Getting To Know Scott Woodward

[LSUDad]

Texas A&M AD Scott Woodward will replace Joe Alleva at LSU, sources say

• BY BROOKS KUBENA | BKUBENA@THEADVOCATE.COM
• PUBLISHED APR 17, 2019 AT 4:52 PM | UPDATED APR 17, 2019 AT 5:08 PM
•  

 

Jimbo Fisher, left, holds up a pair of Texas A&M cowboy boots next to Texas A&M athletic director Scott Woodward after being introduced as the Aggies' new coach Monday, Dec. 4, 2017, in College Station, Texas.

AP photo by Dave McDermand, College Station Eagle

 

Brooks Kubena

By the time afternoon rolled into evening Wednesday, LSU had pulled off a stunning and major coup, striking a deal to bring Texas A&M athletic director Scott Woodward back to his hometown and alma mater — a deal that came just hours after LSU had moved on from its 11th-year athletic director, Joe Alleva.

Woodward, an alumnus of Catholic High and LSU, will take over as athletic director, sources close to the LSU athletic department staff told The Advocate. He will replace Alleva, who, according to an announcement from the university, will transition into a new role as special assistant to the president for donor relations.

The end of Alleva's tenure was cast as a smooth exit toward retirement, but his reassignment included more deliberation behind closed doors.

The decision to remove Alleva as athletic director was made Tuesday night during a tight-lipped executive meeting held by the LSU Board of Supervisors, according to a board member who asked not to be identified because university officials asked members to remain quiet.

 

The board mentioned only "potential litigation" as its official business at the meeting, but board members were expecting a briefing on men's basketball coach Will Wade's return from suspension, in addition to discussing unrelated lawsuits, two sources with close knowledge of the board told The Advocate on Tuesday.

Not all board members were involved in the meeting. Some were miffed and some were not supportive of the decision to remove Alleva.

By 4 p.m. Wednesday, LSU had announced an official statement.

"We are grateful to Joe for his years of service and dedication to LSU," LSU President F. King Alexander said in the statement. "Under his leadership, LSU Athletics has become even more nationally competitive and our student-athletes have reached new levels of academic achievement."

Alleva's $725,000-per-year contract with the university is set to expire June, 30, 2020, and if he were fired by LSU without cause, Alleva would be entitled to 100 percent of the remaining base salary, which is about $650,000.

LSU would have needed to pay Alleva 35 percent of the balance, or about $227,500, within 30 days of his termination, and the rest would have been paid in equal monthly payments over the next 30 months.

 

Alleva's resignation comes at a time when the LSU athletic program is embroiled in controversy, tied to a sprawling college basketball corruption scandal that includes a lengthy FBI investigation into the sport.

On Sunday, Wade returned from a suspension that kept him out of the regular-season finale and LSU's NCAA tournament run to the Sweet 16. His return ended a nearly month-long silence between him and the LSU athletic program, stemming from Wade's reported conversation with a middleman accused of funneling bribes to assistant coaches and cash to families of recruits.

Wade met with LSU on Friday, and Alleva said in a statement Sunday that Wade had been reinstated and "answered all questions and denied any wrongdoing."

In the hours following Alleva's resignation, the university closed in on obtaining Woodward, who had been at Texas A&M since January 2016.

According to The Dallas Morning News, Woodward earned $900,000 in base salary as part of a five-year deal that expires in January 2021. He owes Texas A&M about $40,000 for leaving, according to the terms of the 

 

 

The Texas A&M athletic department did not respond to multiple attempts for comment.

At A&M, two of Woodward's biggest feats have been major coaching hires: luring Buzz Williams from Virginia Tech to replace Billy Kennedy as men's basketball coach, and hiring Jimbo Fisher to a 10-year, $75 million deal from Florida State to replace Kevin Sumlin as football coach.

Woodward was the athletic director at the University of Washington from 2008-15 and served as the school's vice chancellor of external affairs from 2004-08. The latter was a similar position to the one he held at LSU from 2000-04, when he was then-Chancellor Mark Emmert's representative to the athletic department as the director of external affairs.

Before that, Woodward was a political consultant and legislative liaison in Baton Rouge, where he founded a government and public relations firm in the mid-1990s.

