Gonzaga athletic director Chris Standiford joined Dan Dickau on the latest episode of Gonzaga Nation.
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00:00 (upbeat music)
00:02 - Welcome back to another episode of Gonzaga Nation,
00:08 a special edition episode right around the Christmas break
00:13 with Gonzaga's athletic director, Chris Standifird.
00:17 So Chris, thanks for joining.
00:19 I know your time is very busy these days,
00:22 but appreciate the time.
00:23 - I appreciate the opportunity.
00:24 - Well, I say lots of things going on because of your world.
00:29 Interesting news came out and we'll talk about that
00:31 probably in depth yesterday.
00:33 It sounds like the WCC may be making some adjustments
00:37 to the lineup of schools.
00:39 Tell us what you know at this point.
00:42 Obviously it's a fluid kind of process,
00:45 lots of moving parts still, but where are we at
00:47 or what do you know where we're at now?
00:49 - Actually, I don't have a lot of details yet.
00:51 We're meeting today to discuss the matter.
00:54 I don't know the position that Stu's placed
00:59 the conference in.
01:00 He's done an amazing job of being proactive
01:03 and working hard to put the West Coast Conference
01:05 in the best position in this changing landscape.
01:07 So I'm anxious to learn.
01:09 I would anticipate just reading the Twitter feeds
01:14 like everybody else, that there's a lot of speculation
01:18 around what sports would be up for membership.
01:23 And so we're anxious to meet today to learn more.
01:28 I don't know if we'll get to a vote or not,
01:29 but probably by the time this gets posted,
01:32 it'll be old news.
01:34 But I think it'd be a great addition for our conference.
01:37 I think that there's some things,
01:39 particularly in the sport of women's basketball,
01:41 it'd be terrific for our program
01:43 to have some really worthy competitors
01:45 that are added to the league.
01:47 So there'll be some details that I'll be anxious to learn,
01:52 but in concept, I think it's great.
01:54 - Well, we're gonna touch on that again a little bit later,
01:56 but you're in a position as athletic director
02:00 where there's been unbelievable consistency at the top.
02:03 Mike Roth was there for a long time.
02:05 Coach Few's been a head coach, obviously, for 25 years now.
02:09 How much does that stability
02:13 allow Gonzaga to really flourish?
02:16 - Well, it's defined Gonzaga in many ways, in my experience.
02:20 I've been at Gonzaga since I was an undergrad.
02:23 Mike Roth is an amazing leader, mentor, and friend of mine.
02:27 He's done tremendous things
02:29 to elevate the athletic program over his time there.
02:34 We've also had great leadership across campus,
02:38 thinking back to Harry Slatic and Father Spitzer,
02:40 and certainly Thane today,
02:42 have done things that have really empowered
02:44 the athletic department to grow
02:46 and to be nimble at times when,
02:49 college athletics for a long time was seen very static,
02:54 but Gonzaga has really been able to grow
02:56 and change its identity within that framework.
03:00 So now that college athletics has become pretty unstable,
03:05 we see it as an opportunity.
03:07 With change comes opportunity,
03:08 and hopefully we're able to capitalize on something now.
03:12 But in retrospect, looking back,
03:14 I've just been incredibly fortunate
03:16 to be surrounded by great mentors, great leaders,
03:20 people who have taught me how to do things the right way.
03:24 I think, you know, when I think of Gonzaga athletics
03:26 and what really defines my experience,
03:30 it's been about just great character, great people,
03:33 Coach Few, running a program the right way,
03:36 growing, not just a program to win,
03:41 but being a part of an educational process
03:44 really helps young men become adults and ready for life.
03:48 - When you, let's take both Coach Few and Mike Roth,
03:52 leaders, mentors, if there's one or two
03:57 certain characteristics about each of them
03:59 that you've tried to apply for yourself
04:01 in the role of athletic director,
04:03 as you've kind of really kind of taken that on,
04:06 what would those be?
04:07 - If with Mike, it's humility, leading with humility,
04:11 always trying to be there for others,
04:14 recognizing that it's not about me,
04:17 it's my job to help people be successful.
