ATHENS — One year ago this month, Greg McGarity returned to his alma mater and his hometown to become Georgia’s athletic director.
It has been an eventful year for the new boss, from dealing with issues as high-profile as a losing football season to issues as low-profile as how student-athletes are fed.
As he wraps up his first year in his dream job, McGarity, who had spent the previous 18 years as an assistant AD at Florida, seems to have found only one aspect of the new position unsettling: the attention it commands.
“That’s probably been the biggest part to adjust to,” he said. “I’m just a regular ol’ guy. It’s kind of embarrassing when people want to take your picture with them. I’m not used to that.”
In an hour-long conversation in his office this week with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, McGarity reflected on the issues he faced, the decisions he made in Year 1 and his goals for the future.
One notable aspect of McGarity’s first year is that it brought no sweeping personnel changes to the athletics department.
McGarity reshaped the organizational chart, redistributing some duties and spreading administrative oversight of the various sports to more associate and assistant AD’s. But he didn’t bring in his own people to replace those in key positions, as often happens when a new boss arrives.
“I’ve always felt that when you come into a new environment, you have to come with a clean slate, not with any preconceived notions of how people function,” McGarity said. “You have to give people a chance to adapt and adjust. ... It wasn’t like the wheels were off the bus by any stretch of the imagination. It was a really good staff.”
He did bring a clear vision of the type of leadership he wanted for the department.
“I wanted a style of leadership built around being a servant leader ... basically having an attitude internally where staff is focused on helping their employees become successful,” he said. “I think what our staff has done, by and large, is really buy into that form of leadership.”
McGarity, who was named athletic director Aug. 13, 2010, and started work Aug. 30, had hardly unpacked his belongings when the football team found itself with a 1-4 record and on the way to its first losing season (6-7) in 14 years. Rather than making what he felt would have been a hasty, uninformed coaching change, McGarity focused on understanding what had gone wrong and how he and others could help coach Mark Richt turn it around.
“Nobody is happy with 6-7. Nobody. I mean, that’s unacceptable,” McGarity said. “But I think you had to try to help figure out what happened, and I think some of the changes [Richt] made during the offseason have really helped.”
McGarity is particularly enthused about the changes in the strength-and-conditioning program, where longtime staffer Joe Tereshinski took over.
“Time will tell, but I do know that what we’ve seen in January, February, March, April, May, June and July is what you want to see,” McGarity said. “You want to see energy and enthusiasm in practice. Check. You want to see a team that is physically fit. Check that off.”
Although he has replaced only one coach (volleyball) and left the senior management team in place, McGarity has made changes in areas as diverse as fundraising and nutrition since succeeding Damon Evans, who was forced to resign after a DUI arrest.
McGarity created a new position — Bulldog Club executive director — to focus exclusively on fundraising and booster-related events. He hired Mark Slonaker, a former Georgia basketball player and former Mercer coach, for the position this summer. McGarity hopes enough money eventually can be raised to endow all athletic scholarships.
Another change, one McGarity considers extremely important, is the hiring of two full-time nutritionists.
“One piece I thought was missing was, ‘How are our kids being fueled?’” McGarity said.
Starting this week, the football and basketball players and athletes in some other sports eat lunch Mondays through Thursdays from a training table set up in a room in the basketball practice facility. NCAA rules limit training-table meals to one per day, but Georgia had not offered any in recent years.
“That was something I noticed early-on we didn’t have that we needed to have,” McGarity said.
As he enters Year 2, McGarity will be armed with a voluminous set of goals. At his request, a 12-person staff committee recently came up with a list of quantifiable goals by which the department will evaluate itself annually in all areas.
McGarity was reluctant to discuss the goals in detail until he presents them to the Athletic Association’s board of directors next month, but a sampling of the 50 or so benchmarks indicate the bar will be set high. Goals include reaching the NCAA postseason in every sport, winning two national championships and leading the SEC in graduation rate.
“People say, ‘Boy, we want to be the best we can be,’” McGarity said. “But what does that mean? This will be a way to grade ourselves.”
One year after returning to Athens, McGarity feels at home.
“From Day 1, I felt at home,” he said. “Athens has always felt like home.”
