Closing Shot: Winding Down A College Journey

Bob Vecchione was working for National Car Rental when he started building a network that would eventually land him an opportunity in college sports.nacda

The news that came across Bob Vecchione’s desk last week put a smile on his face. Jude Killy was named athletic director at the University of Maine. It wasn’t the kind of news that would stop the presses in most places, but to Vecchione, there wasn’t a bigger story that day.

Killy had interned for Vecchione in the NACDA offices in Cleveland years ago before joining the staff from 1998-2002 as an assistant administrator. NACDA, which stands for National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics, a trade association for college ADs, had birthed another difference-making career and put another one of its graduates in an AD chair.

As Vecchione cruises into retirement at the end of the year, nothing makes him happier than to read stories like Killy’s. And there have been a lot of them.

“It’s another really proud moment,” said Vecchione, who will become emeritus director at NACDA. “That’s part of the beauty of this business. We’ve had over 90% of the AD jobs filled with current administrators. It’s a system that builds from within.”

Vecchione started at NACDA in 1992 and when he steps away, he will have completed 30 years, the last 11 as the CEO. Pat Manak, another NACDA veteran who started as an intern in 1992, will shift into his role as NACDA’s CEO.

“When I think about Bob, I think about how much he cared for his staff,” said Iowa State AD Jamie Pollard, NACDA’s immediate past president. “Even as we planned for his retirement, it was never about Bob. It was always about the organization and the staff. As someone who has been in a leadership role, that always stood out to me.”

Vecchione’s journey to NACDA didn’t start in a traditional fashion. He went to work for National Car Rental in a Chicago sales office at age 23. A subsequent move to Seattle led to a friendship with Washington AD Mike Lude, who began introducing Vecchione to other athletic administrators. One of them was Mike Cleary, the NACDA chief executive at the time. It was the start of an unmatched network of connections in the college space.

A turning point for Vecchione came in 1992 when he left National and joined the University of Minnesota, which opened the door for him to become executive director of the Final Four organizing committee that year.

“Running a Final Four was something I always wanted to do,” Vecchione said. “I can remember sitting there at the 1985 Final Four and telling my father that I wanted to run one of these one day.”

Don Tencher, the AD at Rhode Island College, credited Vecchione’s marketing talents and abundance of relationships for growing NACDA to include 18 professional associations and spanning 22,500 members.

“Bob was ahead of his time,” Tencher said. “At National, he was always visible at athletic functions as he began developing that incredible network of friendships, and it’s grown from there. There’s not another organization in the world where a rookie can break in and engage with some of the legends in this business.”