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LSU athletics director, WCC commissioner to join DI Men’s Basketball Committee

LSU Director of Athletics Joe Alleva and West Coast Conference Commissioner Jamie Zaninovich have been appointed to the Division I Men’s Basketball Committee.

Both will serve five-year terms that begin Sept. 1, 2011. They will replace Gene Smith, the director of athletics at Ohio State, and UC Riverside AD Stan Morrison when their terms expire this year. Smith currently chairs the committee.

Alleva was named LSU’s director of athletics in June 2008 and 14 months later had vice chancellor responsibilities added to his position. He joined LSU after spending the previous 32 years at Duke in roles ranging from assistant director of athletics to associate director of athletics to athletics business manager. Alleva was named AD there in 1998.

He is a 1975 graduate of Lehigh, where he served as a team captain in football and also competed in baseball. He earned his master’s degree from Lehigh in 1976 before joining the Duke staff later that year to work for the vice president for business and finance.

“It’s an honor to be named to this prestigious committee,” said Alleva. “I look forward to the opportunity of representing both LSU and the Southeastern Conference.”

Zaninovich also has been at his current post since 2008, having been named commissioner after spending five years as senior associate athletics director for external relations at Princeton.

Previously, he served as senior assistant athletics director for strategic planning and men’s basketball operations at Stanford, where he earned a master’s degree in business administration in 2001. Zaninovich also earned his undergraduate degree from Stanford in 1993. He worked for the Cardinal as the men’s basketball team’s marketing and operations director from 1996 to 1999.

Zaninovich is the current chair of the Division I Collegiate Commissioners Association Division I subdivision. He helped create a partnership with the Pac-10 and Big West to help train and evaluate men’s and women’s basketball officials.

“The unprecedented growth of men’s basketball has brought with it exciting new initiatives and formidable challenges that make the work of the Division I Men’s Basketball Committee more relevant than ever,” Zaninovich said.

Alleva and Zaninovich will join current committee members Jeff Hathaway, the AD at Connecticut; Texas-San Antonio AD Lynn Hickey; Xavier AD Mike Bobinski; Big 12 Conference Commissioner Dan Beebe; Big Sky Conference Commissioner Doug Fullerton; Wake Forest AD Ron Wellman; Utah State AD Scott Barnes; and SMU AD Steve Orsini. Hathaway will chair the committee for the 2011-12 academic year.