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Director of Athletics John Currie Joins Deac2Deac Podcast
8/31/2022 10:54:00 AM | General
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WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. - John Currie was introduced as the sixth Director of Athletics at Wake Forest University by President Emeritus Nathan Hatch on March 4, 2019. An award-winning college athletics leader with 29 years of experience in the ACC, Big 12 and SEC, Currie previously served as athletics director at Kansas State and Tennessee. The 2022-2023 academic year will mark his 13th as a Power-5 athletics director.
On March 15, 2022, Currie received a signal honor for the second time by the National Association of College Directors of Athletics (NACDA) when he was recognized as the Cushman & Wakefield Athletics Director of the Year. The NACDA ADOY Award recognizes administrative excellence within college athletics and highlights positive contributions of athletics directors to student-athletes, campuses and their surrounding communities.
Previously, he was recognized in 2013 as both a NACDA Under Armour Athletic Director of the Year and as the recipient of the Bobby Dodd Athletic Director Award. He was a Sports Business Journal Forty Under 40 winner in 2011, currently serves as an adjunct faculty member at Columbia University in New York and is a life member of the Fiesta Bowl Board of Directors.
Since his appointment in 2019, Currie has focused on supporting student-athletes and building relationships throughout the Wake Forest, Winston-Salem and ACC communities as he has led the Demon Deacons through a historically unique and turbulent period amidst a worldwide pandemic.
Currie's vision of a Model Intercollegiate Athletics Program includes the core goals of:
Currie's commitment to a World Class Student-Athlete Experience and his resolve to return Demon Deacons basketball to ACC relevance was demonstrated when he made the only major men's basketball coaching change of 2020 and navigated the challenges of the pandemic to introduce proven-winner Steve Forbes as Wake Forest's new head coach on April 30, 2020. Just 22 months later, Forbes was named ACC Coach of the Year after leading Wake Forest to the biggest year-to-year win improvement in ACC history, and his squad tied the single-season program record for ACC triumphs with 13 and home victories with 16. Additionally, graduate transfer Alondes Williams was named the ACC's Player of the Year, the first Deacon to win the award since 2003 and Jake LaRavia was taken by the Memphis Grizzlies with the 19th pick in the 2022 NBA draft, the first Wake Forest player selected in the NBA Draft since 2017.
With the support of President Susan R. Wente, Ph.D. and University leadership, Currie moved strategically to secure a long-term contract extension with 2021 ACC Football Coach of the Year Dave Clawson inking the deal the day before the Deacs clinched their first ACC Atlantic Division title in 15 years. A month later, the Deacs capped an 11-3 season with the TaxSlayer Gator Bowl championship, in the program's sixth-straight postseason appearance, which is currently the second-longest streak in the ACC. Wake Forest became the first ACC school since 2004-05 to sweep the football and men's basketball coach of the year honors when Forbes was honored March 7, 2022.
In May 2022 with the support of President Wente and Wake Forest University leadership, Currie made a change in the women's basketball head coaching position and following a thorough and inclusive search process, he tabbed Megan Gebbia proven winner and holder of multiple NCAA appearances, conference titles and coach of the year accolades as the Deacs new mentor.
Academic excellence is reflected in Wake Forest's most recent report card, with a combined Demon Deacons graduate success rate of a record 96 percent, including 11 programs scoring a perfect 100 percent rate. Seven athletic programs scored a 990 or better Academic Progress Rate. Additionally, a record total of 296 student-athletes earned a spot on the 2021-22 Atlantic Coast Conference Honor Roll following the 2021-22 academic year.
Deacon Club donors have also responded in resounding fashion as Currie's team persevered through the pandemic to reach a new all-time Wake Forest Athletics cash giving record of $37.5 million in FY21 and followed that up with record participation of 5,315 individual donors in FY22! The total was Wake Forest's broadest participation ever and cash gifts to Wake Forest Athletics surpassed $30 million last year. Additionally, Wake's Deacon Club and sports specific excellence annual funds reached an all-time high of $13.69 million.
