The task is monumental but it’s not difficult to feel good about the caliber of the committee searching for a new Kansas University athletics director.
There is a predictable mix for diversity’s sake, as there must be in this day and age. But while I don’t know much about some of the 16 people in this crucial hunt, I do get the impression there are no myopic, single-issue drones who consider controversy their calling rather than solid achievement. At first glance, all would seem to be dedicated to the proposition that it’s vital to get as talented and intelligent a person as possible and to do it within a reasonable amount of time.
KU’s drifting ship keeps taking on water. It needs to be baled out quickly and set on a productive course, foul weather or fair. There are things nobody can do immediately, like assure a needed winning football program this fall. Nobody at any price, such as $250,000 and up, can chase that horse into the corral. If it happens, fantastic; don’t count on it, with KU’s gut-wrenching schedule.
You have to consider committeemen such as Mike Davis, Don Green, Bill Hougland, Drue Jennings, Laird Noller and Gale Sayers heavy-hitters. Chairman Reggie Robinson has people with a lot of experience and business acumen and former-athletes such as Hougland, Jennings and Sayers long have been deeply involved with their alma mater. They know the territory.
Hougland had a fabulous career with the Koch operations, Jennings has been a whopping success with Kansas City Power and Light, and Galloping Gale has been to a lot of picnics and back.
Softball coach Tracy Bunge, footballer Harrison Hill and former-basketballer Jennifer Jackson have the backgrounds to contribute. Associate AD Janelle Martin has been in the Jayhawk loop long enough to recognize the pitfalls and challenges.
With all their contacts, many of the committee members have been hearing for some time about the discontent among Kansas faithful about the direction of the program beyond men’s basketball. They’ll look hard at every candidate and there may be some heated discussions over who can do what for whom. Not many of these 16 people strike me as being easily intimidated and they can be expected to speak their pieces.
But two things keep sticking out: 1 There remains a fantastically deep and loyal alumni-friend affection and appreciation of KU and all it has to offer. 2 Most on this committee fully understand that, since they tend to feel precisely the same, and have demonstrated it many ways. The KU sports program is broken and these people should get all the administrative support possible to fix it with a wise choice for a new chief executive officer.
The KU administration is deeply blessed to have a committee of this caliber to make a decision that can make the hierarchy look good.
I can’t believe the e-mail and phone calls I’ve had since I discussed the athletics program and its challenges in the changeover from director Bob Frederick recently. There’s that marvelous loyalty and pride about KU, the tremendous desire to make things better, but there also are resentments and misgivings to be addressed.
Wrote one former notably successful athlete: ” We read how KU’s athletic department moans about having the highest tuition costs in the conference due to all the out-of-state students, and yet they won’t recruit Kansas kids who are as good as or better than the out-staters who have little or no loyalty to the university and the state. Kansas State seems to be doing pretty well with Kansas kids. My father is a KU alum who lives in Illinois and he believe KU has forsaken the state of Kansas and is now the ‘University of Kansas City and Elsewhere.'”
He adds: “Too much arrogance and political correctness has caught up with KU while the ‘little kid on the block’ now rules the state. I’ve heard many KU alums frustrated with the lack of interest that KU has taken in their children while KSU knocks on their door. A KU grad who lives in my hometown back east originally was from Garden City. He returned for a visit and admitted he was shocked how the color purple had taken over the town.”
Perhaps a little drastic, but something for all KU officials, the selection committee and the new athletics director to take deeply to heart.
There’s another submerged factor that has not helped KU bring in the Kansas kids like Ollie Spencer from Ulysses, Galen Fiss from Johnson, Bob Hantla from Meade, on and on, Ralph Miller, Chanute and Howard Engleman, Arkansas City four of the five starters on KU’s 1952 NCAA basketball title team were Kansas products. You could go on all night.
Time was when the physical education department on Mount Oread offered career paths that helped interested guys enter coaching after college. Then came a steady restructuring, somewhat elitist, that showed no interest in such crass, bourgeois courses of study.
So where does KU have any football or basketball coaches around the state and in the area anymore? K-State has a number and they sure don’t hurt.
The new Jayhawk athletics director will have a giant can of worms and a roomful of feathers to deal with. The good news is that the committee which will make the selection is aware of the problems and is well-equipped to pick someone with a good chance of solving a lot of them.
Jayhawk diehards better hope so.
