June 17, 2004

Progress Report On Vanderbilt�s Athletics Re-Org

FROM NASHVILLE�S INSTITUTION OF GENTEEL ACADEMIC EXCELLENCE comes an eight month progress report on the abolition of Vanderbilt�s athletic department (as we know it).

It was in September 2003 that Chancellor Gordon Gee announced a sweeping re-org that shifted Vandy�s athletics department toward significantly more integration with �everyday campus affairs.� No longer would the athletics department be an entity unto itself, with separate (but not particularly equal) housing, academics and extracurricular activities.

One of the biggest changes was the �reassignment� of AD Todd Turner to a nebulous �assistant-to� position and the outright riddance of the athletic director position. Instead, the athletic �program� (as it came to be called, not �department�) was assigned to the vice chancellor for university life.

The ensuing success of Vanderbilt�s teams�Sweet 16 success for both men�s and women�s basketball teams, and national rankings for all but one spring sports team�has curbed criticism of the re-org thus far.

But the re-org had little to do with the teams� successes, since the coaching staffs and athletes were all recruited under the old regime. Former AD Turner says, �The success of the teams has nothing to do with reorganization. That has everything to do with people. And if the reorganization assists those people in reaching their goals, then I�m all for it. But if it keeps the teams from being competitive and doing the right things on and off the field, then I will be concerned.�

Vanderbilt is one of a small group of top tier schools that could actually pull off such a bold experiment. There are only so many outstanding student-athletes available. Once Vandy, Stanford, Northwestern, Rice, Duke, Southern Cal and Notre Dame pick over the available high school talent, then there�s not much left over�academically at least�for the rest.

For example, such a re-org would be disastrous at Ohio State, which was one of Mr. Gee�s stops before coming to Vanderbilt.

Swaggering in the current topspin of the re-org, Chancellor Gee is immodest in his acclamation, �The very reasons that presidents can�t get it done are the very reasons they have to make it happen, because university presidents are no longer in charge of athletics.�

Ahem.

Easy to do at Vanderbilt, not so easy to do elsewhere.

(this 373 word excerpt�with attendant commentary�was distilled from a 1400 word article in the June 2004 issue of Athletic Business)