New NIU football coach Doeren settling in

There's a stack of spiral-bound notebooks on Dave Doeren's new desk, a can't-miss pile in an otherwise barren office.

They're tattered and wrinkled. Some have pages falling out. Easy to ignore if they weren't one of the room's only attention catchers.

But to Northern Illinois' new football coach, they mean everything.

"This is Year 1 at (Kansas)," Doeren says, pointing to a few scribbles as he flips through the pages.

Doeren may be new at this head-coaching thing, but he didn't arrive at NIU unprepared. Throughout his career, Doeren says he's taken notes of every staff meeting. Over time, stack has become stacks, each one growing at rapid pace. The scribbles he pointed to are from Oct. 20, 2002.

Not all of Doeren's notebooks made the initial trip from his home in Wisconsin. The ones that did have been sitting on his desk since his first day on campus Tuesday, serving as reference points. They contain the knowledge of head coaches he's worked under and been around, from Barry Alvarez and Bret Bielema at Wisconsin to Mark Mangino at Kansas.

"I don't care what you do for a living, you should rely on other people that you respect to make decisions," Doeren said. "I know I'm not going to write the book on how to do this job. There's a lot of people who did it better before me. I've got to learn from those guys.

"I'm going to do it my way, but at the same time I'm going to try to educate myself ahead of time as much as I can."

Doeren's notebooks show he's a man who values being around the right people. That's why he's spent his first week on campus and half his time in Pasadena, Calif. – where he was Wisconsin's defensive coordinator during the 2011 Rose Bowl – interviewing assistant coaches.

Doeren already has added seven assistants to his staff, including offensive coordinator Matt Canada and defensive coordinator Jay Niemann. His first hire was Tom Matukewicz, who will remain NIU's linebackers coach after leading the Huskies to a 40-17 Humanitarian Bowl win against Fresno State on Dec. 18.

Matukewicz had the option to follow former coach Jerry Kill to Minnesota, a move that would've included a higher salary and Big Ten exposure. But he wanted to stay in DeKalb, and after he spoke with Doeren his decision was made.

"As it often does, it came down to the head man," Matukewicz said. "It didn't make a bunch of sense to go be a linebacker coach at Minnesota. When I talked to Dave, I really bought into what he was selling.

"We just talked about who he was as a coach. He's a guy who's worked from being a chef in a kitchen to working his way up the coaching ranks. To me, that's what embodies NIU. We're a bunch of people who've been told we're not good enough."

Doeren has filled his staff quickly, in part because he's thought for years who he'd want to hire when given the chance to be a head coach. Doeren said at his introductory news conference he had a depth chart of assistant coaches. He said Friday the assistants he's hired were near the top of that list.

Matukewicz, who met Doeren during a recruiting trip in Florida a few years ago, is the only assistant left from Kill's staff. In that sense, Doeren said Matukewicz is an important bridge to the way things were done before him.

"When I came from my press conference, I didn't have anticipation of keeping any of [Kill's assistants]," Doeren said. "Jerry, in the past, had taken people with him, so I assumed that wouldn't be an option with those guys leaving to a Big Ten school with more money.

"I flat-out asked [Matukewicz, 'Why wouldn't you want to go to the Big Ten and make more money?' He said, 'It's not about that for me. It's about getting better and growing as a person and a coach.' That showed me a lot about his values."

Doeren still has a lot of work to do. There are more assistants to hire, and more recruiting trips to make.

It's unchartered territory for a guy who never has run the whole show before. But Doeren said it won't be the first time he puts his stamp on his players.

"I've always looked at every part of what I do as my product," Doeren said. "When I was the linebackers coach, I was the head coach of the linebackers. When I was defensive coordinator, I was head coach of the defense. That's kind of how I've always approached the tasks that I've been handed.

"Now it's just 105 (players) instead of 10, or instead of 30 or 50."

One hundred and five players, and stacks of notebooks to help guide the way.