Thanks to the leadership generosity of Bob ('61) and Michele McCreary and the 4th Quarter Drive, Wake Forest broke ground on the new 60,000 square foot $38 million McCreary Football Complex on Feb. 12, 2022. The new complex will be debt-free, fully funded by donor gifts including design, construction, and a maintenance reserve. Additionally, construction of the McCreary Complex provides tremendous Value to Winston-Salem as an estimated 337 jobs are created as a result through the project and tens of millions of dollars will be spent in sales/output and compensation of workers. Ninety percent of the funds raised for the project came from outside the Triad region.
Inclusion efforts sine Currie's arrival include the creation of the Robert Grant and Kenneth "Butch" Henry Trailblazer Award honoring the first Black Demon Deacon football players and recognizing the historical role Wake Forest Athletics played in integrating sports in the South. The Demon Deacon Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC) voter registration drive resulted in 99% of Wake Forest student-athlete participation in the Nov. 2020 election. Strong statements for social justice and racial reconciliation in social media and other outlets, and intentional dialogue and engagement throughout Athletics has created a path for better understanding among coaches, staff and student-athletes alike.
Athletics adopted the University's R.I.D.E. framework -- Realizing Inclusion Diversity and Equity -- and remains committed to seeing each other as equals and treating each other with respect and dignity; recognizing that each Unique Deac makes Wake Forest thrive. Examples of R.I.D.E. initiatives include annual enrichment of all 400-plus student-athletes and 200-plus staff members participated in Feb. 2022 called, Diversity, Equity and Inclusion "The Roadside Assistance Workshop."
Throughout the 2021-22 academic year, Wake Forest Athletics has celebrated the 50th Anniversary of Women's Intercollegiate Athletics, presented by Blue Cross NC. The success of this year-long initiative was bolstered by $4.1 million from 778 donors. What started as a modest goal of 50 gifts of $25,000 turned into an incredible initiative that will help sustain and empower our storied and successful women's programs. Meanwhile, the Winston-Salem community has come together for the first ever joint performances of HBCU Winston-Salem State University's Red Sea of Sound with the Wake's Spirit of the Old Gold & Black for both the 2019 and 2021 football season openers. And in the fall of 2021, Inside Higher Ed provided national acclaim for Wake Forest's innovative student pregame tailgate zone which brought together members of 29 campus organizations and saw multiple games with more than 80 percent of Wake Forest's student body in attendance.
Wake's focus on grass roots community engagement, brand building and delivering The Best Fan Experience in North Carolina has included the launch of the DEACTOWN concept, on campus, around Winston-Salem and anywhere Deacon fans find themselves. For the first time ever, Wake Forest hosted ESPN's College Gameday, Sept. 12, 2020, generating exposure value to the University in excess of $13 million. A massive growth in social media presence garnered almost 150 million Twitter and Instagram impressions across Deacon sports in 2021. Other fan friendly developments have been the Truist Field DEACTOWN Fan Zone and Field Level Terrace, a partnership with R&D Brewing to create Deacon Brew last fall, the official craft beer of Wake Forest Athletics while the Deacs have also entered a long-term partnership with Winston-Salem-based HanesBrands®, Inc. (HBI).
While the incredible season our student-athletes and coaches had on the gridiron in 2021 was one of the most memorable in program history, those results were witnessed by a record number of fans. Behind the first back-to-back sellouts (Duke on Oct. 30; NC State on Nov. 13) since 2006, Truist Field hosted a 6.4 percent increase in average game attendance this fall compared to the 2019 season. That is the seventh-largest increase rate among Power 5 schools and ranks second in the Atlantic Coast Conference.
Student football attendance averaged a record 3,384 per game while LJVM Coliseum welcomed more than 11,500 students for men's basketball games in 2021-22, the most since the 2008-09 season and up 144% from the 2019-20 season.
Other recent competitive successes beyond football and men's basketball include:
As the leader of Wake Forest Athletics, Currie is continuing to build on his prior success. During his 2009-2017 run at Kansas State, Currie turned a program with an inherited deficit into one of the NCAA's most financially solvent and sustainable. He conceived and built $210 million in new state-of-the-art facilities, benefitting all 16 Wildcat sports, entirelyl funded without state tax, university tuition or fee dollars. In 2016, Kansas State's Bill Snyder Family Stadium was one of five finalists for the Sports Business Journal Facility of the Year. During his K-State tenure, the Wildcats won Big 12 championships in football, men's basketball and baseball, appeared in seven consecutive bowl games, had 17 teams earn NCAA berths, and won 11 individual NCAA titles. Currie's career fundraising accomplishments include record private gifts of $50 million at Tennessee in 2008 and $60 million at K-State in 2014.
