A look back at the day Jeremy Foley was hired 20 years ago
Friday, March 9, 2012 | Football, Chris Harry
GAINESVILLE, Fla. -- As breaking news goes, it was a long way from “Man Bites Dog.”
Twenty years ago, the decision to promote Jeremy Foley to director of athletes at the University of Florida was as easy a call as Steve Spurrier sending in a pass play on third and 11.
I remember vividly the day Foley, then senior associate athletics director, was introduced by UF president John Lombardi as the replacement to Bill Arnsparger, who left to become defensive coordinator of the San Diego Chargers. With the move, the 39-year-old Foley completed an unlikely journey from being hired as a ticket office intern in 1976 to overseeing what was at the time a $25 million corporation.
Foley was asked at that March 9, 1992 news conference if his goal from the time he arrived at UF was to one day be a collegiate athletic director.
“My only goal when I worked in the ticket office was to get out of the ticket office,” Foley deadpanned.
And away he went.
All the way to the top.
“I've had opportunities to go elsewhere ... but I'm a big Gator fan,” Foley, who early in his career turned down overtures from the likes of Minnesota, Wichita State, Washington and South Florida, said back then. “I didn't want to go someplace just so my resume said I was AD at Joe State. I wanted to be somewhere I cared about, somewhere that meant something to me.”
Well, that $25 million has quadrupled over two decades under Foley, now the CFO of a $100 million-plus budget and a sports empire he has had major hand in building.
At the time of his hire, the Gators were on something of a roll, having won five of eight Southeastern Conference championships during the 1991-92 academic year, including the first football title in school history. It would have been easy to assume the overall program was on auto-pilot, but Foley had much bigger things in mind.
“I've heard it said many times this program is going in the right direction, that continuity is important, and if it's not broken, don't fix it,” Foley said. “But there are greater things for us to accomplish out there. And I don't think I'm alone in thinking that. I believe our coaches will agree with that, too.”
At the time, Foley listed three major priorities:
Ensuring coaching stability. “The great programs in the country have continuity in their coaching staffs,” he said. “We've got to focus on that right across the board.” Ask Billy Donovan, now in his 16th season and about to head to a 14th NCAA Tournament, about that emphasis on keeping coaches happy while challenging them by providing state-of-the-art resources.
The construction of an on-campus multi-purpose facility. “We don't have a home for our women's volleyball team or indoor tennis courts. That's not acceptable.” Ask Mary Wise about the Lemarand Center. Or Roland Thornqvist about the Alfred Ring Complex. Or Amanda Butler about the “Taj MaHoops” basketball facility that offers the identical amenities to her women's team as Donovan gets for his men.
The development of an academic center for student-athletes. “We've been talking about that for a long time and that needs to get past the talking stage.” Thirteen months after his hire, the University Athletic Association contributed $1.9 million in private funds to the construction of a $3.8 million academic advising center to serve all UF students. It opened in 1995.
As a beat reporter covering UF then, I wrote about the 38 applicants that sought the job, and chronicled when the list was whittled to both five finalists -- including UF women's AD Ann Marie Lawler -- and then again to three. Nothing against either Dave Hart (then at East Carolina) or Max Urick (Iowa State), but Foley was not just the only choice for Florida, but the perfect one.
Even his fellow candidates, who easily could have seen the search as a venerable “kangaroo court,” knew that.
“I don't think it was a sham at all,” said Hart, now AD at Tennessee, at the time. “That is one of the finest jobs in America and I think Jeremy is very deserving.”
Twenty years later, no one will disagree that Foley deserved the job.
Or that UF is lucky to have him.
