College sport in the United States is a big deal. In every way. The manner in which a sports team performs and conducts itself is seen as a reflection on the values of the college and an integral part of how alumni associate with their alma mater.
Popular culture is littered with glowing tributes to the power of a sporting career through education from Friday Night Lights and High School Musical at secondary level through to perhaps one of the great sporting movies of all times, Remember the Titans.
This week we had the pleasure to sit down with Brad Bates the Athletic Director of Boston College who will be bringing the Boston Eagles American football team to the Aviva Stadium in 2016 to take part in the Aer Lingus College Football Classic against Georgia Tech.
Future
“Ireland has a hugely important place in the history and the future of Boston College,” he said over coffee in the Merrion Hotel.
“The College was originally founded to educate the sons of Irish emigrants who were making their way in the new world in the early 19th century.”
“The roots that were established then are as strong today as ever and the trip to Dublin is about so much more than one game of football.”
“We are working with all the faculties and all the departments in the college to bring the trip to life in ways that are really beginning to come into focus.”
“In many ways it has been a catalyst for a greater sense of collegiality than many other colleges might have been able to produce.”
“It’s important clearly for our sports team who get a rare opportunity to represent not only their college but their country in an international context.”
Winner
“It is also a real winner for our business connections with the close bonds that exist on so many levels between Irish and US business groups and leaders.”
“Our President Fr Leahy and all the Board of Trustees are ambitious to make Boston College a world leader. There is a $1.5 Billion development programme under way and this visit to Dublin is interwoven with their plans for the future.”
“There is a real sense of excitement about the event that has grown through our off season and will become an ever brighter beacon as this year’s season gets underway this weekend.”
Bates looks like a Hollywood version of an Athletic Director. Tall with a heavy shock of white hair he played College football himself at Michigan State University and is regarded as one of the leading lights in the administration of College sport across America.
His delivery is measured for the most part, and impeccably well mannered, but the passion for what he does peaks through on more than one occasion, rarely more so than when countering the stereotype image of sports ‘jocks’ being carried through academic grades in order to stay on the team.
“We see sport as an important part of college life but it’s not there in isolation.”
Ethos
“The ethos at Boston College is to develop our young students into fine adults that will represent themselves and their families in whatever they do through life.”
“Sport is integrated into the fabric of intellectual development as much as it is physical.”
“We do not lionise our sports stars in the way that the movies might suggest is normal, though of course the stars are recognised when they are sitting in the midst of their fellow undergraduates in an English Lit or mathematics lecture.”
“We work with them to ensure the demands of sport are managed within their overall life on campus and while there are times that sport is very much to the fore, that does not last beyond game time.”
It’s a model we should be familiar with here in relation to the amateur code of the GAA. Players who give their all on a Sunday afternoon in front of 82,000 fans still have to turn up for work the following morning.
Incredible
College sport as governed by the NCAA is amateur in every sense, even while some of its graduates will go on to earn incredible fortunes based on what they’ve achieved when they graduate to professional sport.
Boston College Alumni Stadium is one of the most advanced in the country, a place we will return to as the build up to September 2016 continues. It’s capacity of 44,500 is more than three times the size of the student population at the college and it’s only part of the sporting programme that Bates oversees.
“Of course there is a pressure to succeed, everyone loves a winning team.”
“We know though what the values of Boston College are. We judge what we do against that overriding ambition to create great adults. we will not compromise that and when we achieve success we know it has been done the right way. That’s important to us”
Bates has a heavy responsibility for producing teams across all sports in a sports mad city. He wears it lightly. You get the sense that the undergraduates who pass through will turn out OK. The leadership that he provides is key to setting the tone that allows that to happen.
We’ll get to see what it means, and how the College has pulled off a winning campus wide opportunity to engage with Ireland over the course of the next 12 months.
PwC supports the Sport for Business Leadership Series a collection of exclusive interviews with leaders in sport and business.
