Jeff Long new AD

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A new leader for Kansas Athletics

Colleagues,

I am excited to report that Jeff Long, one of the most experienced and respected collegiate athletics administrators in the country, will soon be joining the University of Kansas as our director of athletics.

Jeff brings more than two decades of experience in athletic administration at the Division I level, most recently at the University of Arkansas, where he led a program comprising 19 sports and 460 student-athletes. During that time, he transformed Arkansas’ athletics department into one of the most successful in the country and established himself as a national leader within intercollegiate athletics.

Jeff is a terrific fit for Kansas Athletics as we work to ensure our student-athletes succeed on the field and in the classroom. Those who know him describe him as a man of character who cares deeply about higher education and the student-athletes he serves. For all these reasons, we are thrilled to welcome him to the University of Kansas.

Jeff will be introduced at a news conference on Wednesday, July 11, and he will start his role August 1. In the meantime, I invite you to learn more about Jeff and read what his colleagues around the country are saying in today’s announcement.

I want to thank the faculty, staff, alumni and friends who were instrumental to the process that has brought Jeff to KU. In particular, I want to thank Sean Lester, who has served as interim director of athletics for the past six weeks and has done a terrific job in that role. I also want to thank everyone at Kansas Athletics whose work will enable a smooth transition in the coming days.

This is an exciting day for the University of Kansas. To have someone of Jeff’s caliber joining our university speaks well of KU on a national scale. I am confident Kansas Athletics is in good hands under his leadership.

Please join me in welcoming Jeff to KU.

Respectfully,

Doug

Douglas A. Girod
Chancellor
University of Kansas"

Looks like a great hire. I'm excited to see what he accomplishes. Buckle up, I think we're about to launch!

The only red flag I saw was that he was fired by Arkansas last year, so I did some digging and found this:

www.seccountry.com/arkansas/jeff-long-not-arkansas-man

So no bad news there, and an Arkansas-based site called the job he did "astounding". Welcome to the hot seat Jeff.

The only concern I had was that he has protection ( I think extra years on his deal) if the NCAA penalizes football or women's hoops for violations before he was hired.

Given the W-L of those programs recently it hadn't occurred to me that they had been cheating.

I can understand that clause, but it's just for protection, at this point. I put it under the category of smart things to do in a contract, not an indication of how likely he thinks it is to happen.

BTW, I read the quotes from former colleagues, etc. and I'm pretty impressed.
www.big12sports.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_...410&ATCLID=211733689

I can't imagine how tough this job is going to be. I've commented before on how tough it is to build a football program, and I have no idea how you do it while keeping high standards of ethics and academics, especially when we're SOOOOOO deep in the basement of D1 football. Aside from hiring good coaches, what else has he done in the past to elevate football programs? He's obviously turned some of his previous schools around. What's the secret?