The NIU football team plays its home finale, season finale, and final game in the Mid-American Conference on Friday when it hosts Kent State.

The Huskies enter 3-8 and 2-5 in the MAC, on track to be their worst season since a 3-9, 2-6 campaign in 2022.

Kent State, after a winless 2024 season, is 4-7 this year and 3-4 in the MAC. The Huskies have won 12 of the last 13 matchups. The Flashes won in 2021, but the Huskies turned around and won a few weeks later in the MAC championship game, winning what will go down as coach Thomas Hammock’s only MAC title.

Kickoff is at 11 a.m. on CBS Sports Network. Here are three things to know.

Final MAC game not a concern for Hammock, players

After 38 years in the MAC and the last 29 in a row, the Huskies are playing their final game as members of the league. They’ll be joining the Mountain West Conference for football next year and the Horizon League for most other sports.

Hammock said he hasn’t really had time to process what it means to him.

“It’s such an evolving landscape, so many moving parts, you’re just trying to find ways to create an advantage for your program,” Hammock said. “That’s been more on my mind than anything else.”

NIU’s latest stint in the league started in 1997. They were also in the league from 1975 until 1985.

The players said it wasn’t too much on their minds either. Senior transfer running back Chavon Wright said even though he just transferred in this year, he liked the idea of the program moving to a high-level conference.

Quinn Urwiler, a senior linebacker from Batavia, said he hadn’t given too much thought to being a part of the Huskies’ final MAC game either but also liked the thought of the team being a part of the Mountain West next year.

“You need to do whatever you can as a university to keep the culture and keep guys wanting to be here,” Urwiler said. “I think it’s a great move for NIU to represent what our brand of football is.”

Discipline is toughness

Although it’s been a rough year for the Huskies in almost every way, a couple of bright spots have been from statistical categories that require discipline.

NIU ranks in the Top 15 nationally in both turnovers lost and fewest penalties. The Huskies have committed 49 penalties, tied for 15th in the nation. And the 10 turnovers they’ve lost have them tied with 13 other teams for 14th nationally.

Hammock said discipline is toughness.

“To be disciplined in those areas in a form of toughness in my opinion,” Hammock said. “We just have to get better and more efficient in other areas. ... We are a disciplined program. We do things the right way, the hard way. We just haven’t made enough plays in other areas.”

Urwiler said the discipline is something the coaching staff has instilled into the players constantly.

“Quinn and I were just talking in the back there, and he said we might be one of the best 3-8 teams ever,” Wright said. “That’s just a testament to the coaches. That’s the standard. The ball is the program. If you jump offside in practice, you might get taken out. And that translates to the game.”

Quarterback still to be determined

At his press conference Friday, Hammock said the quarterback situation was still up in the air. Jalen Macon has started the last two games despite still recovering from an injured throwing hand.

In his first start, Macon led the Huskies’ best offensive performance of the year against a winless UMass team, but last week he was 1-for-7 for 5 yards against Western Michigan in a 35-19 loss. Brady Davidson was 5-for-8 for 73 yards and a touchdown late in the game.

The Huskies are 132nd out of 134 teams nationally in passing offense and 128th in scoring offense at 15.8 points per game.