Greg Sankey (born 1964 [1] ) is the commissioner of the Southeastern Conference. He was previously employed by the SEC for 13 years in various capacities. Prior to that, he was the commissioner of the Southland Conference. [2] [3]
Greg Sankey (born 1964 [1] ) is the commissioner of the Southeastern Conference. He was previously employed by the SEC for 13 years in various capacities. Prior to that, he was the commissioner of the Southland Conference. [2] [3]
Sankey is a native of Auburn, New York. [4] [5]
Sankey started college as an engineering major at LeTourneau College in Longview, Texas [6] but soon returned back to New York. He earned his associate's degree from Cayuga Community College and an undergraduate degree in education from the State University of New York at Cortland in 1987. [5] [7] While working as the director of intramural sports at Utica College, he earned his master's degree in education from Syracuse University's School of Education in 1993. [5] [8]
Sankey began his career as the director of intramural sports at Utica College. [9] After completing a one-year internship at athletic department of Northwestern State University in Natchitoches, Louisiana, Sankey was hired as the compliance director there. He also coached the university’s golf teams for two years and worked there until 1992. [10] [11]
Sankey joined the Southland Conference in 1992, continuing work on compliance issues, ultimately becoming commissioner in 1996. [12]
In 2002, when the SEC was having compliance issues, then-commissioner Mike Slive hired Sankey as an associate commissioner. When Slive retired in 2015, Sankey was named the league's eighth commissioner. [11] [12] During his tenure as commissioner, the SEC has expanded, adding Texas and Oklahoma to the conference in July 2021. [13]
Sankey in March 2024 raised controversy by suggesting the NCAA men's basketball postseason tournament get rid of automatic berths, thus limiting tournament appearance and financial windfall opportunities for smaller programs and conferences. Auburn and Kentucky were upset in the Round of 64, which didn't make Sankey's arguments legitimate. [14]
Sankey married his wife Cathy in November 1988 in New York. [6] They reside in Birmingham, Alabama and have two adult daughters, one of whom went to a SEC school at Mississippi State University. [15] Sankey is an avid marathoner and has run 41 marathons. [16]
Conference USA (CUSA) is an intercollegiate athletic conference whose member institutions are located within the Southern United States and Western United States. The conference participates in the NCAA's Division I in all sports. CUSA's offices are located in Dallas, Texas.
The Sun Belt Conference (SBC) is a collegiate athletic conference that has been affiliated with the NCAA's Division I since 1976. Originally a non-football conference, the Sun Belt began sponsoring football in 2001. Its football teams participate in the Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS). The 14 member institutions of the Sun Belt are distributed across the Southern United States.
The Southeastern Conference (SEC) is an American college athletic conference whose member institutions are located primarily in the South Central and Southeastern United States. Its fourteen members include the flagship public universities of ten states, three additional public land-grant universities, and one private research university. The conference is headquartered in Birmingham, Alabama. The SEC participates in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I in sports competitions; for football it is part of the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), formerly known as Division I-A.
The Western Athletic Conference (WAC) is an NCAA Division I conference. The WAC covers a broad expanse of the western United States with member institutions located in Arizona, California, Texas, Utah and Washington.
The Southland Conference, abbreviated as SLC, is a collegiate athletic conference which operates in the South Central United States. It participates in the NCAA's Division I for all sports; for football, it participates in the Division I Football Championship Subdivision (FCS). The Southland sponsors 18 sports, 10 for women and eight for men, and is governed by a presidential Board of Directors and an Advisory Council of athletic and academic administrators. Chris Grant became the Southland's seventh commissioner on April 5, 2022. From 1996 to 2002, for football only, the Southland Conference was known as the Southland Football League.
The Auburn Tigers are the athletic teams representing Auburn University, a public four-year coeducational university located in Auburn, Alabama, United States. The Auburn Tigers compete in Division I of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) as a member of the Southeastern Conference (SEC).
Michael Lawrence Slive was an American attorney and college sports executive. Slive was the commissioner of the Southeastern Conference (SEC), a college athletics association, from 2002 until 2015. As part of his role as the SEC Commissioner, he served as the coordinator of the Bowl Championship Series for the 2006 and 2007 regular seasons. He was a member of the NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Committee through September 2009 and served as the chairman of the committee for the 2008–09 academic year. He retired as commissioner effective July 31, 2015.
Arthur Gustavo Malzahn III is an American football coach. He is currently the head coach at the University of Central Florida (UCF). He was the head football coach at Auburn University from 2013 to 2020. He helped lead the 2010 Auburn Tigers to a National Championship as the team's offensive coordinator. As head coach at Auburn, he led the team to a SEC Championship win and an appearance in the 2014 National Championship. Malzahn has coached Heisman winner Cam Newton and two Heisman finalists: Nick Marshall and Tre Mason, including coaching 14 All-Americans. During Malzahn's tenure at Auburn, he qualified as the second-longest tenured head coach at one school in the SEC, behind Nick Saban. Out of active head coaches, Malzahn also holds the best record against coach Saban.
