Phillips' departure rough for NIU

As if Northern Illinois University president John Peters didn't have enough on his plate, now he must find an athletic director.

On the same day Peters announced the decision to demolish Cole Hall, the site of the Feb. 14 killings at NIU, word got out that athletic director Jim Phillips would indeed take the same job at Northwestern.

It's no shock, since the Daily Herald reported last week that Phillips had been offered the job weeks ago and that NIU had gone overboard to try to keep Phillips.

But most of the NIU folks we spoke with in the last week weren't optimistic that Phillips would stay.

Tuesday night, when the men's basketball team played in the first event on campus in two weeks, the air was thick with talk that Phillips was a goner. But no one wanted it to overshadow the contest, and Phillips had little to say as he sat in the stands with a Mid-American Conference official.

That he would leave the MAC for the Big Ten isn't stunning, but it flies in the face of everything Phillips has said for the last 3½ years about finding coaches who want to remain at NIU and trying to sell Northern as a destination, not a stopover.

And it's demoralizing for NIU after everything the campus has been through the past two weeks.

Just as NIU alumni were beginning to believe Northern could become the kind of university others envy, its most high-profile leader departs for what he obviously believes are greener pastures.

It is a punch in the gut for a university already reeling.

But NIU's loss is a spectacular gain for the Wildcats, who will surely reap the benefits of Phillips' amazing fund-raising capabilities, and they can expect improved athletic facilities right around the corner.

No one can begrudge Phillips a chance to improve his lot in life, not to mention moving his family a little closer to Chicago, from whence he came.

But most thought his dream move would be to Illinois, his alma mater, with Ron Guenther expected to leave after 2010, or perhaps Notre Dame somewhere down the line.

Sources at Northern Illinois tell us NIU was matching virtually whatever NU was offering, and in some ways even more, so salary couldn't have been much of an issue.

If it's quality of life, well, Iowa football coach Kirk Ferentz often says that there's something to be said for a 30-second commute, a lifetime of good will and job security. It's why Ferentz has, at least for now, refused to uproot his family from the peace and quiet of Iowa City for the guaranteed misery of the NFL.

Look, we're not comparing Evanston and NU athletics to New Jersey and the Jets, because Phillips will be extremely comfortable in his new surroundings. But Phillips will be thought of as a savior at NU, and there will be some pressure to succeed athletically.

The good news is he will have resources that he never could have dreamed of having at NIU, which is in the process of raising money for an indoor practice field.

Still, with the Huskies he did have lifetime security, and he would have always been looked at as a hero for his terrific work in upgrading the NIU athletic facilities, regardless of how the teams performed.

The reality, however, is that even if he hadn't taken the NU job, the phone was going to keep ringing and eventually he was going to hear an offer he couldn't refuse.

As for the timing of this move, you have to believe Phillips already made his decision and told NU he was coming, just as NIU was hit with the most horrific of tragedies.

This likely only delayed the announcement by two weeks, and assuming that's the case, Phillips couldn't go back on his word even if the events of Feb. 14 made him rethink his choice.

In the meantime, Phillips was a rock of stability and leadership during the NIU crisis, and his tenure there will be defined more by his extraordinary presence during and after the shootings than by anything he built or his decision to leave.

That, in and of itself, should allow him to leave NIU a hero, despite the unfortunate timing of his departure.

It's a good day for Northwestern athletics.

And it's back to the drawing board, again, for NIU.