Cal Poly athletics director Don Oberhelman has announced that he will retire after 15 years leading the athletics program. He will remain in the role until his replacement is named or the end of the summer, whichever comes first.
From President Jeffrey Armstrong: “Don has embraced the Cal Poly hallmark of continued improvement and leaves our Athletics program significantly enhanced from the day he arrived. On behalf of our entire university community, I offer our sincere thanks to Don for his commitment to athletic and academic excellence and his unwavering support for our student-athletes over the years.”
In March, shortly after their conference championship meet, the school announced that they would cut the men’s and women’s swimming & diving programs effective immediately. In the 3 months since, swimmers, parents, and alumni have banded together to try and raise money to save the program.
They have faced a moving target from Oberhelman, who cited the cost of the House v. NCAA settlement, finalized on Friday, as the primary driver for cutting the program. In spite of that, the school first demanded fundraising of $25 million to save the program, which was then lowered to $20 million, in spite of the fact that the endowment return from those levels of fundraising would far exceed the $450,000 annually cited as the reason for the cut.
As of early May, the group had raised around $7.5 million. Several of their highest-profile swimmers have begun transferring to other programs.
SwimSwam has reached out to the group attempting to save the program as to whether they’ve received any information about whether the change will impact the future of the swim program.
Historically, the three avenues where programs have had success in salvaging their futures after a cut was announced have been big fundraising (Arizona State), making a Title IX case (Iowa), or a change in leadership (William & Mary), though none of those three avenues have led to sure-fire results.
Oberhelman took over athletics at Cal Poly in 2011. During that time, Cal Poly teams have won 54 conference championships and the school’s Graduation Success Rate has gone from 71% to 93%.
The school has made $100 million in renovations to athletics facilities in that time period.
Oberhelman has served in a number of NCAA and conference leadership roles, including the first NCAA Division I Council. The 40-member Council is charged with managing the new governance structure, the many changes taking place in college athletics, and the day-to-day decision making for all of Division I. In April 2015, he was appointed by the NCAA to chair the newly formed NCAA Division I Legislative Committee to review legislation and communicate positions to the Division I Council.
Prior to Cal Poly, he worked in athletics at San Diego State, Southern Miss, Texas A&M, and Florida State.
Terrible. This guy is the definition of low.
Candy Arse
Good riddance. Make room for someone who actually works instead of making excuses not to work. Armstrong’s comments are ludicrous.
This is 💯 a forced resignation. Someone prove me wrong. There is an ongoing independent investigation against him and he suddenly decides to retire at 54yo in the face of the biggest changes in NCAA history? Best thing that could happen to Cal Poly Athletics. Ride High 🐎
This guy lacks character, class and anything that resembles a moral compas.
His background tells us he’s a typical program floater, never too good at any one thing but enough contacts in place to get the next job…
Good riddance
🤡 🤡