The Division I Men’s Basketball Committee will feature five new members for the 2021-22 season, thanks in part to the Division I Council’s approval in January of a proposal to expand the Men’s and Women’s Basketball Committees from 10 to 12.
Both committees consist of one member selected from each of the five autonomy conferences and three members selected from the seven highest-ranked nonautonomy conferences based on basketball success. The remaining four members are selected from the 20 other conferences. All appointments will be for five years.
Current chair Mitch Barnhart, director of athletics at Kentucky, is completing a five-year term that began in the fall of 2016, while Mountain West Conference Commissioner Craig Thompson is rotating off the committee after a four-year term that started in June 2017. The third person leaving the committee is Mike Bobinski, the director of athletics at Purdue. Bobinski, who served on the committee from 2008-13, rejoined the group in a temporary role after his Big Ten Conference colleague Jim Phillips left his position at Northwestern in January to become commissioner of the Atlantic Coast Conference.
The Big Ten’s representative will now be Mark Coyle, the director of athletics at Minnesota. Coyle has been at his position at Minnesota for nearly five years and previously led the athletics departments at Syracuse and Boise State and served as deputy athletics director at Kentucky. A former football player at Drake, Coyle holds two degrees from the university and a master’s degree from Florida State.
The Pac-12 Conference will be represented by UCLA Athletics Director Martin Jarmond. A graduate of the University of North Carolina Wilmington, Jarmond was a two-year captain on the men’s basketball team at UNCW and led the team to its first NCAA tournament appearance in 2000. He also holds a master’s degree from Ohio. He previously served as director of athletics at Boston College and worked in the athletics departments at Ohio State and Michigan State. Jarmond is a former member of the Division I Men’s Basketball Oversight Committee.
The Southeastern Conference’s appointment is Greg Byrne, the director of athletics at Alabama. Byrne, who has been in his current role since 2017, previously served in the same position at Arizona and Mississippi State and worked in the athletics departments at Kentucky, Oregon State and Oregon. Byrne holds degrees from Arizona State and Mississippi State.
Other first-year committee members include Keith Gill, the commissioner of the Sun Belt Conference, and Barry Collier, who will be representing the Big East Conference as the director of athletics at Butler. Gill has been at the Sun Belt for two years and previously worked for the Atlantic 10 Conference, where he was executive associate commissioner. He also served as the director of athletics at both Richmond and American, spending five years on each campus. Gill also worked in the athletics departments at Oklahoma and Vanderbilt and had two stints working in the membership services department at the NCAA national office. A four-year football letterman at Duke, Gill graduated from the university in 1994 and later earned a master’s degree from Oklahoma.
Collier has led the athletics department at Butler since 2006. From 1989-2000, Collier served as the head coach at Butler, where he led the Bulldogs to six postseason appearances, including in 1997, when the school made the NCAA tournament for the first time in 35 years. In 2000, Collier was named the head coach at Nebraska, where a six-year run ended with a 19-win campaign. Collier then returned to Butler, from which he graduated in 1976. Prior to becoming the head coach at Butler, Collier was an assistant coach at five institutions. He also holds a master’s degree from Indiana State.
“We are eternally grateful for the dedication and service given to this committee by Mitch, Craig and Mike, who are all highly respected leaders within the collegiate athletics community,” said Dan Gavitt, the NCAA’s senior vice president of basketball. “As the Division I basketball championships have continued growing, the workload and time commitment of basketball committee members in managing the event, as well as selecting, seeding and bracketing the field, has evolved, which led to the appropriate expansion to 12 members. We are excited to have Barry, Greg, Keith, Mark and Martin join the committee as they bring a wealth of experience and leadership to the group.”
The chair of the committee for the 2021-22 season is Tom Burnett, commissioner of the Southland Conference. Other committee members include Bubba Cunningham, director of athletics at North Carolina; Charles McClelland, commissioner of the Southwestern Athletic Conference; Bernadette McGlade, commissioner of the Atlantic 10 Conference; Mike O’Brien, director of athletics at Toledo; Jamie Pollard, director of athletics at Iowa State; and Chris Reynolds, director of athletics at Bradley.
(info courtesy of Gopher Sports)