NIU coach Thomas Hammock assigns new coaching staff roles

Three members of the Northern Illinois University football coaching staff have been assigned additional responsibilities and coordinator roles within specific areas of the offense and defense, NIU head coach Thomas Hammock announced Thursday.

Tony Sorrentino, who will continue to serve as wide receivers coach, has added duties as the Huskies’ passing game coordinator; cornerbacks coach Dan Jackson has been named pass defense coordinator and running backs coach Nic McKissic-Luke also will serve as run game coordinator in 2021.

“After the season, I had the time to do a complete and thorough evaluation of every aspect of our program, including the coaching staff and roles within the staff,” Hammock said. “Throughout our team, we have the pieces in place to improve tremendously and as a staff there are ways we can get more production and better utilize our personnel by assigning these specific areas of responsibility.”

Sorrentino begins his third season on the NIU coaching staff in 2021. He coached the NIU wide receivers in 2020 after working with the tight ends in 2019. He will bring that experience coaching both positions at NIU to his role in coordinating the game plan for the NIU passing attack.

“The year that Tony coached the tight ends, they were our strongest position, then we moved him to receivers and they had a strong season,” Hammock said. “This gives him a great opportunity to grow and develop our passing game to the level where we can be very complementary with our running and passing offense.”

Jackson, who joined the Huskies’ staff last season and coached the cornerbacks while also serving as co-special teams coordinator, will retain those roles while concentrating on formulating the game plan for NIU versus the pass.

“Dan has shown with his work with our corners last year that he can be a lot more involved with the game-planning aspect and coordinating what we want to do on the back end of our defense,” Hammock said.

McKissic-Luke begins his second season as the NIU running backs coach and also will concentrate on game plan elements for the Huskie running game in 2021.

“Nic has a very thorough knowledge of the running game and how to create effective runs for the offense,” Hammock said. “His ability to put the ground game plan together will help Coach Eidsness a great deal and be big as we continue to move forward.”

Hammock said putting specific areas of the offensive and defensive game-planning in the hands of these coaches provides each with an area of expertise and helps the operation of the overall offense and defense moving forward.