The fine print

Should --- as it appears likely --- Debbie Yow leaves Maryland to become N.C. State's athletic director, she'll leave a situation at Maryland that remains very much in flux.

A new campus president has yet to be named to replace C.D. Mote, who will retire at the end of August.

Football coach Ralph Friedgen has two years remaining on his contract, and with Maryland coming off a 2-10 season interest in his program has --- at least relative to the rest of his tenure --- bottomed out.

And now Maryland will presumably search for an athletic director for the first time since 1994.

There's a long way to go before much of that gets sorted out, but thanks to some scouring via a public records search last fall, there's one thing that can be stated.

Brenda Frese's contract stipulates she will be part of the search committee.

Frese, Maryland's women's basketball coach, has an 18-page contract. You've got to go all the way to the bottom of page 16 to finds this item wedged between Frese's right to select assistant coaches and support staff and the necessity for the university to tell Frese when the Comcast Center floor is booked for things outside her program during basketball season:

14.2 Search Committee: In the event Dr. Deborah A. Yow should leaver her position as Athletic Director while Coach is serving as Head Women's Basketball Coach at the University of Maryland under this Agreement or any extensions thereof, the University will appoint the Coach as a regular voting member to such search committee as may be established to find candidates for the vacant position.

Well, it would appear that scenario has come to pass.

It's tough to say how much sway any search committee has. Sometimes they exist just to exist, and sometimes they carry some weight. With (presumably) a new president likely to ultimately select a new athletic director, it's anyone's guess how much a committee would be leaned upon. It's also uncertain how big the search committee would be.

Ultimately, it's an interesting nugget, a reflection of how public records requests can turn up interesting tidbits and, at the moment, not a whole lot else.

Comments

[Mikeinrockville]

Yow just sent an e-mail to all Terrapin Club members at noon today announcing her departure from Maryland and new job at NC State, effective July 9. Guess that makes it official.