Utah State athletic director Diana Sabau leaving for new job at Maryland

Diana Sabau, Utah State’s first female athletic director, is joining Maryland. | KSL.com. LOGAN (KSL.com) — Diana Sabau’s stay in Cache Valley has been brief but memorable. Now the first full-time female athletic director in Utah State history is headed back to the Big Ten. Sabau, who has been with the Aggies for less than two years, will be the next deputy athletic director at Maryland, a move first reported by CollegeAD and confirmed by multiple outlets, including one source to KSL.com. Sabau will join newly named Maryland athletic director James E. Smith, who joined the department in May from the Atlanta Braves. Under Sabau’s leadership, Utah State won six Mountain West titles including a school-record four (men’s basketball, women’s soccer, men’s tennis and women’s volleyball) during the 2023-24 school year. The Aggies also won conference titles in women’s soccer and gymnastics in 2024-25. Her ambitious $125 million “reach and rise” campaign garnered $28 million in pledges by the end of the program’s first year in 2024, and the university reported $34 million in gifts and donations for the 2023-24 academic year. In addition, Sabau made two hires in Utah State’s most high-profile sports — bringing in Jerrod Calhoun from Youngstown State to replace Ryan Odom in men’s basketball, and hiring former BYU coach Bronco Mendenhall from New Mexico to succeed Blake Anderson (and interim coach Nate Dreiling) as head football coach. All of this while Utah State navigated a number of Title IX investigations, and working the past 4.5 months under interim university leadership when former president Elizabeth Cantwell took the same job at Washington State. Sabau also guided the Aggies to the Pac-12, where they will join Mountain West rivals Boise State, Colorado State, Fresno State and San Diego State with Oregon State, Washington State, Gonzaga and newly added Texas State in the reformed conference beginning July 1, 2026. Sabau came to Utah State in August 2023 following two-plus seasons as the deputy commissioner and chief sports officer at the Big Ten Conference, where she oversaw administration for all 28 sports, and managed affiliate memberships, competition, scheduling, championships, sportsmanship, officiating and awards following her time as as senior administrator at Ohio State. Under terms of her current contract, Sabau, Maryland or a combination of the two will owe Utah State $500,000 in liquidation fees for terminating her contract prior to June 30, 2026, according to sports business expert KC Smurthwaite. The university is currently acting under interim president Alan L. Smith, who replaced Cantwell in February. Smith has more than 27 years of experience in higher education, including nine years as a professor and chairperson of the department of kinesiology at Michigan State prior to being named the dean of the Emma Eccles Jones College of Education and Human Services in July 2021. It’s the third presidential change in two years for Utah State, where former president Noelle Cockett stepped down in July 2023. That was less than a year after former athletic director John Hartwell resigned in November 2022 prior to taking the same job at Louisiana-Monroe.The post Utah State athletic director Diana Sabau leaving for new job at Maryland appeared first on East Idaho News.
Source: eastidahonews.com