The next two weeks will mark a subtle but significant shift in the landscape around NSU athletics.

It’s the last few days in Natchitoches for Tommy Hazlewood and Julie Lessiter.

Their departures are surprising only because they’ve become fixtures due largely to their love of Northwestern and in particular NSU athletics. Both arrived in the early 1990s, Tommy from Loranger in southeast Louisiana, and Julie from Southampton, southwest of London.

They’re that different, too. But in their own distinct styles, on very different paths, they have been part of the heart and soul of Demon sports for all of their adult lives.

These are talented people who could have chased more lucrative opportunities elsewhere long before now. Somebody will replace them, but it’s going to be nearly impossible to fill their shoes.

These are people who bleed purple.

Julie has three degrees from NSU, and finished magna cum laude as an undegraduate. Tommy took basically all of Bill Clinton’s presidency to get his undergraduate degree in journalism ? because he was too busy working, and having fun all the while, not because he wasn’t smart enough to finish faster.

Lessiter will depart her position as the academic advisor for athletics, assistant tennis coach (see the above photo, she’s the one on the left) and her role as the senior woman administrator, responsible for helping manage NSU’s compliance with Title IX issues while also steering the Student Athlete Advisory Committee. That lengthy sentence hardly does justice to her importance in athletics.

If you asked nearly any of the young men and women who have competed for NSU since she took on her job, they would probably list Julie in the top five of “most influential people” who helped them succeed during their undergraduate days. She has encouraged them all, challenged those who needed a push, helped those who needed a hand.

Julie goes the extra mile. And she runs it, too.

There haven’t been many three-sport athletes in modern-day NSU athletics, but Lessiter came over from England as a tennis player and became a competitive cross country athlete and distance runner on the track team. In recent years, she’s emerged as a regionally-respected triathlete, winning an event in Oklahoma City.

She’s relocating to the Shreveport-Bossier area where she’s changing career paths utilizing her third degree from NSU, business education with a concentration in marketing. Wednesday the 23rd is her last day here. It's a couple of days after the President's annual State of the Union address, which hasn't often resonated through our country as much as Julie's words have among our student-athletes.

As for Hazlewood, he’ll have been in New Orleans for more than a week by then, working for Cox Sports Television after being the man behind N-Side Demon Sports and much more NSU sports television programming for about 10 years now. It goes way, way past the duties of producer and director and cameraman ? this has been a labor of love for Tommy, who is one of the most avid Northwestern supporters we could ever hope to have.

His job has given him the chance to see every football game and many, many basketball games over the past decade. That doesn’t explain why he’s made countless road trips and hardly ever missed a home game for the Demon softball team, and was a charter member of the Outfield Club, and spearheaded getting a deluxe grandstand behind the left-centerfield wall.

Any time you’ve seen highlights of NSU teams or athletes on regional or even national TV, chances are that Tommy was responsible. His support of NSU, and all other local sports, is unconditional. His friendship, as many fellow Demon fanatics and others can attest, is boundless.

I am sure Tommy will scoff at being compared to Julie, thinking he’s not worthy. And she will laugh at being linked to Tommy, knowing his playful side. But they have so much in common ? a love for NSU chief among them, but also the qualities of unselfishness, loyalty, dedication and a commitment to excellence, along with quite a biting sense of humor that gets applied any time the opportunity exists.

We’re lucky to have had them both on our team.