04:21 For Coach Few, it's never see limitation,
04:25 never see obstacle, just see opportunity.
04:28 He has an amazing ability to believe
04:30 that anything can be accomplished at Gonzaga,
04:33 and it's served us very well.
04:35 - It has served very well,
04:37 obviously 20 plus years consecutively in the NCAA tournament,
04:40 a couple of Final Fours.
04:42 The conversation gets brought up every single year
04:45 about does the WCC challenge Gonzaga?
04:48 And I've always pushed back on the narrative
04:50 when people say it doesn't, because look,
04:52 you've been to two Final Fours,
04:54 you've been in National Title Games,
04:55 you've been in eight straight Sweet 16s,
04:58 the league's good enough to get you where you wanna go,
05:00 but you mentioned the ever-changing landscape
05:02 of college athletics, you never know
05:05 what's gonna be out there a week from now.
05:07 I mean, you're talking about you're on a call later today
05:09 with the rest of the WCC about present opportunities.
05:14 How kind of forward-thinking do you have to be
05:18 and how big-picture do you have to take in
05:21 every bit of information that comes in
05:23 to make sure that you see all the opportunities
05:26 that are out there for Gonzaga?
05:28 - I think you just have to be a great listener.
05:30 You have to anticipate and know what's going on
05:34 in the moment, but also just trying to be
05:37 a little bit strategic of where it's gonna go,
05:39 use some logic.
05:40 Clearly, the tenor of the student-athlete experience
05:45 has changed.
05:47 The narrative nationally has changed.
05:51 We are in a situation where the judiciary
05:53 has really changed the definition of a student-athlete
05:56 and how we respond to that as an industry
06:00 is really in question.
06:02 Clearly, President Baker has a vision
06:06 that I believe is very rooted in his experience
06:11 as a politician to try and gain some antitrust exemption
06:15 relief so that the NCAA can govern again.
06:17 And yet, at the same time, we're not going back.
06:21 It's not going to be a situation where we're going
06:24 to revert to where we were pre-NIL.
06:27 The student-athletes' opportunity to utilize
06:30 their name, image, and likeness for their benefit
06:32 is here to stay as it should be.
06:34 And the question is how are we going to adapt
06:37 as an industry and be able to economically support that
06:41 as well as the really critical mission-driven experiences
06:46 that we have in college athletics for our students.
06:50 It's such an incredible opportunity
06:52 to experience higher education in the most formative way
06:55 where they can take something that they're gifted at
06:58 and leverage it for the opportunity to have school paid for
07:01 but also to really take their experience
07:05 and have it be a really formative part of their life.
07:08 - So let's go back to, you mentioned the NCAA's
07:11 new President Baker and some of the proposals
07:14 that he brought up a week or so ago.
07:17 And it's necessary that the NCAA is going to have to change
07:21 in some way.
07:22 I mean, the TV contracts, the conference realignment
07:25 is continuing to drive these changes.
07:28 But if we're going to keep the NCAA
07:29 in college athletics somewhat normal
07:32 to what people's expectations are
07:34 and what their experiences have been,
07:36 can you give us kind of maybe a quick synopsis
07:39 of what his outline was and is?
07:41 - Sure, his outline is essentially a little bit
07:45 of a bifurcation of Division I,
07:47 trying to identify that the 360-ish schools
07:51 that are in Division I are not similar.
07:53 And at the very top,
07:55 the economics are dramatically different.
07:58 And so he proposed a structure
08:01 which was very provocative.
08:03 It was intentionally so to try and create discussion
08:07 amongst the membership of what would it be like
08:09 if we moved to a model where the institution
08:13 had more direct control over additional compensation
08:16 to student athletes.
08:17 And it's caused quite a stir.
08:19 It's caused a great deal of consternation,
08:22 particularly for long-term athletic administrators
08:25 because we're in an environment
08:27 that it's essentially a false economy.
08:29 We have a great deal of revenue
08:32 that's come into the space in the last 20 years,
08:35 and it all gets consumed by the enterprise.
