The NCAA News - News and Features

August 31, 1998

Spanier, Bryant named to leadership positions

Graham B. Spanier, president of Pennsylvania State University, has been named chair of the Division I Board of Directors, effective immediately.

Also, Clint Bryant, athletics director at Augusta State University, has been elected chair of the Division II Management Council.

Spanier

Spanier replaces Kenneth A. Shaw, chancellor of Syracuse University, due to Shaw's decision to chair an NCAA task force created to undertake a broad-based study of basketball issues in Division I.

Spanier will complete Shaw's term as chair of the Board through January 1999. Spanier's term with the Board expires in January 2000.

Prior to his presidency at Penn State, Spanier was chancellor of the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, from 1991 through 1995.

He also has served as provost and vice-president for academic affairs at Oregon State University and as vice-provost for undergraduate studies at the State University of New York at Stony Brook.

Before that, Spanier was a faculty member at Penn State from 1973 through 1982 and served in three administrative positions.

Bryant

Bryant will replace Lynn L. Dorn of North Dakota State University at the conclusion of the 1999 NCAA Convention.

Bryant was elected by the Division II Management Council at its July 27-29 meeting, and his election was ratified at the August 11 meeting of the Division II Presidents Council.

Bryant currently serves as vice-chair of the Management Council. He also has chaired the Division II Championships Committee and serves as a member of the Division II Budget and Finance Committee and the NCAA Men's Basketball Rules Committee. He also has served on the Division II Student-Athlete Advisory Committee.

The first seven years of Bryant's career were spent as an assistant men's basketball coach at Clemson University, where he worked with teams that had one NCAA and three National Invitation Tournament appearances.

He spent the next three years at the University of Miami (Florida) before accepting the dual position of head men's basketball coach and athletics director at Augusta State in 1988-89. He relinquished his basketball duties after the 1996-97 season.

He has coached basketball at the U.S. Olympic Festival and also has served as assistant coach for the U.S. national junior team on two occasions.