Currie holds a master's degree in sports administration from the University of Tennessee and earned his undergraduate degree in history from Wake Forest University in 1993. He and his wife of 23 years, Mary Lawrence, are the proud parents of three children, Jack, Gigi and Mary-Dell, and King Charles Cavaliers named Charlie and Chase.
WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. - John Currie was introduced as the sixth Director of Athletics at Wake Forest University by President Emeritus Nathan Hatch on March 4, 2019. An award-winning college athletics leader with 29 years of experience in the ACC, Big 12 and SEC, Currie previously served as athletics director at Kansas State and Tennessee. The 2022-2023 academic year will mark his 13th as a Power-5 athletics director.
On March 15, 2022, Currie received a signal honor for the second time by the National Association of College Directors of Athletics (NACDA) when he was recognized as the Cushman & Wakefield Athletics Director of the Year. The NACDA ADOY Award recognizes administrative excellence within college athletics and highlights positive contributions of athletics directors to student-athletes, campuses and their surrounding communities.
Previously, he was recognized in 2013 as both a NACDA Under Armour Athletic Director of the Year and as the recipient of the Bobby Dodd Athletic Director Award. He was a Sports Business Journal Forty Under 40 winner in 2011, currently serves as an adjunct faculty member at Columbia University in New York and is a life member of the Fiesta Bowl Board of Directors.
Since his appointment in 2019, Currie has focused on supporting student-athletes and building relationships throughout the Wake Forest, Winston-Salem and ACC communities as he has led the Demon Deacons through a historically unique and turbulent period amidst a worldwide pandemic.
Currie's vision of a Model Intercollegiate Athletics Program includes the core goals of:
- A World Class Student-Athlete Experience
- Integrity in Academics, Compliance, Finance, Inclusion and Safety
- Value to the University, Winston-Salem and Triad Communities
- Win Championships
- The Best Fan Experience in North Carolina
Currie's commitment to a World Class Student-Athlete Experience and his resolve to return Demon Deacons basketball to ACC relevance was demonstrated when he made the only major men's basketball coaching change of 2020 and navigated the challenges of the pandemic to introduce proven-winner Steve Forbes as Wake Forest's new head coach on April 30, 2020. Just 22 months later, Forbes was named ACC Coach of the Year after leading Wake Forest to the biggest year-to-year win improvement in ACC history, and his squad tied the single-season program record for ACC triumphs with 13 and home victories with 16. Additionally, graduate transfer Alondes Williams was named the ACC's Player of the Year, the first Deacon to win the award since 2003 and Jake LaRavia was taken by the Memphis Grizzlies with the 19th pick in the 2022 NBA draft, the first Wake Forest player selected in the NBA Draft since 2017.
With the support of President Susan R. Wente, Ph.D. and University leadership, Currie moved strategically to secure a long-term contract extension with 2021 ACC Football Coach of the Year Dave Clawson inking the deal the day before the Deacs clinched their first ACC Atlantic Division title in 15 years. A month later, the Deacs capped an 11-3 season with the TaxSlayer Gator Bowl championship, in the program's sixth-straight postseason appearance, which is currently the second-longest streak in the ACC. Wake Forest became the first ACC school since 2004-05 to sweep the football and men's basketball coach of the year honors when Forbes was honored March 7, 2022.
In May 2022 with the support of President Wente and Wake Forest University leadership, Currie made a change in the women's basketball head coaching position and following a thorough and inclusive search process, he tabbed Megan Gebbia proven winner and holder of multiple NCAA appearances, conference titles and coach of the year accolades as the Deacs new mentor.
Academic excellence is reflected in Wake Forest's most recent report card, with a combined Demon Deacons graduate success rate of a record 96 percent, including 11 programs scoring a perfect 100 percent rate. Seven athletic programs scored a 990 or better Academic Progress Rate. Additionally, a record total of 296 student-athletes earned a spot on the 2021-22 Atlantic Coast Conference Honor Roll following the 2021-22 academic year.
