Ron Rivera Officially Named Cal Football Athletic Director
Cal football now appears to be entirely independent of the athletic department.
With a contract now officially inked, the California Golden Bears have proceeded to set in stone what has already been occurring in name. Ron Rivera is now officially the main overseer of Cal football, with a direct line to the Chancellor’s Office. This essentially bifurcates the Cal Athletic Department, which now oversees all non-football operations.
Rivera has already been making many of the tough decisions for football in the last few years, starting with the decision to replace Justin Wilcox with Tosh Lupoi. He has been instrumental in NIL work that has yielded multiple top 25 classes, working in tandem with assistant GM Marshall Cherrington and Recruiting Chief of Staff Benji Palu. And he has been an essential fundraiser, helping Cal rake in record numbers in athletic donations in the past few seasons in the ACC.
Rivera will be in charge of this program for at least the next two years, which will be the most crucial moments in the future of this program. The next round of conference realignment is likely to kickoff in the next year, as TV contracts are all set to expire at the end of the decade and negotiations for which schools will end up where. Rivera, along with Chancellor Rich Lyons and head coach Tosh Lupoi, will provide a very established leadership triumvirate to advocate for the future of the California Golden Bears in the major football landscape.
There’s a lot of work ahead, but the foundation has been laid to give the Bears their best shot to win in the present and the near future.
It really seems like Lyons is taking setting a winning organizational structure seriously. You can definitely see the business background.
Now I hope they reform the football marketing so that fans and alumni get the “college” feel at games. If you look at other successful programs it is clear a tradition-rich college environment can be wildly successful.
It’s time to mic the band and cut a lot of the piped in stuff.
This is the way.