NCAA member athletic directors are glad to see someone who was their peer just recently take a high-ranking job at the governing body for collegiate sports.
According to Inside Higher Ed, Oliver Luck's appointment as the NCAA's executive vice president of regulatory affairs is a sign that the governing body is serious about creating a better relationship with its members. Luck left his post as West Virginia University's athletic director to take the NCAA job.
"This is a seminal time period and I'm honored to be given the opportunity to move the mission forward for the NCAA, which I think is hugely important within American society," he said on a press call Thursday, IHE reported. "Certainly an institution of this size has some warts, or a soft underbelly if you will, but I certainly think this is absolutely something worth fighting for."
The NCAA saw its Chief Operating Officer retire in Aug. and Mark Emmert, the NCAA's president, saw it as an opportunity. Though Luck was hired with a different job title, he is expected to serve some of the same purposes.
"I think there's been a criticism for some time that the hands-on operations of an athletic department, and the complexity of that, wasn't fully understood by many of the NCAA administrators," Richard Ensor, commissioner of the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference, told IHE. "This seems to be a good-faith effort to find someone who can help remedy that."
But of the 1,100 NCAA member institutions, only a few belong to the Power Five conferences, which are named so because their football and basketball teams are viewed more and make more money. Patrick Harker, president of the University of Delaware, was skeptical and said he hopes the Power Five does not wind up as the de facto head of collegiate sports.
"It's great to have an athletic director, sure," he told IHE. "But there are athletic directors other than the ones in the Big Five."
Either way, Luck's hiring is an obvious step in the right direction for the NCAA as they head into a transitional period for many of their long-standing policies and practices.
"Oliver is a great hire for President Emmert, the NCAA and everyone involved in collegiate athletics," Greg Byrne, Arizona director of athletics and search committee member, said in a statement. "He understands the needs of universities, student-athletes and athletics departments. His experience working on campus will provide valuable insight for all of college athletics as it continues to evolve."
