DEKALB, ILL. - Former Drake football player and assistant coach Dave Doeren, who served as an assistant coach at Wisconsin since 2005, has been hired as the new head football coach at Northern Illinois, the school announced this week.

Doeren succeeds Jerry Kill, who was hired as Minnesota's coach.

A Badgers assistant since 2005, Doeren served as defensive coordinator and linebacker coach since 2008.

A native of Shawnee Mission, Kan., he was a four-year football letterwinner at Drake (1990-93), where he was named to the second team of the 1993 GTE University Division Academic All-America team.

He worked as a Drake graduate assistant coach (1995-96) and the Bulldogs' defensive coordinator (1997) before coaching stints at Southern California, Montana and Kansas.