08:38 And so the question is,
08:39 if you're going to reallocate some of those revenues,
08:43 what expenses are gonna go away?
08:45 And most expenses are long-term.
08:48 They're capital investments in facilities,
08:50 they're long-term investments in coaches,
08:52 certainly in programming.
08:54 The idea of taking any student-centric programming away
08:57 right now would be a disaster.
08:59 So what he's really done is he's laid out
09:01 a kind of a bright line of,
09:05 hey, if this is what we're going to do,
09:07 we need to really start the discussion on how we do it
09:11 because what we're doing right now
09:13 is just talking in circles and Congress isn't listening.
09:16 - And it's, from my experience and my viewpoint,
09:19 it's something that can't be fixed overnight.
09:21 It's gonna take a long ramp to kind of figure out
09:24 the details and how to do it and then how to implement it.
09:27 Am I right with that?
09:28 - Absolutely.
09:29 I think that's the critical part of it
09:31 is that there's structural change
09:32 that's going to need to be implemented over time.
09:35 And I'm not sure that there's a lot of people
09:36 that are patient for that right now.
09:39 So I think first and foremost,
09:40 my greatest wish is just to give the NCAA the tools
09:45 to start to make those changes.
09:46 But right now they're in absolute paralysis and gridlock
09:50 with every time they try to make any kind of judgment,
09:53 either a state's attorney general
09:54 or some group of lawyers is gonna turn around and sue them
09:57 'cause they have no protection.
09:59 And that's a relatively recent phenomenon
10:01 since the Alston case hearing at the Supreme Court.
10:06 And so that's what we need to get fixed first and foremost,
10:09 'cause I do believe in the NCAA,
10:11 not necessarily the giant bureaucracy that it's become,
10:13 but it's purpose and its leadership
10:17 is one that I believe in right now
10:19 and that I think given the right tools
10:21 could make these structural changes
10:23 that will find an outcome that will satisfy all parties.
10:27 I don't think there's not a scenario
10:29 where we can do everything.
10:30 There's simply not, even at the highest levels,
10:33 there's just not enough money.
10:34 I think if we can keep our focus on higher education,
10:38 educating students, the entertainment value that we bring
10:41 generates revenue, but it shouldn't be the sole purpose
10:43 that college athletics exists for.
10:46 And if we can get enough people on that page,
10:50 get some support from Congress,
10:51 I think that there's a real chance
10:53 of making meaningful changes to college athletics
10:57 that will serve us well for a long time.
10:58 - And the hard part is, is it's not like,
11:00 say the NBA or the NFL,
11:02 where you're only looking at one sport
11:04 and 30 to 34 franchises.
11:07 You're looking at, as you mentioned, over 360
11:09 and not all those schools have the same exact sports
11:13 and they don't have the same emphasis on winning
11:17 or even supporting of those sports.
11:19 So it's gotta be looked at in so many different angles.
11:21 - Yeah, and I think there's no question
11:24 that football is the issue here.
11:29 They generate 80 to 90% of the revenue in the Power Five.
11:34 They do an amazing job of generating revenue
11:36 that subsidizes everything else.
11:38 In many places, basketball as well.
11:42 So I think until we really have an honest conversation
11:45 about the economics of college athletics,
11:47 we're not really gonna get to the solution.
11:49 A college football player
11:52 also doesn't have a path to professionalism,
11:54 like a college basketball player or other people.
11:57 There's a lot of professional opportunities
11:59 that exist without having to go to school.
12:00 That doesn't really exist for a football player.
12:03 So until we get that part fixed,
12:05 until we really identify that football is different,
12:08 I think it's gonna be hard to make the structural changes.
12:11 - One of the things that I think the NCAA
12:13 has done a nice job of easing restrictions and rules
12:18 is the NIL space.
12:19 I've always felt going back to when I was a player,
12:23 like, why can't I get $500
12:25 to run a basketball camp at that time?
12:27 Why can't I get a free meal here or there?
12:29 Obviously, the rules have changed now.
