a memorable worst-to-first season, the quarterback of the team few expected to be here was discussing it all, exactly where he’s supposed to be.
He had just spent the better part of 20 minutes making the rounds on the field for the postgame celebration. Posing for photos, grinning ear to ear. He couldn’t go 10 seconds without a teammate, coach or support staffer embracing him with a hug or a slap on the shoulder pads he had yet to remove.
Back in Michigan with some fresh hardware, Rocky Lombardi was the man of the hour.
“It’s been really fun,” Lombardi said with a smile after Northern Illinois’ 41-23 win over Kent State in the MAC championship game Saturday. “That’s the biggest part for me. I found a place, and I’ve had a great season.”
Lombardi is a prime example of a transfer portal success story. There’s something to be said for that. There aren’t too many instances of it working out quite like this, even though most players probably enter the portal expecting it to look like some version of Lombardi’s story. Truthfully, when he entered the portal almost a year ago, Lombardi wasn’t sure what his decision ultimately would lead to. He just realized it had to be done.
The 2020 season was, well, rocky for Lombardi. His previous school, Michigan State, had a new staff in place. The coaches arrived in mid-February, only to have the world shut down around them a month later. That meant no spring football, no in-person evaluations, no face-to-face time to install the playbook and a shortened fall camp. That time can be so valuable for players and coaches alike. Naturally, it led to some problems.
Michigan State went 2-5 last year. Lombardi was named the starter to begin the season and quarterbacked some of the highs of that season. He threw for 323 yards and three touchdowns in a 27-24 win over rival Michigan last fall. A month later, he helped MSU upset then-No. 8 Northwestern at home. But Lombardi had his share of struggles, too. He would be the first to admit that.
When the season ended, MSU was set to move forward with Payton Thorne and grad transfer Anthony Russo competing for the starting quarterback job. It became apparent that if Lombardi wanted a chance to play regularly, he would have to look around.
“Sometimes, in order to be a great sailor, you have to learn how to navigate rough seas,” said Tony Lombardi, Rocky’s father and a former MAC coach. “There’s a plan. But we don’t always know what that plan is.”
This was certainly true of Lombardi’s situation. He’s a competitor at heart. A 2017 recruit with two years of eligibility remaining, Lombardi felt he was capable of helping a team and a program, if given a chance to re-invent himself. So he entered the portal, unsure of what awaited him on the other side.
What followed was a search for the right fit and a new place to call home. The interest was out there. Lombardi had experience, starting a number of games in the Big Ten. That is enough to earn some phone calls. Some Power 5 programs, most notably UCLA, reached out hoping to take in Lombardi. A few others did, too.
But as he narrowed his choices, Lombardi kept going back to a shortlist of things he wanted out of his next stop.
“I had some offers from bigger schools than here,” Lombardi said. “But at the end of the day, I wanted to pick a spot where I felt like I could make an impact on a program. Not only on the team but on a program. I wanted to be somewhere that I could win a championship. I wanted to be somewhere that I could move people, where I could influence people’s lives.”
You’d be hard-pressed to find anyone at Michigan State who doesn’t like Lombardi. He has been viewed as a strong leader, a person players gravitated toward. After his first career start as a redshirt freshman in 2018, the Spartan Stadium crowd chanted his name as he led MSU to a victory over Purdue. His teammates did the same in the locker room after the game.
Mark Dantonio and the previous coaching staff at MSU thought highly enough of Lombardi’s character that he earned gameday captain honors as a backup during the 2019 season. During the 2020 season, he grew into more of a vocal role on behalf of the players — both in public and behind closed doors.
Lombardi believes his ability to lead is one of his best traits. That stayed in the back of his mind during his time in the portal. Ultimately, it was a pitch from NIU head coach Thomas Hammock that won over Lombardi.
“I explained to him what our team lacked,” Hammock said in September. “I told him very candidly, ‘If you don’t want to come here and provide the leadership and toughness we need at the quarterback position, you should go somewhere else.’”
