After seven seasons leading the Northern Illinois University football program, head coach Thomas Hammock has resigned to return to a coaching position in the National Football League, NIU Vice President/Director of Athletics and Recreation Sean T. Frazier announced on Wednesday.

“Representing the Cardinal and Black of Northern Illinois University as a player, alumnus, assistant coach, and head coach has been the honor of my life,” Hammock said in a statement. “To Sean Frazier, my mentor, thank you for the incredible opportunity to lead, guide, and mentor the young men in this program over the past seven years. I hope I have left a lasting impact on our players the way Coach Novak left one on me.

“These are exciting times for the Huskies as they enter the Mountain West Conference. I look forward to watching this team stay united, compete at a high level, and continue building under new leadership. I will always be proud to call NIU my alma mater, and I will always be cheering for the Huskies.”

Multiple online reports indicated that Hammock took a position with the Seattle Seahawks.

Frazier, who assumed sport administration duties for football in December, has promoted defensive coordinator Rob Harley to interim head coach.

Per NCAA rules, NIU players will get a 15-day window to enter the transfer portal starting five days after NIU announces its next head coach.

Hammock is 35-47 in seven years at NIU. The Huskies were 3-9 last year after making and winning bowl games in 2023 and 2024, the first back-to-back bowl wins since 2010 and 2011.

“This has always been my dream,” Hammock said in his NIU introductory press conference on January 19, 2019. “When I was a GA at Wisconsin [in 2003-04], I said I want to be the head coach at Northern Illinois University, because I knew what Coach [Joe] Novak did for me, and I want to do the same for others. It’s an unbelievable feeling to have the opportunity to come home to a place that I love, to the school that has meant so much to me.”

This will leave the Huskies looking for a new coach about a month before the start of spring practices, which had not been announced yet. Last year, they began on March 24 and generally begin in late March each year.

The new coach will also have to navigate the team’s move into the Mountain West. The Huskies were to begin play in the new conference beginning this fall. The schedule has not been announced yet.

Home and away opponents were set, but that was before the league announced earlier this month the addition of North Dakota State as a football-only member starting in the 2026 season.

Hammock was the first Black head coach in NIU history and the first graduate to lead the program at the FBS level. Before taking over in 2019, he was the running backs coach with the Baltimore Ravens.

NIU was his first head coaching job. He went 5-9 in his first season, then 0-6 using an incredibly young roster in the COVID-shortened 2020 season.

With most of those same players, the Huskies won the MAC title in 2021, going 9-5 and losing the Cure Bowl.

Injuries derailed the 2022 season, and the Huskies went 3-9. They went 7-6 in 2023 and 8-5 in 2024 with a senior-heavy group.

The 2024 season included one of, if not the biggest, wins in program history when the Huskies defeated Notre Dame, 16-14. The Irish were ranked No. 5 at the time, and their only other loss that season was to Ohio State in the National Championship game.