12:32 But I think because the NCAA took so long
12:34 to implement something, there's no guardrails.
12:37 You essentially have no salary cap for some,
12:41 I can't call it schools, some connection,
12:45 some collectives that might have some deep pockets,
12:48 some deep donors.
12:49 I've always felt like freshmen should make X
12:52 increases as a sophomore, junior, senior,
12:55 team bonuses, individual bonuses
12:57 for, say, all-league or player of the year.
12:59 But because the NCAA didn't do anything for so long,
13:01 and unfortunately there were programs,
13:04 multi-sports that did things under the table,
13:08 something had to happen that NIL came about.
13:11 How has the NCAA not doing anything
13:14 really created this opportunity
13:18 or this disadvantage for a lot of schools?
13:21 And what's your overall view of the NIL
13:23 and what needs to happen?
13:25 - I think the first thing I would say
13:26 is that an unintended consequence
13:29 is it's devalued the scholarship.
13:31 An athletic scholarship is an incredible gift
13:34 to any student athlete in the context of
13:39 not just the opportunity or the access
13:41 to a particular institution that,
13:42 in many cases, it provides,
13:44 but just the economic certainty
13:46 that they don't have to worry about
13:47 paying for anything during their college experience.
13:51 And then you have, and I think that's
13:54 for the vast majority of college athletes,
13:57 that's really their goal, right?
13:59 They're trying to, and there's a lot of rules
14:02 that exist that limit scholarships right now.
14:04 In a lot of men's sports,
14:06 you can't provide full scholarships
14:08 to all your student athletes.
14:09 If I were making structural changes in the NCAA,
14:12 I would focus there before the individual income.
14:15 My personal philosophy is that we have
14:18 an opportunity to try and create change
14:21 in a human being's life.
14:23 And the more that we can foster an environment
14:26 where they can have agency in their own success,
14:29 the more we've helped them along in that process.
14:33 The more that we structurally create entitlements for them,
14:36 I think we're doing the opposite.
14:38 So I love NIL for the fact that it is about agency.
14:42 It's about you as an athlete taking your name,
14:45 image, and likeness, and becoming an entrepreneur,
14:47 using your initiative to go out
14:50 and exploit your own image
14:53 for the benefit of yourself economically.
14:56 But that doesn't necessarily mean
14:58 that everything that we do,
14:59 or everything that we're talking about now
15:01 that I agree with in the context of,
15:04 should there just be a flat payment
15:05 for every offensive lineman, that sort of thing.
15:08 Maybe there should be.
15:09 I don't even really weigh in on
15:12 whether there should or shouldn't be.
15:13 I would like to see us really maximize
15:16 the opportunities for student athletes,
15:18 first and foremost, in the way that every student has.
15:20 If they want to start a business, great.
15:22 If they want to have an opportunity
15:24 to go out and do an autograph signing
15:26 or those kinds of things, terrific.
15:28 I really, the thing that I value about the collectives
15:32 is it allows us a mechanism,
15:34 and I say us as an industry,
15:36 to have people provide money to a collective
15:39 and then have that collective turn around
15:41 and do good things in the community.
15:43 To go out and have student athletes
15:45 be able to go out and have an impact at a hospital.
15:48 Have them experience community service
15:50 in a way that they're incentivized.
15:52 And I think in the end, they're moved and changed by that.
15:55 I really think that's a big part
15:57 of where I think the collectives role fits in nicely.
16:01 - So for example, Gonzaga, there's the Zags Collective.
16:06 Now you guys can't necessarily be involved
16:09 and tell them or guide them, direct them
16:11 of what you guys think needs to be done.
16:14 But at the same time, you as an athletic department,
16:16 Coach Phiu as a coach, Lisa Foyer,
16:19 you guys need to know what is going on.
16:22 How does that dynamic between athletic department,
16:25 collective, coaches, and all that work?
16:27 - Yeah, so there's regular meetings that take place
16:29 between our compliance staff and the people
16:31 that run the collective just to keep dialogue going
16:34 to make sure that the rules are being followed,
16:36 that there's understanding.