With Larose native Ed Orgeron as LSU's football coach, Woodward's hiring marks the first time since February 1955 that LSU's athletic director and football coach are both from Louisiana. T.P. "Skipper" Heard was athletic director then, and Gaynell Tinsley was the football coach before being succeeded that year by Paul Dietzel.

Alleva, 65, took over the LSU athletic department in 2008, replacing legendary baseball coach Skip Bertman, who stepped down after seven years in the same role.

Fans' disappointment and frustration with Alleva centered in part on LSU's lack of national championships won at during his tenure, particularly with the football program.

LSU football had won the 2007 BCS national championship the year before Alleva arrived, and the Tigers have since made it as far as national runner-up in 2011.

The LSU football program began to slip in the seasons following that title game appearance, and the Tigers went 105-37 (a 73.9 winning percentage) in their 11 seasons in Alleva's tenure.

Most of that was under former football coach Les Miles, who was fired in 2016 after the Tigers began the season ranked No. 5 but fell out of the Top 25 after a 2-2 start.

Miles was nearly fired the year before. The Advocate reported Dec. 4, 2015, that representatives from LSU and representatives for Fisher, a former LSU assistant who was then at Florida State, were in discussions days before the Tigers beat Texas A&M in what many believed would be Miles' final game as coach.

Alleva said then that he only "looked at options" and made "inquiries" regarding a potential new coach.

Speaking at Southeastern Conference media days last summer, Fisher, now at Texas A&M, said "unfortunately it just didn't work out at the time" when asked about LSU and Fisher's reported discussions.

When Miles was fired in 2016, Alleva insisted that he would run LSU's search for a new football coach. During a radio interview with WNXX-FM, Alleva said: "I'm the search."

In November 2016, The Advocate reported that LSU decision-makers used Fisher's talked-about candidacy as a ruse to quietly negotiate with then-Houston coach Tom Herman and stay ahead of the University of Texas to strike a deal with Herman.

A potential deal with Herman collapsed in part because of reports that surfaced from HornsDigest.com that strongly linked Herman to the LSU job, and LSU leaders blamed Herman's camp for leaking the information and ended discussions, refusing to be part of a bidding war with someone who leveraged LSU's interest into an eventual job with the Longhorns.

By the end of the 2016 season, Alleva handed the job to Orgeron, who had gone 6-2 as the interim coach after Miles' departure.

LSU football has yet to break its eight-game losing streak to Alabama that dates to 2011. The streak has continued under Orgeron.

Last year, however, LSU had its most successful season since 2013 with a 10-3 record and a victory in the Fiesta Bowl — its first New Year's Six bowl game victory in the College Football Playoff era. The Tigers will likely be a preseason Top 10 team this fall.

LSU baseball (2009) and men's golf (2015) were the two programs to win team national championships under Alleva.

Men's and women's track and field has won 34 individual national championships across its outdoor and indoor programs since 2009, and the women's gymnastics team has flourished, with nine individual national championships won during Alleva's tenure.

Financially under Alleva, LSU was always near the top among other national programs when it came to total revenue.

LSU's profit margin climbed to as high as $56.1 million under Alleva, raking in most of its cash from a vastly profitable football program.

LSU pulled in $145 million in total revenue in 2017-18, and in 2016-17, LSU ranked No. 9 nationally with a total revenue of $147 million.

A considerable percentage of those revenues came from the seven neutral-site games the LSU football program played during Alleva's tenure.

 

LSU made nearly $23 million across those games, including a $4.75 million guarantee for playing Miami in the 2018 season opener at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas.

Some debate stirred around those "pay games" among LSU supporters who wanted to see top regular-season games at Tiger Stadium instead of on the road.

That issue was among many reasons that helped explain waning attendance among ticket holders within the past decade.

Miami was the last scheduled neutral-site opener, and Alleva drew iconic football programs to Tiger Stadium with deals with Texas (2020), UCLA (2024), Clemson (2026), Oklahoma (2028) and Arizona State (2029).

"Our fans have been anxious for to us to play quality opponents in Tiger Stadium," Alleva told The Advocate in August.

LSU averaged 100,819 in recorded home attendance in 2018, with announced sellouts against Louisiana Tech, Georgia and Alabama, after the school ranked sixth nationally in 2017 with an average recorded attendance of 98,506.

