ACC Media Takes on Yow Hire

This is great stuff. This is fantastic stuff. Hopefully because of my relationship with Debbie Yow over the last decade plus, I have a more detailed perspective than just about anybody in the media down here. I think it’s an absolutely, positively, overwelmingly great hire for NC State.

You are talking about one of the smartest people I have met in 20 plus years of covering college athletics….one of the most influential people I have encountered in 20 plus years of covering college athletics…and maybe, most importantly, somebody that when a university is in desperation mode they turned to Debbie Yow and she got it done at Maryland. When the conference was in desperation mode and needed television money and they looked around the room, they turned to Debbie Yow and she got it done.

So you can talk about fractured relationships with Gary Williams and the Maryland fan base and there are some valid criticisms as well. But anyone who is starting from a point that this is an incompetent hire or a bad idea has absolutely, positively no clue about how college athletics works.

On Taylor Zarzour’s show today. Full audio of interview available here.

For another take on Yow, here is what John Feinstein wrote in his latest column:

Her downfall—and believe me she’s getting out of town ahead of the posse here with a new president taking over the school on September 1—came when she thought she saw an opening to get rid of Williams in 2009 and the notion blew up in her face. The basketball program was struggling and Williams made the mistake of taking a frustrated public swipe at Yow when asked about some recruiting efforts that hadn’t panned out. Yow saw an opening and tried to pounce only to find that most Maryland people remembered what Williams had done to rebuild a fallen program into a national champion and also believed he could still coach.

Williams’ players rallied behind him to make the NCAA Tournament in 2009 and then had a very good year in 2010. Yow was forced to retreat. She even went so far as to “nominate,” Williams for the basketball Hall of Fame last month, an absolute grandstand play if there’s ever been one. Debbie Yow nominating Gary Williams for the Hall of Fame is the equivalent of Tiger Woods nominating me for The Pulitzer Prize. No one bought that act—especially Williams, who was as close to speechless as he ever gets when the subject came up.

There was also the botched attempt to get rid of Friedgen last fall. After failing to raise the money from boosters to buy Friedgen out, Yow let it leak that perhaps the money could come from state funds—an idea quickly shot down by Governor Martin O’Malley. So, she looked bad again and looked even worse because she had committed $1 million to James Franklin as the coach-in-waiting when no one on earth could see any reason to anoint Franklin.

AD & Department General Kay Yow NC State NC State Administration

30 Responses to ACC Media Takes on Yow Hire

  1. WTNY 06/25/2010 at 1:51 PM #

    Thanks for the link; Glenn is certainly impressed.

    The more I learn, the more I see that this is not a “the sky is falling!” hire.

  2. Plz2BStateFan 06/25/2010 at 1:51 PM #

    I am convinced.

    She is an ass kicker. Will shake up the department.

    This is exactly what I needed.

  3. packbackr04 06/25/2010 at 1:59 PM #

    maybe we can get a contract with under armour too. adidas sux

  4. Alpha Wolf 06/25/2010 at 2:24 PM #

    Actually, I hope she calls Gary Stokan and asks him to put her in contact with those IMG contacts he talked about.

    I also hope no matter what, Wolfpack Sports Marketing and the SID and her office are immediately audited and reviewed. Hopefully, Ms. Annabelle Lee will be reassigned running an intramural spelling bee. WSM should be terminated and true professionals brought in.

    THEN start looking at coaches.

  5. Daily Update 06/25/2010 at 2:27 PM #

    ^Alpha: Read the Feinstein link I just put up. It talks about how she balanced the budget, but he claims mostly through slashing costs not through generating additional revenue. I thought Stokan’s background and connections were a great fit to address a huge weakness at NC State – the size of our budget.

  6. VaWolf82 06/25/2010 at 2:40 PM #

    I put Feinstein in the same category as Dave Glenn…they’re not always wrong, but that doesn’t mean that I value their opinion.

