Beth Goetzs biggest asset in becoming Iowa Hawkeyes interim AD? I was always curious

IOWA CITY, Iowa — From 1970 through Tuesday — 53 years — Iowa has employed four athletic directors. They include hall of famer Bump Elliott (1970-1991), former Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby (1991-2006) and Gary Barta (2006-2023). Overlapping the Elliott and Bowlsby eras was legendary figure Dr. Christine Grant (1973-2001), who served as the women’s athletic director before the departments merged with her retirement.

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Beth Goetz knows that history and respects it. Goetz, 49, joined Iowa’s staff as deputy athletic director and chief operating officer last September and Tuesday becomes the interim athletic director through at least early 2024. She replaces Barta, 59, who retires 17 years to the day from when he began at Iowa. Goetz is the only female serving as a Big Ten athletic director.

Goetz has extensive experience ranging from her days as a soccer player at Brevard College and Clemson to serving as the interim athletic director at Minnesota following a sexual harassment scandal. As Goetz starts her first day leading Iowa’s department, she spoke about her background as an athlete, coach and administrator, plus her immediate thoughts as Iowa’s interim AD.

Goetz grew up in Florissant, Mo., and earned All-America recognition at Brevard College (N.C.) as a soccer player and was inducted into the school’s Hall of Fame in 2017. She transferred to Clemson, where she was a team captain as a starting midfielder and earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in psychology in 1996.

As a result of her playing experience, to which Goetz said, “I’d give anything to go back and get one more day in a uniform,” she said she feels empathy for the athletes and coaches going through the ups and downs of sport.

“It’s a part of the journey,” Goetz said. “For me, in particular, being an athlete was one of those things that gave you confidence. It showed you how to maybe get outside your comfort zone, and you’ve got to accomplish things you weren’t sure you thought you could do before. I just really believe in how impactful that experience is at any level.

“These young men and women are going to get to use that experience, and I want them to go out and be doctors and lawyers and pro football players and everything else. I want more athletes out there because I think you learn something special on the way, and it certainly impacted me that way.”

Upon her Clemson graduation, Goetz returned to the St. Louis area and first became an assistant women’s soccer coach at Missouri-St. Louis in 1996, then the head coach in 1997. That started her down what she called “an accidental career path.”

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“I was going to be a therapist,” Goetz said. “My college coaches just kept saying — because I worked camps and all that — ‘You really ought to try coaching.’ I’m like, ‘I have to go to grad school because I have a psych degree.’ So I ended up with the opportunity to be an assistant there and just really fell into the head coaching position.”

If coaching was accidental, Goetz’s career path was really unplanned. She earned her master’s degree at UMSL in 2000, then added senior woman administrator and assistant athletic director to her resume. Goetz stayed at UMSL through 2008 and won 120 games. She was inducted into the UMSL Sports Hall of Fame in 2014.

“Even though it’s a small school, you get to learn all sides of the business,” Goetz said. “Whether that be learning how to cut your own grass, because you don’t have grounds crew there, or ‘Hey, you’ve got the soccer thing down well enough, now you’re going to manage the equipment room.’ Or you’re going to get transportation for everybody in the department. So it just gave me a really good sense of the big picture. And, ultimately, I got intrigued with the bigger picture.”

In 2008, the big picture led Goetz to one of her most impactful roles as senior woman administrator and associate athletic director at Butler. Goetz supervised multiple sports, including men’s basketball and men’s basketball coach Brad Stevens, who now is the Boston Celtics’ general manager. She said, “I was always curious” when it came to growing as an administrator. She spent five years at Butler, then moved to Minnesota in 2013 to become deputy athletics director.

In 2015, she faced a significant crisis. Athletic director Norwood Teague resigned after sexual harassment accusations. Goetz became Minnesota’s interim athletic director and had to manage that situation coupled with raising money for a $200 million football practice facility. Football coach Jerry Kill resigned midway through the 2015 football season because of health issues, and there was a Title IX investigation based on gender inequality.

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Despite those challenges and several open administration jobs, Goetz raised more than $15 million for the new facilities. Her leadership was praised by then-Minnesota president Eric Kaler as “unflappable, calm.”

