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College Sports in the Carolinas
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from the East
Friday, March 5, 2004
By Al Myatt
ECU Beat Writer for The News &
Observer |
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No need for rush to action in
AD hire
©2004 Bonesville.net
The chancellor selection process at East Carolina, which will directly
impact the hiring of the school's athletics director, appears to be
drawing to a close.
Three candidates have visited the ECU campus this week and interim
chancellor Bill Shelton remains a possibility. Although he hasn’t been
through the formal search process, Shelton has previous experience as a
university CEO as president at Eastern Michigan. He has apparently handled
responsibilities in an effective manner at ECU as chancellor on an interim
basis since William Muse resigned on Sept. 12.
The three candidates from outside ECU’s present administration are Steve
Ballard, the provost at the University of Missouri-Kansas City; Janie M.
Fouke, dean of the college of engineering at Michigan State; and Roderick
McDavis, provost and vice president at Virginia Commonwealth.
It’s a diverse group. Ballard is a Caucasian male, Fouke is a Caucasian
female and McDavis is an African-American male. The ECU board of trustees
will submit a list of two or three candidates to University of North
Carolina system president Molly Broad, who will likely make her
recommendation to the system’s board of governors on March 19.
The AD search process was designed and timed to produce several candidates
for the new chancellor’s consideration once the top leadership position at
ECU was filled. The aim was to have a new AD in place for the summer.
The leaders after interviews off campus last weekend — in no particular
order — appear to be ECU alumnus Jeff Barber, director of the Gamecock Club
at South Carolina; Rick Hart, an assistant AD at Oklahoma and the son of
former ECU AD Dave Hart; Nick Floyd, interim AD at ECU; and Rick McDuffie,
an ECU graduate who is AD at Eastern Illinois.
Others who were interviewed for the ECU AD post include ECU Pirate Club
executive director Dennis Young, former Indiana AD Clarence Doninger,
Maryland assistant AD Joe Hull and Wichita State AD Jim Schaus.
There also apparently have been informal approaches made to the elder Hart
about returning to his former AD position with the Pirates. His price tag
likely would make him the highest paid employee in the history of ECU
athletics, which will probably rule such a move out based on financial
practicality.
Notice that there is not a Division I-A AD included in the pool of
candidates. Several of the AD search committee members have indicated they
were less than overwhelmed by the field of applicants, which leaves the
possibility that the chancellor may alter the process as it was designed to
go forward by the search committee.
It has been suggested that Floyd may be given the AD job with a
relatively-short contract, perhaps one year. That would allow the new
chancellor to evaluate his performance and develop a working relationship
with ECU’s present interim AD. Floyd could either receive an extended
contract or another search could be initiated to coincide with the
completion of Floyd’s term.
Rather than passively await a pool of applicants to indicate their interest
through submitted resumes, ECU could conduct a proactive search. Many
programs hire consulting firms to “headhunt” top candidates. A list of
objectives could be formulated and administrators with proven abilities in
those areas could be approached.
One vital area that was discussed with those interviewed last weekend was
how additional revenues might be generated for the ECU athletics department.
ECU’s present athletics budget of roughly $16 million is about half that of
Louisville’s, but Pirates fans expect their teams to compete on an equal
basis with the Cardinals.
One factor that has been cited as a deterrent in attracting a stronger field
of candidates is that AD applicants were unsure about whom they would be
working for with the pending hire of the chancellor. Shelton said he
disagreed with that line of thinking.
“There are only 117 of these Division I-A athletics directors jobs in the
country,” Shelton said. “That in itself makes these positions highly
coveted. I don’t think that was a factor that discouraged people from
pursuing the job.”
Bill D’Andrea, senior associate AD at Clemson, was among those who
apparently decided not to pursue the position on that basis. There were
probably others.
Floyd is in his third year as senior associate AD at ECU. He served
previously as an associate commissioner in Conference USA, where he was the
league’s chief financial officer for three years. He participated in
negotiating C-USA’s television contract and bowl ties. Floyd has said that
the desire of his wife, Elizabeth, to get to a warmer climate from that of
the C-USA office in Chicago was one factor that led him to accept a position
on the staff of former ECU AD Mike Hamrick.
Hamrick’s departure for the AD job at Nevada-Las Vegas in August of 2003
created the current vacancy.
The Floyds have two children, Suzanne and Nixon. Floyd’s father was a
university athletics administrator himself. Floyd graduated from Clemson in
1982, the scholastic year in which the Tigers won the national championship
in football. He has a masters in business administration from Ole Miss.
Floyd was in athletics administration at Southern Miss for 12 years prior to
moving to the C-USA office. He was senior associate AD at USM from 1995 to
1999. His range of responsibilities during his tenure at Southern Miss
included those of chief financial and administrative officer, football
scheduling and the construction of a new baseball stadium. He managed a
budget expansion from $2.7 million in 1986 to $9.5 million in 1999 at
Southern Miss.
Floyd certainly has a resume that deems him capable of continuing to serve
as AD at ECU. He has performed effectively as a low profile administrator
during the six months since Bill Muse appointed him to handle the AD
position on an interim basis. The urgency of filling the position hastily
has come and gone with the resolution of conference affiliation.
There would be no transition period if Floyd gets the job, albeit on a short
term contract initially. That possibility would give the new chancellor the
time and means to get the right person in place, whether or not that person
is ultimately the current interim AD.
The fact is the current search process may not have produced the best
candidates to lead ECU’s athletics department. The new chancellor and ECU
will certainly be judged in the public eye by the performance of the new AD
given the sweeping influence of that position.
Athletics are not the most important function of a university but they are
often the source of greatest public awareness of institutions of higher
learning. Bill Muse came to that conclusion and, long before Muse's
relatively short tenure at ECU, Leo Jenkins tenaciously embraced that
principle.
The need to find the right person to orchestrate the vision that supporters
have for the Pirates is essential. That may take some more time, an
evaluation period by the new chancellor and, possibly, a more effective
search at a later date.
Giving the job to Floyd in the short term would not undermine the welcomed
stability that has settled in during Floyd's temporary stewardship of the
program. What such a stand-pat move would do, however, is afford ECU's new CEO an opportunity to
influence the talent identification and hiring regimen from start to finish,
a course
that might be more effective for the university's athletics interests in the
longer term.
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02/23/2007 12:45:13 AM
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