    From Equity in Athletics Website for the 08-09 school year

    NC State
    Undergrad enrollment – 21,354
    330 men, 201 women on athletic teams (unduplicated)
    Gross Revenue – $46.5M
    Gross Expenses – $45.8M

    Maryland
    Undergrad enrollment – 24,296
    393 men, 360 women on teams (unduplicated)
    Gross Revenue – $60.0M
    Gross Expenses – $59.7M

  7. gcpack 06/25/2010 at 2:43 PM #

    A few entries from the earlier post have either worried that this was a hire to satisfy the Kay Yow supporters or they were underwhelmed. Maybe a few of them are disguised UNC fans hoping to perpetuate the “fractured fan base” that we hear so much about but I hope the rest of you true State fans will embrace this hire.

    I believe this is an outstanding hire and even more so as I type and listen to the press conference going on now. She will kick ass and take names and I personally hope that the men’s soccer program is the first to get the facelift.

    Yow has already mentioned that while some facilities are in great shape others will still need improvement. I believe she understands what needs to be done.

    And while I am at it we also need to be proud of Chancellor Woodson as I hear him take the typical local media angle of trying to paint any news at State with the negative brush. One question about why supposedly Yow’s name was not on the list from the Parker company and Woodson directly and emphatically looked at the reporter and said “she was on my list”.

    We are in great shape with our university in the overall leadership and now with someone in Yow as with Woodson that will not cowtow to the stupid media angles that we are all too used to.

    Everyone needs to reserve their judgement until we give Yow the time to demonstrate her leadership.

    I think you will find that she will be a great hire.

  8. Plz2BStateFan 06/25/2010 at 2:43 PM #

    Just finished watching live news conference.

    HOLY CRAP does she seem impressive. No BS. No politically correct BS statements. Gave clarity to everything. Went into detail.

    I am in love!

  9. Daily Update 06/25/2010 at 2:56 PM #

    I don’t know whether Feinstein is right nor not, but what you posted doesn’t have anything to do with how Yow balanced the budget at Maryland and got them out of debt. Maybe you are just posting the numbers to add some information.

  10. Alpha Wolf 06/25/2010 at 3:05 PM #

    Yow won’t have a huge deficit to address here.

    As for Feinstein, he’s grandstanding himself again and IMO painting a one sided red meat picture for the home crowd. Feinstein needs to stick to golf and the Patriot League.

  11. gcpack 06/25/2010 at 3:12 PM #

    I am currently listening to Adam Gold and Joe Ovies on 99.9. Gold, a Maryland alumnus, commented that while he respects Feinstein that it is well known that Feinstein is a Gary Williams apologist. So Feinstein just may not have liked that Yow jousted with Williams hence his negative opinion towards Yow.

  12. Will NCSU 06/25/2010 at 3:14 PM #

    Great hire. Not sure how anyone can complain after 10 years of Fowler. Purcell would have been the emotional hire, not yow. He has no experience, she has 16 years of running a top 25 athletics department. Not sure who the complainers want. just be glad she was willing to take a step down and come here.

  13. Pack Mentality 06/25/2010 at 3:16 PM #

    At least she tries to get rid of coaches that she feels are bad. When was the last time we had somebody like that at State?

    I can’t understand all this negativity at all. Maryland has been exponentially better than us at damn near everything the whole time she’s been there. I know that’s not saying much so let me rephrase this. Maryland has been playing with the big boys and winning the whole time she’s been there, some down years, but so what. They’re good across the board in the non-revenues too. Football conference title (we haven’t seen one since ’79), basketball national title and conference titles as well as being a player in the top of the league standings most years (again almost a generation ago since State had that). #13 in the Director’s Cup and we are in the 90s.

    I’m not saying she is a step up from Lee, my grandmother would be that. I’m saying this is a damn good hire.

  14. Alpha Wolf 06/25/2010 at 3:29 PM #

    State’s fans were raised in negativity. It’s been a long time since the 1980s. Yow is right, winning will unite the fanbase.

  15. VaWolf82 06/25/2010 at 3:35 PM #

    I don’t know whether Feinstein is right nor not, but what you posted doesn’t have anything to do with how Yow balanced the budget at Maryland and got them out of debt.

    I would say that the numbers cast considerable doubt on Feinstein’s conclusions. UMD supports more athletes than State and generates about $15M more revenue than State. Yow may have also cut expenses, but it’s obvious that she did not gut the athletic dept to do it.

  16. durhamwolf19 06/25/2010 at 4:00 PM #

    I definitely will be contacting her about Wolfpack Sports Marketing after a phone conversation I had with them about something that is good publicity for NC State in which I got zero support. This is something that all other schools in the Carolinas supports 100%.

