Six years ago, Mack Rhoades left Missouri to become Baylor’s Vice President and Director of Intercollegiate Athletics (I wrote the literal tiniest ever blog post about him and spelled his name wrong!) and I don’t think any of us knew how lucky we were to have gotten him! Since Rhoades came to Baylor, the Athletics department collected 24 Big 12 Conference titles and 6 national championships. With nearly every university in the country lusting after Rhoades for their Athletic Director, yesterday we all breathed a collective sigh of relief to hear that Baylor signed him to a 10-year contract extension with the approval of President Linda A. Livingstone and the Board of Regents.
In yesterday’s press release Rhoades said “Amy and I have felt called to be at Baylor University and remain an integral part of Baylor’s future. It is a blessing to work with President Livingstone, who leads our University with great integrity and vision, and to continue to work alongside our championship coaches, staff and student-athletes for the next decade as we continue our mission of ‘Preparing Champions for Life.’ We are humbled and appreciative of the confidence reflected in us by the Board of Regents, President Livingstone and University leadership. We are excited Baylor has given us the opportunity to finish my career as the University’s Athletics Director.”
Rhoades has made some incredible coaching hires, most notably Head Football Coach Dave Aranda and Women’s Basketball Coach Nicki Collen. In March 2020, the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics named Rhoades their 2019-20 Under Armour Athletics Director of the Year and the Sports Business Journal gave him the 2021 Athletics Director of the Year honor. One of Baylor Athletics’ greatest accomplishments under Rhoades’ tenure was becoming the first ever Big 12 university to win football, men’s and women’s basketball regular-season championships all in the same year (last season). Baylor also became the first Power Five school to sweep the basketball conference regular-season titles in consecutive seasons (2021 and 2022). We are extraordinarily lucky to have Mack as our Athletic Director and under his leadership, we’ll continue seeing great athletic success!!