“Basically what he told me was that we’re one quarterback and one leader away from a championship,” Lombardi said. “That right there was a pretty hard sell for me because one of my main three goals was to win a championship. I wanted to be a champion. And obviously, I’m a quarterback, and leadership is a strength of mine, so coming here was basically a no-brainer.”
In Northern Illinois, Lombardi found the fresh start he was looking for and a program that could be molded into a winner under Hammock. Of course, that was easier said than done. The Huskies were coming off of a winless season in six games in 2020. Hammock returned a roster that was the second youngest in the country. NIU was predicted to finish last in the MAC.
Throughout the offseason, however, Hammock and Lombardi discussed the state of the team and its chances of winning. Lombardi quickly came to realize that Hammock’s actions matched what he was sold over the phone when deciding on NIU. That wasn’t the case with every coach who contacted him out of the portal. The two saw eye-to-eye on a lot of things.
Lombardi always had played on teams with strong veteran leadership and older players who had been around the block. On this NIU team, he was that guy. He found himself in the weight room surrounded by players who were 18 and 19 years old. He realized he needed to lead, and Hammock did, too. He relied on Lombardi to set the tone for his young team.
“Rocky, do you think they believe?” Hammock asked his veteran quarterback at various points during the offseason, referring to the young team he was in charge of.
“I don’t know,” Lombardi would reply, “But we’ll get ’em there.”
It didn’t happen overnight, but it happened. Lombardi could see it coming together. Young players getting up to speed. Execution taking place in practice. It’s one of those feelings you sort of have to bottle up until the games begin and the lights come on. Show, don’t tell.
For this NIU team, the turnaround began early. Week 1, to be precise. That’s when the team traveled to Atlanta to face Georgia Tech. The Huskies were 18.5-point underdogs, but they sure didn’t play like it.
Trailing by a touchdown with less than a minute to play, Lombardi orchestrated a late-game scoring drive, connecting with running back Clint Ratkovich to make it 21-20, Georgia Tech. Decision time.
Uninterested in kicking the extra point and playing for overtime, Hammock opted to keep his offense on the field and go for the two-point conversion. With the game on the line, he put the ball in the hands of his transfer quarterback.
Lombardi took the snap, rolled to his right, directed traffic in the end zone and found wide receiver Tyrice Richie in the back of the end zone for the successful conversion. Final score: Northern Illinois 22, Georgia Tech 21.
“Once we got that first win, it just kept rolling,” Lombardi said. “You just need that taste of victory. Once you get that, you can just keep going from there.”
As the season went along, this team developed an identity. Offensively, these Huskies were built to run the ball. They rank fifth in the FBS in rushing yards per game with 231.5, averaging 44 carries. Lombardi has been asked to convert QB sneaks and read-options, keep the chains moving, carry the team with his arm when needed and even punt. During the season, Lombardi threw for a career-high 2,314 yards and 13 touchdowns with only eight interceptions and also ran for 390 yards and five touchdowns. NIU’s offense averaged 30.8 points per game — its highest mark since 2015.
This team is also known for its flair for the dramatic. NIU’s 2021 season was filled with tightly contested games and dramatic fourth-quarter wins, and Lombardi found himself at the forefront of it all.
A seven-point win over Eastern Michigan. A two-point win over Toledo. An eight-point win over Bowling Green. A pair of one-point victories over Central Michigan and Ball State and a six-point win over Buffalo in overtime. Time and time again, this team came through in the clutch.
All of those games worked in NIU’s favor and helped the Huskies finish 8-4 in the regular season and 6-2 in conference play, clinching a spot in the MAC championship game. Lombardi felt it was a product of the team’s collective buy-in, which he saw come together during the offseason.
“I think we’ve had three game-winning field goals, seven one-possession victories. I mean, it’s been unbelievable,” Lombardi said. “I feel like we gotta have a game-winning drive every week, which is obviously fun. At the end of the day, we know we can do it now. It just shows what kind of heart and belief this team has. It’s pretty special.”