16:38 'Cause the rules are changing constantly.
16:41 Guidance from the NCAA is constantly changing.
16:44 So there's that kind of regular dialogue.
16:46 And there's also, the thing I love about the Zags Collective
16:49 is there's mission alignment.
16:50 They're really trying to do good in our community
16:53 and trying to be great representatives
16:56 of what we do in our community as well.
16:58 So, it's an awkward time in that there's really
17:02 no structural connections that we're allowed
17:04 to have per NCAA rules right now.
17:07 I think that's gonna change.
17:09 I'm only speculating, but I think that there's enough
17:13 growth in the collective space that the NCAA recognizes
17:17 that there's a lot of risk that comes with that
17:19 and better connectivity would be a helpful thing
17:22 for everybody.
17:23 - I'm sure alignment between vision
17:26 of an athletic department and vision of a collective
17:28 for whatever school it would be would be very important.
17:31 So, you're not going in two separate directions
17:34 or telling a potential student athlete two separate things
17:37 that would be obviously detrimental.
17:41 Conference realignment is obviously exploded
17:44 over the last couple of years.
17:45 You see now that PAC 12 essentially is gone.
17:48 Yes, we've touched on WSU, OSU are having
17:52 very intense meetings now with the WCC.
17:56 But the Big 12 is expanding, the Big East has expanded.
18:00 When Gonzaga gets lumped into those conversations
18:04 with news leagues, different things,
18:06 somebody has to find out there was a conversation.
18:10 Is it you guys actively looking to talk to a league?
18:13 Is it a league talking to you?
18:15 Is it a consultant that's kind of a middleman
18:17 that's maybe trying to broker a deal?
18:19 How does that typically come about?
18:21 - Well, let me just start with,
18:24 we're proud members of the West Coast Conference.
18:27 We've had terrific success.
18:28 It's been an incredible run for Gonzaga in the conference
18:33 and it's served us very, very well.
18:36 And we're grateful for our partners in the conference.
18:38 They're great institutions.
18:40 And we're not trying to run away from that.
18:44 But as the environment changes,
18:47 we have to continue to just leave our options open.
18:50 And this isn't like the last two years.
18:52 This has been the last 10 years.
18:55 To make sure that you're available
18:57 for conversations and discussions.
18:59 Certainly the Gonzaga brand has been elevated
19:01 by Mark and his program and Lisa
19:04 and a lot of work, Coach Maktoff,
19:07 a lot of really good, Tyson.
19:09 We've got a bunch of great coaches
19:12 that have done terrific things.
19:14 And as that brand elevates,
19:16 opportunities change and conversations happen.
19:19 I would say that to answer your question directly,
19:23 they're more mutual.
19:26 We're not actively out there seeking membership
19:28 in other conferences with trying to ring up
19:31 different commissioners and saying, "Hey, let's talk."
19:34 That's not at all where we're at.
19:36 But when there's people that think
19:39 that we would be a good fit somewhere,
19:40 we're open to those discussions.
19:42 And that's really how we've gotten to where we're at.
19:44 - Use a hypothetical, Gonzaga does switch leagues,
19:49 whatever it may be.
19:50 Is there changes to facilities,
19:52 like say the McCarthy Athletic Center
19:54 that would need to happen?
19:55 'Cause I'm just looking at,
19:56 say it is the Big East or the Big 12.
20:00 You're talking about most of those arenas
20:02 are 10, 12,000 plus.
20:05 Would there be changes that would have to be done
20:08 within the athletic department?
20:10 - Well, McCarthy Athletic Center
20:12 is an amazing place to play college basketball.
20:14 And that environment is not something
20:15 that we would wanna mess with.
20:16 We'd look at everything.
20:19 There'd have to be some configuration changes
20:21 in terms of seating.
20:22 Different conferences have different obligations
20:25 to visitors, that sort of thing.
20:26 So there could be some disruption on that side.
20:30 The Spokane Arena is a great venue too,
20:31 and it's available to us on occasion
20:34 that would help maybe identify some opportunities there
20:38 or facilitate some opportunities.