The Mississippi State Bulldogs football program represents Mississippi State University in the sport of American football. The Bulldogs compete in the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and the Western Division of the Southeastern Conference (SEC). They also have won one SEC championship in 1941 and a division championship in 1998. The Bulldogs have 26 postseason bowl appearances. The program has produced 38 All-Americans, 171 All-SEC selections, and 124 NFL players. The Bulldogs’ home stadium, Davis Wade Stadium at Scott Field, is the second oldest in the NCAA Division I FBS.
The NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), formerly known as Division I-A, is the highest level of college football in the United States. The FBS consists of the largest schools in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). As of the 2024 season, there are 10 conferences and 134 schools in FBS.
The Lamar Cardinals basketball team represents Lamar University in NCAA Division I men's basketball competition. The Cardinals currently play in the Southland Conference following a return from the Western Athletic Conference on July 11, 2022. They were one of four programs, all from Texas, that left the Southland Conference on July 1, 2021, to join the Western Athletic Conference (WAC). Lamar left the Southland Conference for the second time, having initially joined at the league's formation in 1963, left in 1987, and returned in 1999. After one season in the WAC, Lamar returned to the Southland Conference. The Cardinals have played home games in the Montagne Center since 1984. The Lamar University basketball team is one of the school's most storied athletic programs. The Cardinals have competed in NCAA Tournament play eleven times and six times at the NCAA Division I level with the most recent appearance in the 2012 tournament. The 1979–80 team was one of the 1980 tournament's Sweet Sixteen teams. The Cardinals have also competed in four NIT tournaments. Heading into the 2014–2015 season Lamar had a 284–143 record in the Montagne Center. The Cardinals overall record going into the 2014–2015 season was 922–818.
The Louisiana–Monroe Warhawks football program is a college football team that represents the University of Louisiana at Monroe (ULM).
The College Football Playoff (CFP) is an annual postseason knockout invitational tournament to determine a national champion for the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS), the highest level of college football competition in the United States. It culminates in the College Football Playoff National Championship game. The inaugural tournament was held at the end of the 2014 NCAA Division I FBS football season under a four-team format. The CFP expands to include twelve teams for the 2024 season.
SEC Network (SECN) is an American multinational sports network owned by ESPN Inc., a joint venture between The Walt Disney Company and Hearst Communications. The channel is dedicated to coverage of collegiate sports sanctioned by the Southeastern Conference (SEC) including live and recorded event telecasts, news, analysis programs, and other content focusing on the conference's member schools. The network is estimated to have 70 million subscribers, more than any other dedicated sports network.
The 2016 Southeastern Conference football season was the 84th season of SEC football and took place during the 2016 NCAA Division I FBS football season. The season began on September 1 with Tennessee defeating Appalachian State on the SEC Network. This is the fifth season for the SEC under realignment that took place in 2012 adding Texas A&M and Missouri from the Big 12 Conference. The SEC is a Power Five conference under the College Football Playoff format along with the Atlantic Coast Conference, the Big 12 Conference, the Big Ten Conference, and the Pac-12 Conference.
The 2017 Southeastern Conference football season was the 85th season of SEC football and took place during the 2017 NCAA Division I FBS football season. The season began on August 31 and will end with the 2017 SEC Championship Game on December 2. The SEC is a Power Five conference under the College Football Playoff format along with the Atlantic Coast Conference, the Big 12 Conference, the Big Ten Conference, and the Pac–12 Conference. For the 2017 season, the SEC has 14 teams divided into two divisions of seven each, named East and West.
The 2018 Southeastern Conference football season represents the 86th season of SEC football taking place during the 2018 NCAA Division I FBS football season. The season began on August 30 and will end with the SEC Championship Game, between Alabama and Georgia, on December 1. The SEC is a Power Five conference under the College Football Playoff format along with the Atlantic Coast Conference, the Big 12 Conference, the Big Ten Conference, and the Pac-12 Conference. For the 2018 season, the SEC has 14 teams divided into two divisions of seven each, named East and West.
The 2021–22 NCAA Division I men's basketball season began on November 9, 2021 and concluded on March 13, 2022. The 2022 NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament culminated the season and began on March 15 and concluded on April 4 with the championship game at the Caesars Superdome in New Orleans, Louisiana.
The 2022 Southeastern Conference football season is the 90th season of Southeastern Conference (SEC) football, taking place during the 2022 NCAA Division I FBS football season. The season began on August 27, 2022 and ended with the 2022 SEC Championship Game on December 3, 2022. The SEC is a Power Five conference as part of the College Football Playoff system.
Sankey, 57, was appointed Commissioner...
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