Deacon Club donors have also responded in resounding fashion as Currie's team persevered through the pandemic to reach a new all-time Wake Forest Athletics cash giving record of $37.5 million in FY21 and followed that up with record participation of 5,315 individual donors in FY22! The total was Wake Forest's broadest participation ever and cash gifts to Wake Forest Athletics surpassed $30 million last year. Additionally, Wake's Deacon Club and sports specific excellence annual funds reached an all-time high of $13.69 million.
Thanks to the leadership generosity of Bob ('61) and Michele McCreary and the 4th Quarter Drive, Wake Forest broke ground on the new 60,000 square foot $38 million McCreary Football Complex on Feb. 12, 2022. The new complex will be debt-free, fully funded by donor gifts including design, construction, and a maintenance reserve. Additionally, construction of the McCreary Complex provides tremendous Value to Winston-Salem as an estimated 337 jobs are created as a result through the project and tens of millions of dollars will be spent in sales/output and compensation of workers. Ninety percent of the funds raised for the project came from outside the Triad region.
Inclusion efforts sine Currie's arrival include the creation of the Robert Grant and Kenneth "Butch" Henry Trailblazer Award honoring the first Black Demon Deacon football players and recognizing the historical role Wake Forest Athletics played in integrating sports in the South. The Demon Deacon Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC) voter registration drive resulted in 99% of Wake Forest student-athlete participation in the Nov. 2020 election. Strong statements for social justice and racial reconciliation in social media and other outlets, and intentional dialogue and engagement throughout Athletics has created a path for better understanding among coaches, staff and student-athletes alike.
Athletics adopted the University's R.I.D.E. framework -- Realizing Inclusion Diversity and Equity -- and remains committed to seeing each other as equals and treating each other with respect and dignity; recognizing that each Unique Deac makes Wake Forest thrive. Examples of R.I.D.E. initiatives include annual enrichment of all 400-plus student-athletes and 200-plus staff members participated in Feb. 2022 called, Diversity, Equity and Inclusion "The Roadside Assistance Workshop."
Throughout the 2021-22 academic year, Wake Forest Athletics has celebrated the 50th Anniversary of Women's Intercollegiate Athletics, presented by Blue Cross NC. The success of this year-long initiative was bolstered by $4.1 million from 778 donors. What started as a modest goal of 50 gifts of $25,000 turned into an incredible initiative that will help sustain and empower our storied and successful women's programs. Meanwhile, the Winston-Salem community has come together for the first ever joint performances of HBCU Winston-Salem State University's Red Sea of Sound with the Wake's Spirit of the Old Gold & Black for both the 2019 and 2021 football season openers. And in the fall of 2021, Inside Higher Ed provided national acclaim for Wake Forest's innovative student pregame tailgate zone which brought together members of 29 campus organizations and saw multiple games with more than 80 percent of Wake Forest's student body in attendance.
Wake's focus on grass roots community engagement, brand building and delivering The Best Fan Experience in North Carolina has included the launch of the DEACTOWN concept, on campus, around Winston-Salem and anywhere Deacon fans find themselves. For the first time ever, Wake Forest hosted ESPN's College Gameday, Sept. 12, 2020, generating exposure value to the University in excess of $13 million. A massive growth in social media presence garnered almost 150 million Twitter and Instagram impressions across Deacon sports in 2021. Other fan friendly developments have been the Truist Field DEACTOWN Fan Zone and Field Level Terrace, a partnership with R&D Brewing to create Deacon Brew last fall, the official craft beer of Wake Forest Athletics while the Deacs have also entered a long-term partnership with Winston-Salem-based HanesBrands®, Inc. (HBI).
While the incredible season our student-athletes and coaches had on the gridiron in 2021 was one of the most memorable in program history, those results were witnessed by a record number of fans. Behind the first back-to-back sellouts (Duke on Oct. 30; NC State on Nov. 13) since 2006, Truist Field hosted a 6.4 percent increase in average game attendance this fall compared to the 2019 season. That is the seventh-largest increase rate among Power 5 schools and ranks second in the Atlantic Coast Conference.
Student football attendance averaged a record 3,384 per game while LJVM Coliseum welcomed more than 11,500 students for men's basketball games in 2021-22, the most since the 2008-09 season and up 144% from the 2019-20 season.