20:40 But as a facility in and of itself, McCarthy's great.
20:45 I don't think there would need to be any structural changes
20:47 or the insufficiencies because of it.
20:50 Now, from a revenue perspective,
20:52 whatever happens next in college athletics,
20:56 the only thing that we know with some certainty
20:57 is it's gonna be more expensive.
20:59 It already is.
21:00 The transformation committee's changes
21:02 have driven up expenses directly
21:04 in terms of supporting student athletes.
21:06 They're great changes.
21:07 And we've got a tremendous donor base
21:10 that's been incredibly generous.
21:12 One of my favorite answers to being asked,
21:16 what makes Gonzaga special?
21:18 How does all this happen?
21:19 It's all the things we've talked about,
21:21 but it's also our community.
21:22 Spokane has embraced Gonzaga in a way
21:25 that has really elevated us,
21:27 and it's allowed us to do a lot of things.
21:29 And I would expect that whatever that next phase for us is,
21:32 we'll lean heavy into the community
21:34 and hope to continue to have that support as well.
21:38 - With TV rights and those fees exploding,
21:42 Gonzaga doesn't have football.
21:44 I can only imagine there's no conversation
21:46 about having football
21:47 because the basketball program's been so good.
21:51 But how does that change the dynamic of the TV rights deals,
21:56 whether it's the WCC
21:58 or when there is other conversations going on?
22:01 - Well, you know TV better than I do, Dan,
22:03 but one of the things that seems evident to me
22:06 is TV has really grown in terms of maybe its total spend,
22:12 but it's really starting to value premium content over mass.
22:17 And so you're seeing a lot of the money
22:22 start to move into the more premier content.
22:25 And as the digital players in Amazon and Apple,
22:28 their strategies are really clear.
22:29 They just go for the biggest brands in the biggest moments.
22:33 So I think that we're gonna continue to see pressure
22:36 where the rich get richer
22:38 and that the conferences like the West Coast Conference
22:41 will continue to be under pressure economically
22:46 on the TV side,
22:47 because they're gonna see those opportunities
22:49 go to these bigger leagues
22:51 that have more linear opportunities
22:53 and now that these, you're talking 16, 18,
22:57 probably 20 team conferences pretty soon.
22:59 - With all of this realignment that occurs,
23:03 do you see a day,
23:05 and you kind of touched on it a little bit earlier,
23:07 do you see a day where it's football is completely separate
23:10 and then maybe every other sport reverts back
23:13 to what their previous conference alignment
23:16 and affiliations were?
23:17 - I don't know.
23:19 That part's really hard for me.
23:20 I think the first step is just an honest economic evaluation
23:25 of what football does for college athletics
23:27 and understanding how do we find a way
23:31 to meet some of these contemporary goals
23:35 for student athletes,
23:37 particularly football student athletes
23:39 in that economy, right?
23:41 And so, one of the things I kind of chuckle at sometimes
23:45 is you have football coaches that come up with ideas
23:47 on how to fix the whole thing.
23:49 They're really looking out for those cross country kids,
23:51 I understand that.
23:52 - Yeah.
23:53 - But there's a lot of misinformation
23:56 about what conference competition looks like.
23:58 There's a lot of sports that the totality
24:01 of conference competition is a championship.
24:03 That's it.
24:04 That's simply, you show up once a year
24:06 at a common location and compete against each other.
24:09 So when you look at the full,
24:13 and obviously when you look at the Ivy League
24:16 or the Big 10 and even the Pac-12 schools,
24:19 they had 30 sports.
24:21 Well, when you look at the SEC,
24:22 you're talking 16 or 18 sports.
24:24 So there's a lot of variance within Division I,
24:28 even at the highest level,
24:30 that do you need to change the structures for all sports?
24:35 Maybe, maybe not.
24:39 But maybe just change the structures
24:41 on how those sports compete,
24:43 where you have a lot more non-conference,
24:44 regionalized schedule,
24:46 with a more consolidated conference championship format.
24:50 Those things, and it depends greatly by sport, certainly.
