6 minute read
WVU Director of Athletics Shane Lyons
by Joe Swan
DIRECTOR OF ATHLETICS/ASSOCIATE VP
SHANE LYONS
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There’s a reason Shane Lyons was named NACDA Athletics Director of the Year in 2021, it’s because he spends endless hours daily for the betterment of more than 500 student-athletes and their day-to-day needs in order to help them succeed in the classroom and in competition.
His open lines of communications have made him a popular role model for WVU student-athletes and coaches. His honest, fair and caring approach has led to success on and off the field. Whether it’s regularly scheduled meetings with the student-athletes or his open-door office policy, Lyons has his finger on the pulse of his department.
In the past year, his success and work ethic has brought national exposure to West Virginia University as Lyons’ presence is wanted on many national and prestigious committees. During the COVID-19 pandemic, he chaired the all-important Football Oversight Committee and played a key role in the sport overcoming, adjusting and managing the difficulties to complete the 2020 season. There’s no doubt that Lyons’ even-keeled demeanor, ability to think outside the box and solve problems played a major role in having a football season in 2020.
He is also a member of the NCAA Council and will chair that distinguished committee in 2021-22. Additionally, Lyons served on the NCAA Working Group on Transfers, the Football Competition Committee and the NCAA Wrestling Academics Enhancement Working Group.
His work with WVU President E. Gordon Gee’s senior leadership team and the Big 12 Conference has brought additional respect and positive exposure to his department and the University. He’s been a member of the Big 12 Administration Committee, Finance and Budget Committee and the Game Management and Officiating Subcommittee, while chairing the Big 12 athletic directors committee in 2018.
In moving his department forward, his Climbing Higher facilities master plan will keep West Virginia a strong Power 5 institution and position his department for growth and continued success. The Time2Climb fundraising membership drive he initiated in 2021 already is getting new donors involved in Mountaineer athletics and helping the Mountaineer Athletic Club grow and plan for the future.
From training, nutrition, medical upgrades and competitiveness, Lyons has already left many accomplishments and success in his rearview mirror and the coming year will add to that portfolio. He will officially unveil a complete overhaul of football’s Milan Puskar Center and open a new Olympic Sports Performance Center that will benefit hundreds of student-athletes, bringing them together in one beautiful complex. Lyons inherited aging sports venues in 2015 and worked hard to fundraise, plan and implement more than $200 million in longoverdue facility improvements. One of the end results of his efforts will take place in the fall of 2021, when all 18 varsity sports teams will have their own private and dedicated locker rooms for the first time in school history.
In 2019, Lyons commissioned and announced an economic impact study that showed Mountaineer Athletics produced more than $300 million to the state’s economy and more than $78 million to the local economy. And with the local economy in mind, Lyons’s proudly saw the formal opening of a new $45 million aquatic and track facility that not only benefits WVU, but also local schools and the entire community. Already, the facility has brought thousands of guests to Morgantown as it has hosted such events as the Big 12 swimming and diving championships as well as the NCAA zone diving competitions.
When he stresses academics, he means it as a department-high 341 student-athletes made the Big 12 Commissioner’s Honor Roll and WVU’s overall department GPA was 3.34 last year. WVU featured 251 athletes with a 3.00 GPA and 90 with a perfect 4.0 for the 2021 spring semester.
Also, a Clinical and Sport Psychology unit that he formed along with creating the department’s first Diversity, Equity and Inclusion committee furthers his belief in helping the total student-athlete, and his commitment to their well-being and advancement.
Ask him and he’ll tell you it’s not his department, but West Virginia’s department, and part of his job is to develop our country’s future leaders. He cares, and the proof is in what he has accomplished for Mountaineer athletics in the past six years.
Lyons came to West Virginia after spending more than three years as the deputy director of athletics and chief operating officer at Alabama. He worked closely on day-to-day strategic leadership, the direction of the overall Crimson Tide Athletic program and was the direct second in charge.
Prior to joining the Alabama staff in November 2011, Lyons spent 10 years as an associate commissioner at the Atlantic Coast Conference. At the ACC, Lyons focused on conference-wide compliance and academic initiatives, providing direct assistance to the conference’s presidents, chancellors and athletics directors in dealing with NCAA regulatory matters.
In addition, he served as the ACC’s human resource manager and was responsible for the administration, negotiation and mediation of the employee benefits program and managing the conference’s organizational policies and procedures. He was part of the senior administrative team for ACC events, including the football championship game, the men’s basketball tournament and men’s and women’s NCAA basketball events.
Prior to working at the ACC, Lyons served as associate athletics director for compliance at Big 12 member Texas Tech from 1998 to 2001. During that time, Lyons assumed responsibility for the leadership, administration and implementation of a comprehensive NCAA compliance program with emphasis toward rules education and extensive monitoring systems. He also served as oversight administrator for several of the Red Raiders’ athletic teams and had financial and operational supervision of the strength and conditioning, nutritional and sports medicine units.
Before joining Texas Tech, Lyons worked at the NCAA for almost 10 years as a senior membership services representative, where he was responsible for the oversight and coordination of rules and interpretations for the 25 membership service representatives and was the staff liaison to various NCAA standing committees.
Lyons began his career in college athletics in July 1988 as assistant commissioner of the Big South Conference. With the Big South, he was in charge of conference-wide compliance and championships.
A native of Parkersburg, West Virginia, and a graduate of Parkersburg High, Lyons was a standout basketball player for the Big Reds. He earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in sport management from WVU in 1987 and 1988, respectively.
Lyons, the University’s 12th athletic director, and his wife, Emily, a graduate of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, have two children: Cameron and Brooke. Cameron is a graduate student-athlete and a member of the football team at UNC-Charlotte and Brooke is a freshman at WVU.