There were multiple major renovation projects under Alleva, which included the 2014 expansion of the south end zone of Tiger Stadium, the construction of a gymnastics practice facility and a tennis center.

Projects are still underway to expand the baseball program's hitting facility, plus a $23 million construction project to renovate the football operations center.

LSU twice finished within the top 20 rankings for the Learfield Directors' Cup (LSU was No. 15 in 2014-15, and No. 18 in 2016-17), an annual award given to universities based on the combined performance of a program's athletic teams.

Alleva received a $50,000 incentive bonus for both Top 20 finishes, and this year, LSU ranks 26th nationally in the Learfield Cup standings, sixth among SEC programs.

LSU's athletic programs all maintained a score above 925 in the NCAA's Academic Progress Rate, which calculates the number of athletes that stay in school and are academically eligible, in five consecutive years from 2012-13 until 2016-17, which netted another $50,000 bonus for each year.

The men's basketball program eventually found consistency in its APR score during Alleva's tenure. From 2004-05 until 2011-12, the program recorded an APR score above 925 once (in 2007-08), and its score of 905 in the 2009-10 academic year led to an immediate penalty of one scholarship reduction.

[Herb]

Not a whole lot about Woodward in that article. Lol.

[LSUDad]

 

 

What does LSU AD hire mean for Tigers ... and Texas A&M?

JEFF BORZELLO AND ADAM RITTENBERG12:25 PM ET6 Minute Read

Scott Woodward, left, will leave his role as athletic director at Texas A&M to take the same position with LSU.C. Morgan Engel-USA TODAY Sports

On Wednesday, ESPN confirmed that Scott Woodward was leaving Texas A&M to become the new athletic director at LSU. Earlier Wednesday, LSU announced that Joe Alleva was stepping down as AD and transitioning into a new role at the university. Alleva had been the Tigers' athletic director since July 2008.

 

For the first time in over a decade, there's a new face in charge of LSU's athletic department. So let's address the key questions.

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How did we get here?

Alleva's stock had been declining among key LSU stakeholders for quite some time. He drew criticism for the drawn-out football coaching transition from Les Miles, nearly fired at the end of the 2015 season, to Ed Orgeron. The angst grew in March after the school suspended men's basketball coach Will Wade, leading to chants for Alleva's firing at the home finale against Vanderbilt.

The chance to move on from Alleva and appoint Woodward to lead the athletic department proved too appealing to pass up. Woodward gives LSU national credibility, a track record of big-time coaching hires and local/institutional knowledge as a Baton Rouge native and an LSU alum and ex-administrator.

Is Jimbo Fisher going to follow Woodward out the door to LSU?

Jimbo Fisher has no buyout at Texas A&M, which will lead to speculation about a possible poaching.C. Morgan Engel-USA TODAY Sports

Fisher arrived at Texas A&M with an unprecedented contract -- 10 years, $75 million and, perhaps most shocking, zero buyout. But the man providing that sweetened deal also played a major role in getting Fisher there. Woodward and Fisher worked together at LSU in the early 2000s, and Fisher said Woodward's presence at Texas A&M swayed him to accept the job.

"As he told me in his vision for the place and what he had and he told me the president's vision and the chancellor's and the board of regents', it was a no-brainer," Fisher said at his introduction at A&M.

It's unlikely Fisher will have the same rapport with Texas A&M's next athletic director. But he already has the resources and financial backing that he grumbled about at Florida State. Fisher knows he can win big in Aggieland. He also likely would be at the top of LSU's -- and now Woodward's -- wish list if there's a football vacancy in Baton Rouge.

Will Buzz Williams have any buyer's remorse about taking the Texas A&M job?

Doubtful. Williams left Virginia Tech earlier this month after five seasons with the Hokies to take over in College Station. It's a job Williams had been eyeing for a long time, and one for which he had been considered the heavy favorite for more than a year. He's a Texas native who spent two seasons as an assistant coach at Texas A&M from 2004 to 2006. Williams more than likely would have taken the job regardless of the athletic director.

When a new athletic director takes over, there's always the chance that he and the coaches won't get along or won't click like the previous regime. But as long as Williams has the same success at A&M that he had at Virginia Tech and Marquette, that won't be an issue.