It also keeps things interesting.
“They call us the Heart-Attack Huskies around here,” Lombardi said, laughing.
On Saturday in Detroit, with a conference title up for grabs, there was no need to live up to that nickname. It was fitting, considering NIU’s opponent, Kent State, handed the Huskies one of their two conference losses this season — a high-scoring affair that saw Lombardi throw a program-record 532 yards in a losing effort.
What was expected to be a tight rematch with the potential to go down to the wire turned into one of NIU’s most comfortable wins of the season, thanks to Lombardi and a ground game that had its way on Saturday.
NIU jumped out to a commanding 17-0 lead and carried it into halftime. While the game never felt like it would slip away, Kent State did have an opportunity to make things interesting in the fourth quarter. Trailing by 14 points, the Golden Flashes attempted to claw their way back into the game. NIU faced a third-and-15 from deep in its own territory. Without a conversion, Kent State would get the ball back with good field position and plenty of time left.
Instead, Lombardi completed one of the best throws of his season, slamming the window shut just as Kent State cracked it open.
That throw, and the catch by Trayvon Rudolph, kept the drive alive. The NIU offense continued on, working its way down to the red zone and eventually inside the 10. On a third-and-3 from the Kent State 5, Lombardi fooled the entire defense on a QB keeper and walked into the end zone for the easy score, putting his team up 31-10.
At that point, the team could feel it. Lombardi could, too.
This was a program win in every sense of the phrase. The defense held a Kent State offense averaging 38.5 points per game in conference play to just 23 points. The Huskies rushed for 266 yards on 61 carries, led by Jay Ducker’s 146 yards and a touchdown. Lombardi made the throws he needed to make and finished the game with three rushing touchdowns, with the NIU crowd even chanting his name late in the fourth quarter.
Hammock said this was everything he envisioned when those initial conversations with Lombardi took place last December. Hammock felt his team needed a quarterback and a leader away. He found both in Lombardi.
“Hopefully, he’s gotten as much from it as I have,” Hammock said. “Sometimes in the recruiting process, people tell you certain things, and they don’t stick to their word. Hopefully, he can leave our program saying everything that I told him was the truth, and we treated him that way. He’s come in and been a phenomenal leader, phenomenal man, a tremendous worker. We won this championship because he had a big part of it.”
On the field, all that was left was the celebration. Lombardi navigated the on-field scrum and posed for a group photo with his fellow quarterbacks and another with the entire team. He broke out a new MAC champion hat reserved for the victors of this game and never took it off.
After his fun on the field, Lombardi made his way to the NIU crowd that stuck around, dapping up friends and complete strangers in attendance who came to see him play. He then made his way to his father for a warm embrace and a pat on the head from the first row.
At 9-4, Northern Illinois is eyeing its first 10-win season since 2014. It’ll have a chance to get there with a win in its bowl game, and if it happens, this team will have gone from winless to double-digit wins. It has been a remarkable turnaround story, spearheaded by Hammock’s belief in his roster and Lombardi’s bet on himself and this NIU program. And they believe they’re just getting started.
Lombardi said he plans to use his extra year of eligibility and return to NIU for one final go-around in 2022. And why not? This team won the MAC with one of the youngest rosters in the sport. The Huskies won’t lose too many pieces from this year’s squad, and the expectation is that those young players will continue to develop and improve. That’s a scary thought for the rest of the conference, considering what we saw from NIU this season.
But that’s a conversation for another day. Right here, right now, Lombardi, now a champion, is enjoying his moment.
“My teammates and coaches and the fans have made it really fun for me, and that’s really what it’s all about,” Lombardi said. “You find a lot of football programs that work hard, that have some success. But they don’t really enjoy the process. We enjoy the process here. That’s what makes it fun. That’s what made our season so special.”
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The Athletic: How Rocky Lombardi found a home at Northern Illinois