  17. Daily Update 06/25/2010 at 4:23 PM #

    Vawolf82: Who knows without looking at past revenues for Maryland and how they have increased relative to peer institutions? Comparing Maryland’s budget in 1 single year to State’s budget in 1 single year doesn’t give us enough information to draw a conclusion.

  18. Classof89 06/25/2010 at 4:23 PM #

    The comments on the idiot board were absolutely appalling. Lets hope none of the media doing the “fanbase reaction story” look there…

  19. VaWolf82 06/25/2010 at 4:28 PM #

    Comparing Maryland’s budget in 1 single year to State’s budget in 1 single year doesn’t give us enough information to draw a conclusion.

    Not so. When you combine these numbers with some reported by Dave Glenn and PP, what we see is that UMD supports more teams than State, while also paying off over $40M in debt.

  20. Daily Update 06/25/2010 at 5:19 PM #

    How she paid off the debt at Maryland has nothing to do with State or how many more sports Md has than State. I don’t have other budget numbers for Maryland any other years to compare to that number you provided in this thread.

    To be clear, I thought this was the statement of Feinstein’s being discussed:

    She balanced an un-balanced budget (largely through cutbacks but nevertheless she did it)

    Cutbacks doesn’t mean she cut teams.

  21. FredandDwight82 06/25/2010 at 6:54 PM #

    Feinstein sounds like he is talking about a 10 year old girl’s slumber party. Who told on who, who won’t look at me, who won’t talk to someone else…

    I thought Yow brought a lot to the table, but since Feinstein is against her, she must bring more than I thought!

  22. VaWolf82 06/26/2010 at 9:39 AM #

    She balanced an un-balanced budget (largely through cutbacks but nevertheless she did it)

    Cutbacks doesn’t mean she cut teams.

    It doesn’t necessarily mean that she cut teams, but where else would she get the kind of money that we’re talking about here?

    You don’t even need the detailed numbers from that website to prove that Feinstein is full of himself (as usual). From the UMD’s press release, Yow oversaw $180M worth of expansions/upgrades while cutting the AD debt from $50M+ to $8M over a 16 year period….while balancing the annual budget.

    Those numbers work out to nearly $14M PER YEAR over the annual budget needs during her 16 years at UMD. Anyone that claims that she did that “largely through cutbacks” had better have some damn convincing proof…and Feinstein offers none.

  23. coach13 06/26/2010 at 10:05 AM #

    Here is my take. I feel, as several of you I’m sure. NC State should be one of the elite, more successful Universities in the ACC and NCAA. For some unknown reason, we haven’t been led in that direction in decades. I am optimistic she will surpass her success she had at Md here at State. And considering what that success has been, I am very excited.

    We have wanted change for so log. Let’s get pumped, embrace it and get ready for some new glory years.

  24. whope90 06/27/2010 at 2:17 PM #

    I am so excited on this hire for my school that i think we have finally passed the mediocre days of being semi competetive in all sports. And to those John Fienstein comments, i say bunk!! It takes a lot of guts to get tough with national championship basketball coaches and a acc football conference championship coach and demand more from them. What a mentality, to demand winning from folks whom have actually won!! The mindset and enviroment is going to change dramatically and if i were Tom o’ Brien and Sidney Lowe i would worry! Both must win this year or they will be gone, and it is that simple, win and graduate players and everything will be fine but should that not be the example of job production we should receive from our school’s athletic programs???

    Winning times are ahead, or heals will roll! What a great hire and a move from the nc state adminsistration!!

  25. Primewolf 06/27/2010 at 3:38 PM #

    Great hire. She demands that coaches win. What a breadth of fresh air. the fact that she tried to oust the Fridge is a plus IMO. If an AD is going to be proactive, he (she) has to make some calls. If the boosters were too cheap to buy our Fridge, then MD gets what they deserve.

    She is the antithesis to LeeFoulup. Clean house. Begin winning at something, anything, raise money, demand more from our cheap fanbase, and it they don’t put up, then it is time to shutup. How can we be at the absolute low end of athletic funding with such a passionate fanbase. I suspect the biggest whiners are the same ones that give maybe $300 per year.

Leave a Reply