Does Ed Orgeron have to start worrying about his job again?

Many at LSU had soured on Alleva, but Orgeron wasn't among them. Alleva gave Orgeron his dream job at a time when many viewed him as an effective interim coach and a standout recruiter who had botched his only opportunity to lead a program (10-25 in three seasons at Ole Piss). Orgeron showed tangible progress on the field with LSU in 2018 and last month received a two-year contract extension through 2023. But one or two subpar years at LSU usually results in a coaching change, and Orgeron must impress his new boss this fall with a talent-stocked team.

Orgeron and Woodward can bond over their Louisiana roots and shared love for LSU, but they haven't worked together before. Woodward's track record of splashy football hires -- Chris Petersen at Washington, Fisher at Texas A&M -- will turn up the heat on Coach O to deliver. If SEC championships and College Football Playoff appearances don't come soon, Woodward could make a move, most likely with an eye toward Fisher.

What are the implications for embattled LSU basketball coach Will Wade?

Wade was reinstated to his position on Sunday night, more than a month after he was suspended for not meeting with the school to answer questions about his relationship with Christian Dawkins, the runner-agent who was found guilty in October's FBI trial and will stand trial again next week. In early March, Wade was reported to be caught on wiretaps talking to Dawkins about a "strong-ass offer" for a recruit. Wade was suspended the following day, and interim head coach Tony Benford took over for the SEC and NCAA tournaments. A month later, Wade is back -- and Alleva is out.

One of Woodward's top priorities will be navigating the Will Wade situation.Chuck Cook/USA TODAY Sports

For what it's worth, sources have told ESPN in the past -- before Wade's reported wiretap issues -- that Woodward had been impressed by Wade's quick success at LSU.

How will Woodward handle the current FBI probe?

The March reports of conversations between Wade and Dawkins involved Javonte Smart, the LSU freshman from Baton Rouge who chose the Tigers in June 2017. Once the reports emerged, Wade and Smart were both suspended. Unlike Wade, though, Smart sat down with LSU and NCAA officials and was cleared after missing just one game. Wade was reinstated after a similar interview procedure.

So while the NCAA might be off LSU's back for now, the FBI investigation into college basketball corruption is a different story. Wade, who has denied any wrongdoing, was subpoenaed for next week's federal trial involving Dawkins and Merl Code, both of whom were found guilty in the fall. There is a hearing on Friday to determine whether Wade will have to testify. If he does have to testify -- or if there is evidence shown in court involving Wade -- Wade could still have issues. Woodward will have to wait and see on that front.

What is Woodward's legacy at Texas A&M?

Woodward was in College Station for only three-plus years, but he made two big-time hires, plucking established coaches away from ACC programs. He brought in Williams to lead the basketball program earlier this month after parting ways with Billy Kennedy in March. Kennedy had been in charge of A&M for eight seasons but went to the NCAA tournament just twice and had been on the hot seat for two seasons. Once the Aggies finished 14-18 this season, Woodward had to make a move -- and Williams was the next man up. Given his Texas ties and his three straight NCAA tournaments at Virginia Tech, Williams was a no-brainer hire.

The same holds for Fisher, who won a national championship and three ACC titles at Florida State. He brought instant credibility to a program that, given its financial clout and talent-rich location, had underachieved for many years. Fisher also is one of few former Nick Saban assistants who has won at the highest level, and eventually could challenge Saban's stranglehold on the SEC West. Woodward gave Fisher every resource to compete for championships, and a strong finish to the 2018 season has Aggies fans excited for the future.

What -- and who -- is next at Texas A&M?

Not surprisingly, Woodward's departure isn't sitting well with certain Aggies fans, who are turning their ire toward chancellor John Sharp. While Woodward lured big-time coaches to College Station, the school ultimately lost him to another SEC school. That stings. His successor's priorities should be ensuring Fisher and Williams are happy, and keeping the money flowing into College Station.

Texas A&M could look to Texas Tech's Kirby Hocutt, a respected and sensible option who has led two Power 5 departments. It will be interesting to see how Sharp's presence impacts the Texas A&M search, as he has turned off some around the program and likely was a factor in Woodward's departure from the school.