After losing two road games to Power 4 teams, the NIU football team returns home Saturday to take on San Diego State.

The Huskies enter off a 38-10 loss at Mississippi State despite trailing only 14-10 at halftime. The Aztecs (2-1) crushed Cal 34-0, their second shutout of the season.

The Huskies are 0-6 all-time against the Aztecs including 0-3 in DeKalb. SDSU won the last meeting 34-28 in San Diego in 2017. In 2016, the Aztecs won 42-28 in DeKalb. The teams also played four times between 1967 and 1971.

Here are three things to know about the game.

Hammock: Offensive line play trending upward

Coach Thomas Hammock said the offensive line has been a huge positive for the team so far, especially considering the line features three walk-ons (Landon Hron, A.C. Curry and Izzy Ozoh) and a Division II transfer (Aidan Tweedy).

Against the Bulldogs, quarterback Josh Holst was sacked once, and Hammock said that was because Holst ran out of bounds. They gave up two sacks in each of the first two games of the year.

“So we played an SEC opponent, very minimal pressure, and we ran the ball at a decent clip,” Hammock said. “We lost 130 starts from last year, and those guys are giving us a chance to be really, really good.”

As a team, the Huskies averaged 4.6 yards per carry in the loss to the Bulldogs. They’re averaging 3.9 per carry on the year.

Hammock gave credit to offensive line coach Luke Meadows, now in his second year in the program.

“What has worked? Coaching has worked,” Hammock said. “We’ve evaluated, we’ve developed, we’ve coached them, and they’re doing what they’re supposed to do. If I were a coach at another university, I would ask, ‘Who’s their offensive line coach at NIU? ... He’s doing a phenomenal job coaching those guys up.’ ”

Hron also credited Meadows and said that the group trusts each other, and that shows up on the field.

“We have seven guys that have been playing, and I think the biggest thing is whether I have Tommy [Paasch] or Tweedy or A.C., we all trust each other and we trust what Meadows says,” Hron said. “It works great.”

Tough early schedule for the Huskies

In addition to the loss in Starkville, the Huskies lost 20-9 at Maryland on Sept. 5. The Bulldogs and Terps are a combined 8-0 this year and feature two of the best defenses in the country. The Bulldogs are 16th in scoring defense nationally. The Terps are 13th.

Now the Aztecs and their 17th-ranked scoring defense head to Huskie Stadium.

Hammock said it’s a great early schedule, helping prevent a false sense of security if you’re putting up points against weaker teams.

Nickelback Ty Myles said the last two games have proved how tough the Huskies are.

“When we played Maryland, we played with them for three quarters. Obviously we’d like to finish that, but playing against a Big Ten opponent and playing with them for three quarters is really big-time,” Myles said. “Versus Mississippi State we played a half, worse than Maryland, but Mississippi State, that was a really good football team. And I liked we played with them for that first half. Have to do better obviously in the second half.”

MAC play starts Oct. 4 against Miami, ranked 123rd in scoring defense.

Third-down troubles for offense

Against the Bulldogs, the Huskies completed one of their nine third-down attempts in the game. They’ve converted 28.3% of third-down attempts, which ranks them 128th out of 134 FBS teams.

Only three of the nine third downs the Huskies faced were shorter than 10 yards, the shortest a third-and-6 they faced in the fourth quarter. Their average distance to go was 10.4 yards. Their lone turnover of the game was on a third down.

“We have to be better on first and second down,” Hammock said. “We have to be in manageable situations on third down to be more efficient and effective.”