“I’ve always been a processor,” Goetz said. “So as you are taking in information, I think it’s really important to be as steady as you can in those moments. To some extent, it’s a little bit like coaching, right? If you lose your mind on the sidelines, if you don’t think your athletes are paying attention to that — and some respond well, some coaches can — but I do think they feed off the energy of the coach.

“It was similar for me in that scenario. What is the issue? Who do we need to first care for, whether that’s an athlete or staff members or whatever it might have been? And then you’re in evaluation. So, how did this occur? How do we educate and set expectations so that we don’t find ourselves in this position again? How do you make it easy for people to report if there’s a challenge that you didn’t see? Then commit to making change and holding people accountable if you do find something.”

Goetz was one of four finalists, but Minnesota opted to hire former department employee and then-Syracuse athletic director Mark Coyle. After nine months as interim athletics director, Goetz left one month after Coyle’s hiring for Connecticut as the senior woman administrator and chief operating officer. She served in that role for two years.

“It wasn’t until I got to Minnesota and was actually in the interim role that I’m like, ‘Hey, I think I have the tools and the experience that I could be positioned for this,'” Goetz said. “I really started to think like this is a path that that I would want to take, and I think I can contribute in different ways.”

After two years at UConn, in which she supervised the powerhouse women’s basketball program, Goetz was named the athletic director at Ball State in 2018. In four years, Ball State won 10 Mid-American Conference titles, including seven during the 2021-22 athletic season. Goetz also ushered in a $15 million practice facility in which all of the money was raised privately. In 2022, Goetz was named the NCAA Division I FBS Nike Executive of the Year.

In 2021, she served as vice chair of the NCAA Division I Women’s Basketball Committee and was named the committee chair for 2022-23. In September 2022, Goetz left Ball State to become Iowa’s deputy athletic director and chief operating officer, replacing the retiring Barbara Burke. It was the next step to Goetz’s goal of becoming a Power 5 athletic director.

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“Every place is special for a different reason, whether it’s at a Power 5 school or my time at Ball State or Butler,” Goetz said. “But just the dynamic nature and things that are going on at this level, I think from an intellectual standpoint, and from being around a passionate fan base, it was certainly something that you aspire to.

“It was a really unique opportunity to be back in the Big Ten, to be in a place that I felt like I could be a good contributor, be a good fit and could learn from Gary. He articulated he wasn’t going to be here for too long; I didn’t think it was going to be nine months. To have a chance to get to lead us alongside him, and now to lead over the next few months, it was certainly something that I was looking for in that opportunity.”

Beth Goetz's career

Like every major athletic program, Iowa has issues but largely is healthy. The football program ranks ninth in Power 5 victories during the past five seasons, and the men’s basketball program has just one losing Big Ten campaign since 2012. The wrestling and women’s basketball squads finished second nationally last spring, and other sports like baseball and field hockey have earned recent NCAA Tournament berths.

Financially, Iowa’s athletic department has recovered from the COVID-19 pandemic, which forced it to secure a $50 million loan. The department had 236 athletes recognized as Academic All-Big Ten members this past year, and the combined GPA was above 3.0. There is turnover expected among its administrators, and four of Iowa’s top coaches are in their 60s.

For Goetz, there is the opportunity to retain the department’s strengths and chart a new course.

“It’s a great question about short-term priorities and long-term priorities,” Goetz said. “Over the next couple months, we’ll continue to talk about some of those. But if you just take a snapshot of the last couple years, Iowa’s had just a lot of success competitively across lots of sports.

“Whatever changes we experience in college athletics, how can we be at the forefront of trying to be prepared to shift and be the best version of Iowa we can be? We’re not trying to do what somebody else in our league is looking at, but how do we prepare to pivot? How do we leverage what’s great about our state, our fan base? So in terms of being creative and proactive there, I think that’s going to continue to be a priority.

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“The best time to reinvent and build yourself are when things are going well, not when you start to experience challenges. I would say based on where we’ve been. That’s where Iowa is right now.”

(Top photo: Scott Dochterman / The Athletic)

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