University of Tennessee’s Vice Chancellor and Director of Athletics Dave Hart announced on Thursday morning that he would be retiring effective June 30, 2017. Hart was hired at UT’s AD in 2011 and has been a rather controversial figure over the last five-plus years he’s been the head of the athletic department.
When Hart took over as UT’s AD, he had quite the mess on his hands. Then just a year later, he had an even bigger mess when he fired Derek Dooley and had to go find a new head football coach. In his tenure, Hart has hired four head coaches in Tennessee’s main athletics, helped merge the athletic department, and guided the Vols out of a budget deficit.
But for all the good Hart did, he also had his fair share of bad publicity and mistakes as well.
The Good
Dave Hart did plenty of good during his time as Tennessee’s Athletic Director. And he still has plenty of time left to do more good before he officially retires. Time will tell if he does or not, but he at least had done these three main things while being the head of Tennessee’s athletic department.
Hiring Butch Jones
You can say whatever you want about the way Hart hired Butch Jones. You can say he “lucked into it” or “stumbled into the hire” after so many other coaches turned down the head coaching position for Tennessee’s football team. But the fact remains that Hart and Jones will remain synonymous with each other.
Hart fired Derek Dooley before the end of the 2012 football season. That gave them a few more weeks to look for a successor. Unfortunately for the Vols, several of their top candidates turned them down, including most notoriously Charlie Strong, then the head coach of Louisville.
Finally, Hart was able to hire Jones, and he couldn’t have asked for a better hire in retrospect.
Jones came in and immediately recruited at a high clip, and although the results on the field weren’t there in his first year, he has improved Tennessee’s win total every season he’s been head coach and looks poised to get the Vols back to prominence this season.
Hart will most famously be tied to his hiring of Butch Jones. And even if things ultimately go south with Jones at UT, his hiring brought stability back to the football program.
Getting Out of the Deficit
When Dave Hart was brought in as Tennessee’s AD, the department was in a financial deficit, something no major athletic department like UT should be in. But there they were.
The 2011-12 fiscal year saw UT’s athletic department report a $3.98 million deficit for that year. Hart was in charge of getting more revenue in to the program, and he was able to do just that.
Just four years later, and the department was back above water.
UT announced in September of last year that the 2014-15 fiscal year posted a $13.1 million surplus for the athletic department, completely erasing that black eye of a deficit just a few years ago.
Now the athletic department is much healthier and viable. Dave Hart played a large part in that.
Bringing on Nike
This move was almost universally hailed as a brilliant move by Hart and the athletic department when it was first announced in 2014. Tennessee had been under Adidas for years, and many felt it was time to change over to the largest and most recognizable brand out there.
And that’s just what Tennessee did.
The money brought in with the Nike deal may now pale in comparison to other newer deals, especially Michigan’s deal with Nike, but bringing on Nike as Tennessee’s apparel sponsor was still a good overall move by Hart and the department. It injected some excitement into the program and gave them some positive headlines in a time when they needed them.
Say what you want about the finances of the deal, but bringing on Nike and getting rid of Adidas was a solid move by Hart and the athletic department.
The Bad
Of course, there has been plenty of bad during Hart’s tenure as UT’s AD as well. From minor missteps to major gaffes, Hart has made his fair share of unpopular decisions as well.
Hiring Donnie Tyndall
When Cuonzo Martin bolted for California, the Vols were unexpectedly left without a head basketball coach. So Hart and a search firm went out and looked for the best fit for Tennessee’s vacancy.
Then they found Donnie Tyndall at Southern Miss. And on the surface, Tyndall looked like a great hire. He had the type of personality and salesmanship Vol fans fell in love with while Bruce Pearl was Tennessee’s head basketball coach.
Unfortunately for Tyndall and the Vols, he also had the NCAA issues Pearl had.
Tyndall was fired just a year after being hired after the NCAA investigated his time at Southern Miss and found he and his staff had provided impermissible academic benefits to their players. The good news was that UT wasn’t implicated in anything and would face no charges because of Tyndall, but it was still a massive oversight by the athletic department to hire him in the first place.
Hart claimed he and the search committee did their homework and vetted Tyndall properly. But they obviously did not, and the tumultuous situation was a major black eye on the university at the time.
Removing the Lady Vols
The idea itself of removing the Lady Vols brand from UT may not be terrible on the surface if done in the name of unity. But it was the way Hart went about handling the situation that drew ire from fans and media.
Hart announced in 2014 that the Lady Vols brand would be dissolved in all of UT’s women’s athletics except for the basketball team. That in itself caused an uproar, raising questions as to why Hart and the department would bother removing the Lady Vol name from only some teams and not all.
Then there was Hart’s reaction to it all that only made things worse.
Hart vehemently refused to have open discussions about the removal of the Lady Vols name, instead insisting that he and the department knew what was best. A loud portion of the fan base was extremely outspoken against Hart on this matter, and many still hold a grudge against him to this day because of it.
The Title IX Lawsuit
Of all the infamous things associated with Dave Hart’s tenure as UT’s AD, this one by far received the most national scrutiny.
The University of Tennessee was hit with a Title IX lawsuit in February of 2016, as anonymous plaintiffs claimed the university “created a student culture that enables sexual assaults by student-athletes, especially football players, and then uses an unusual, legalistic adjudication process that is biased against victims who step forward.”
The lawsuit mainly focused on the football program, but the accusations were leveled against multiple areas of the university. UT decided to fight it initially, and Dave Hart, as well as others, maintained the university’s innocence the whole time.
Then four months later, the university settled the lawsuit.
Settling was probably the best decision in a situation that didn’t present any perfect options. But the hit the university took during the months the lawsuit was active was noticeable, and Hart didn’t exactly handle the situation as well as he could have. The PR nightmare wasn’t as bad as it could have been, but it certainly could’ve been better.
Hart’s Legacy
Ultimately, Dave Hart will be remembered as one of the more controversial figures in Tennessee’s athletic department. He did his fair share of good work for UT, but he also had plenty of mistakes that marred his tenure.
In short, Hart did what he was brought in to do. He righted Tennessee’s ship and brought stability to areas that needed it most. And although he wasn’t the most “people friendly” AD around, he did the dirty work and leaves Tennessee’s athletic department in better shape than it was when he got there.
Now it’s time to find a successor that can take the department even higher.