Other recent competitive successes beyond football and men's basketball include:
- Remarkably, every Demon Deacon spring team reached NCAA play and won a game, match or advanced on from regional competition to nationals. Overall, during the 2021-22 academic year, Wake Forest had 14 of its 18 programs qualify for postseason action, while also adding two more championships to its 55 ACC team titles.
- Collectively, the Demon Deacons were 31-30-1 against our Big 4 rivals in 2021-22 and Wake Forest swept the Wolfpack in football, men's basketball and baseball in regular season action.
- The Deacs' men's & women's golf programs captured the 2022 Atlantic Coast Conference Golf Championship trophies for the first time in school history in the same year.
- Wake Forest's women's program followed their championship with a clean sweep of the conference's yearly awards. This marked the second time in program history, and first time since 1995, the Demon Deacons women's program won ACC Coach (Kim Lewellen), Player (Rachel Kuehn) and Freshman (Carolina Chicarra) of the Year awards. With that, the Deacs are one of just two ACC programs to outright win all of the top awards multiple times in league history.
- Women's tennis student-athletes Anna Brylin and Brooke Killingsworth becoming the first doubles team to win an ITA All-Americans Championship last fall
- Men's Tennis has been consistently nationally ranked and made an appearance at the ITA National Indoor Championships last spring for the sixth time since 2016.
- Women's soccer qualified for the 2021 NCAA Tournament for the 21st time in program history and men's soccer extended its ACC-best streak of NCAA Tournament appearances to 11-straight including another Sweet Sixteen appearance in 2021.
- Men's soccer extended its ACC-best streak of NCAA Tournament appearances to 11-straight in 2021, which is five more years than the next conference school in Virginia Tech. Additionally, Wake Forest once again ranked in the top-10 nationally in total attendance and average attendance per home match.
- Women's basketball earned its second-ever berth in the NCAA Tournament in 2021.
- Men's cross country head coach John Hayes received the 2021 Southeast Region Coach of the Year on Tuesday. Hayes received the Southeast Region Coach of the Year honor for the second consecutive year after his squad placed third overall in the ACC and the team won the NCAA Southeast Region Championship for the first time since 1993. Individually, all seven runners placed inside the top-25 for the Demon Deacons to earn All-Region honors.
- Individual ACC Indoor Track & Field Championships in 2021 by Anna Bush and Tony Jones, followed by an incredible cross country season fall where the Deacs won the Southeast Regional for the first time since 1993.
- The 2021-22 academic year culminated with ACC Champion Thomas Vanoppen earning a fourth-place finish in the 1,500-meter final earned him First Team All-America honors. Additionally, Zach Facioni, Tony Jones, Anna Bush and Emma Soderstrom all merited All-America distinctions in Eugene in June 2021.
- The Diamond Deacs finished the 2022 season with 41 wins, the fifth most in program history and became the first squad since 2017 to reach 40 wins and posted Wake Forest's seventh 40-win season in program history. Additionally, Wake Forest made the program's 14th NCAA Tournament appearance and finished tied for the second-most wins in the conference, while leading the ACC's Atlantic division.
- Wake Forest's field hockey program led by three-time NCAA Championship coach Jen Averill was nationally ranked the entire 2021 season and volleyball posted its first winning season since 2010 last fall.
As the leader of Wake Forest Athletics, Currie is continuing to build on his prior success. During his 2009-2017 run at Kansas State, Currie turned a program with an inherited deficit into one of the NCAA's most financially solvent and sustainable. He conceived and built $210 million in new state-of-the-art facilities, benefitting all 16 Wildcat sports, entirelyl funded without state tax, university tuition or fee dollars. In 2016, Kansas State's Bill Snyder Family Stadium was one of five finalists for the Sports Business Journal Facility of the Year. During his K-State tenure, the Wildcats won Big 12 championships in football, men's basketball and baseball, appeared in seven consecutive bowl games, had 17 teams earn NCAA berths, and won 11 individual NCAA titles. Currie's career fundraising accomplishments include record private gifts of $50 million at Tennessee in 2008 and $60 million at K-State in 2014.
Currie holds a master's degree in sports administration from the University of Tennessee and earned his undergraduate degree in history from Wake Forest University in 1993. He and his wife of 23 years, Mary Lawrence, are the proud parents of three children, Jack, Gigi and Mary-Dell, and King Charles Cavaliers named Charlie and Chase.
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