24:53 Some sports don't lend itself well to that.
24:55 Baseball needs inter-conference competition.
25:00 But the vast majority,
25:04 I shouldn't even qualify with it.
25:06 A lot of the sports in the context
25:10 of the sports we participate in,
25:12 regionality is nice,
25:16 and it gets exercised on a non-conference basis.
25:19 But the conference schedule's
25:21 not a significant part of what we do.
25:22 - Yeah, I mean, when you look at the non-conference
25:24 for Gonzaga, it's essentially 13-ish games a year.
25:28 The conference is 16.
25:30 If it does expand, it'll become probably close to 20.
25:33 But obviously, as someone who's been around
25:36 the Gonzaga Athletic Department,
25:39 kinda come up through the ranks,
25:40 now you're the athletic director,
25:42 obviously, Gonzaga men's basketball
25:44 has driven a lot of growth.
25:46 But there's other great athletic programs.
25:49 Is there maybe a coach or two
25:50 that just has blown you away with their vision,
25:54 or their ability to take the program
25:56 from here to the next level?
25:58 - I couldn't pick one.
26:00 I think that generally our coaches are amazing people,
26:05 first and foremost with the culture they build.
26:09 And I think of Coach Maktoff a lot
26:14 in our baseball program,
26:16 and the impact that he's had on his student athletes.
26:19 And then the outcomes have been progressive,
26:23 and they just got better and better and better.
26:25 You know, and there's always a little bump towards the end
26:28 in terms of recency bias,
26:30 in terms of how the program's doing.
26:31 But when you look back over large swaths of time,
26:34 and you see the great outcomes,
26:37 and those outcomes aren't just competitive,
26:40 although they're the things that we're marking,
26:42 but they're also graduation rates.
26:44 They're activity in the community.
26:46 They're the way they show up on campus
26:50 for their fellow classmates.
26:51 It's been a terrific run between,
26:57 I mean, obviously what Pat Tyson's done
26:59 in our cross country track program is amazing.
27:03 He's an amazing person that has a huge impact
27:06 on our community, and certainly on the running community.
27:10 And Jake Stewart, similarly on the women's side,
27:14 has come in from the University of Illinois,
27:16 and really just changed our expectations
27:19 of what our women can accomplish in the running program.
27:23 You know, we had a terrific year in women's soccer this year
27:27 and I am so excited for Katie Benz
27:30 to take over as our head coach.
27:31 She is a rock star, and I just think
27:34 that where that program's going is amazing.
27:37 So yeah, listen, I'm--
27:40 - I guess it's like picking a favorite.
27:41 - It is, it's like I'm gifted with so many amazing people
27:45 that I work with, not just coaches, staff,
27:48 our senior staff, we talked about longevity.
27:50 If you look at our senior staff,
27:51 I don't even know what the average tenure is,
27:53 but it's probably north of 15 years.
27:55 And a bunch of them are Zags.
27:57 You know, it's just a special place,
28:00 and I'm incredibly blessed to have the opportunity
28:04 to be amongst them.
28:05 And I look at it as a continuation of the work
28:10 of Mike Roth and the people that came before me,
28:12 but I also look at it as, you know,
28:14 there's someone that's gonna come after me
28:16 that's gonna inherit what we do,
28:18 and it better be better than what I inherited,
28:22 because that's my responsibility.
28:24 And that outcome is gonna be the outcome
28:27 of the people around me,
28:28 not anything that I do individually.
28:30 - Well, Chris, I really appreciate the time.
28:32 I know as an athletic director in this time
28:34 and day and age of everything going on,
28:37 your time is limited.
28:38 So I know there's a big conference call later today.
28:41 If you don't mind, if maybe you can text me an update
28:43 so we can kind of have the inside scoop,
28:46 we would greatly appreciate it,
28:47 but we really appreciate the time.
28:49 - All right, thanks for the opportunity, Dan.
28:51 - For Gonzaga Nation,
28:53 the athletic director of the Zags, Chris Standifird.
28:55 I'm your host, Dan Dickow.
28:57 Thanks for watching.
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