When Illinois fired athletic director Mike Thomas on Nov. 9, interim university Chancellor Barbara Wilson spent a portion of her news conference awkwardly praising him.
"(The athletic department) has achieved much under Mike Thomas' leadership, including significant milestones in fundraising," Wilson's statement read in part.
It was a conflicting message. The discussion during Thomas' dismissal of his ability to raise money highlighted a dichotomy in the evolving and increasingly complex role of the college athletic director.
With a greater emphasis on fundraising and the ability to manage multimillion-dollar organizations that have mushroomed financially over the last few decades, university leaders are hiring more people with business and legal backgrounds.
Yet the bottom line in college athletics is based on the same simple objective of hiring coaches who can win and run clean programs.
"That (business background) helps for one phase of (the job), but you better have some type of personnel background," said Wisconsin AD Barry Alvarez, speaking on the college landscape as a whole, not Illinois specifically. "I don't know if a lot of people understand the magnitude of the job and the layers involved.
"It's just like running a corporation. You have to know how to deal with people. You're making decisions on a daily basis, whether it's setting ticket prices or dealing with licensing and marketing. There's so much involved with it now. There's not just one background (that works)."
A study by the University of Arkansas in 2011 found 43 percent of FBS athletic directors were former coaches, compared with 65 percent of all Division I ADs in 1994. The 2011 study showed 73 percent of ADs had earned at least a master's degree.
The model of football coach rising to athletic director, such as Alvarez and former Michigan AD Bo Schembechler, isn't so common anymore. More and more frequently ADs such as Notre Dame's Jack Swarbrick (lawyer and consultant), Michigan's interim AD Jim Hackett (furniture company executive) and Indiana's Fred Glass and Texas' interim AD Mike Perrin (attorneys) come from non-sports backgrounds.
"It really occurred in the early to mid 2000s with the rise of the BCS, the rise of media rights and the revenue that was generated through that and the facility arms race that took over in college athletics," said Steve Dittmore, an Arkansas professor who presented the 2011 research on career patterns of athletic directors at the College Sports Research Institute.
"It reflects the reality that if you look at an average SEC institution with a $100 million-a-year athletic budget, that's the size of a major corporation. So it makes sense you would have more of a CEO mentality running that. The challenge is that athletic departments operate within an educational structure and are designed to be nonprofit organizations -- that's where the balance comes in."
Former Michigan AD Dave Brandon was CEO of Domino's Pizza before the Wolverines hired him in 2010; he resigned under pressure a year ago and is widely viewed as a failed experiment. About 1,000 Michigan students and fans protested on President Mark Schlissel's front lawn last October to demand Brandon's firing.
"There was a time you didn't even know who the athletic director was," Alvarez said. "It was just the coaches. It's a much more complicated job than it was 25 years ago."
Illinois is tasked with finding an AD who has the necessary fundraising ability but also can make strong hires and have proper oversight.
Thomas spearheaded a $160 million renovation of the State Farm Center and landed a $60 million naming-rights agreement. He was behind upgrades to other facilities, including Memorial Stadium.
But after four years in Champaign, Thomas was let go in the wake of a university-commissioned external investigation that showed former football coach Tim Beckman -- whom Thomas hired and fired -- had mistreated players' medical conditions.
The football team's poor records didn't help either, nor did scandals and lawsuits in other sports such as women's basketball and women's soccer.
Some of the names circulating as potential candidates at Illinois reflect varying backgrounds. Illini golf coach Mike Small is popular on campus, but his lack of administrative experience could be a strike against him. Another possible target is Craig Tiley, CEO of Tennis Australia and a former tennis coach at Illinois.
"This job has changed so much," said Northern Illinois AD Sean Frazier, also not speaking specifically about Illinois. "Yes, you have to fundraise (and) you've got to be sure you can build a constituency and understand the constituency. I would say 80 percent of what I've dealt with as a sitting AD has to do with human-resource management.
"What makes this job (so difficult) is you do it under the constraints of the higher-education governance structure. I've watched a lot of folks really struggle because this is not just a business."
Northwestern AD Jim Phillips said the evolving role of the job has made it "increasingly more demanding and a great deal more complex. The time demands are enormous."
The job is also becoming less stable. The average tenure for a Division I AD is less than seven years, according to a June report in Sports Business Daily. There were 46 job changes in 2013 among the 351 Division I schools, the most ever, the report said.
"The scrutiny is incredibly intense and it's not going away," said Phillips, who has been at Northwestern since 2008 and rose through the ranks of athletic administration.
"The days of being at a place 25 (or) 30 years is becoming harder and harder. It's tracking similar to presidents and coaches with shorter tenures. Continually being under the microscope shortens people's tenure at places."
The increased use and influence of search firms has also shaped who is being hired. Some argue that firms too often recommend only those from the business world.
Another common criticism is the lack of diversity in the position. Only 15 of the 128 FBS athletic programs are run by minorities and only seven by women, according to the Sports Business Daily report.
"I wish our profession would take a real step forward with (diversity)," said Frazier, who is African-American.
Illinois is looking for an AD with ties to the university, according to sources. But it also will be essential for that person to understand today's model of the role.
"It's hard to say whether I think it's good or bad," Dittmore said. "(There's) a sensitivity toward fiscal responsibility in college athletics. It's necessary for athletic directors to possess money management or business skills now."
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