Rutgers fires Kyle Flood, AD Julie Hermann

The Rutgers Scarlet Knightsfired football coach Kyle Flood and athletic director Julie Hermann on Sunday, the school announced.

"Kyle Flood has been a loyal and dedicated member of our community for more than a decade and our head football coach for four seasons, during which his teams won 26 games and played in three bowl games," school president Robert Barchi said in a statement. "However, our continued struggles on the field combined with several off the field issues have convinced me that we need new leadership of our football program."'

Rutgers also announced that it had hired Pat Hobbs as the school's new athletic director. Hobbs was the interim athletic director at Seton Hall from 2009 to 2011.

Flood, who has gone 27-24 since becoming head coach in 2012, had said he believed his job was safe after the Scarlet Knights ended a tumultuous 4-8 season with a 46-41 loss toMarylandon Saturday.

"Nobody's given me any indication that I wouldn't be the football coach," Flood told NJ.com after the Scarlet Knights surrendered a 21-point first-half lead Saturday. "I get those questions, and I think the shame of those types of questions is they lead other people to believe that there's some question about it. To my knowledge, there's no question about it.

"I'm the head football coach. I've been here for four years now. We've won the only conference championship in the history of this program. We won the only Lambert Cup in the history of this program. We've gone to three bowl games in four years. And I fully expect to be the head coach here for a long time.''

He went 4-12 in conference games, including a 1-7 mark this season, since Rutgers joined the Big Ten in 2014.

Flood was suspended three games earlier this season for emailing a professor and later scheduling an in-person meeting to discuss the academic standing of former Scarlet Knights defensive back Nadir Barnwell.

In addition, seven Rutgers players were arrested this season for offenses varying from home invasion to assault.

Hermann took over as athletic director in 2013 after the Mike Rice scandal led to Tim Pernetti's firing.

Rutgers is the fourth Big Ten school in the past 13 months to get rid of the football coach and the athletic director, joining Minnesota, Illinois and Michigan.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.