CaneSport's Inside The Lines: The Dan Radakovich Interview Part 1

When Dan Radakovich was named the 14th Director of Athletics in University of Miami history on Dec. 8, 2021, it brought him full circle to where he began aspiring to the top level of athletic administration as a graduate of the UM School of Business Masters program.

That first job was as the Athletic Business Manager at The U and from there he traveled a road with six stops before taking over the top position at Miami.

Like football coach Mario Cristobal, Radakovich would not have taken the job had he not seen a complete reversal in terms of the emotional and financial commitment the University wanted to make toward athletics.

He was already the Athletic Director at Clemson for nine years and had a 30-year track record in his profession. Prior to that, Radakovich was the AD at Georgia Tech and had significant athletic administrative roles at Georgia Tech, LSU, American, South Carolina, Long Beach State and UM.

There was no need to take step backward. 

At Clemson, Radakovich oversaw the most successful stretch in Tigers football history as the program won two national championships (2016, 2018), six ACC titles and made six College Football Playoff appearances during his time there. Clemson also set a school record in the NCAA’s most recent Graduation Success Rate (GSR) report, posting a 95 percent score, which also tied for first in the ACC amongst public schools. That shows how successful Radakovich was in building a program with balance between academics and athletics.

CaneSport sat down with Radakovich for an extensive interview about a wide-ranging assortment of topics.

In today’s Part 1, Publisher Gary Ferman talks to Radakovich about why he chose to take the Miami job and why the timing was right to make that move. They talk about Miami’s plans for new facilities and when shovels might hit the ground.

The construction plans are a clear response to the arms race in college football with acknowledgement that Miami is a little late to the game. That comes with challenges but Radakovich is intent on making it all happen now at The U.

Here is the video of Part 1 (above). Over the next three days, you will see Parts 2-4.

Some highlights:

ON WHY HE TOOK THE MIAMI JOB: “I will tell you that I really wasn’t looking to move. But when I had an opportunity to speak with some of the folks from the university I was just really impressed with it and impressed with their ideas of being able to go in and invest in the program. I mean, I’ve been in the ACC since 2006. And it was easy to see that Miami might not be investing like they need to, like some of the other schools in the league were doing to have the greatest success that they that they could have. And when the idea came forward that they were going to do that, that kind of perked my interest. Because I know that Mario Cristobal is an incredible football coach. He’s going to do great things. He’s pulled together an incredible staff. We’re going to try to do all we can to support him. So the idea that we’ll have the resources to do that really made this a really interesting opportunity to look into.”

ON THE DISCUSSION ABOUT A NEW FOOTBALL COMPLEX THAT COULD COME WITH A $100 MILLION PRICE TAG: “None of this is in in cement right now. But in order to get to the right solution, you have to talk about everything……We’re here to make sure that the student athletes have a great experience, not only in football, but in our other sports as well. You have to get five or six approvals to be able to build anything even if you have the money. Okay, so here, there’s approvals and an understanding of how it impacts the campus environment. We want to be good partners with the campus. There’s a finite amount of space here on our campus to be able to work with and each one of the square feet here has to be dedicated to a positive process. So we need to make sure that what we’re what we’re looking to do is going to move the university forward because certainly I can make the case that all of these changes will move the athletic program forward.”

ON THE TIMELINE FOR THE NEW FACILITIES: “Oh, my gosh, we’re a long way from shovels in the ground. You’ve got to work through the local municipalities here, the city, the county to make sure that you know, those things are in good shape. I haven’t built anything in Coral Gables or on the University of Miami campus, so I don’t know, I can’t do the math real quick……But we have great partners on campus who are working through that who do have (experience) and have built some really good things on campus. So that will help guide us through that. There’s an urgency to move. Yes, there’s absolutely an urgency to raise the money as soon as we can, get the permits as soon as we can. There will be pictures. Pictures are easier to come by than all the rest of that. But we will be going out to our alumni to people in the community to help begin to raise money. We’re guising up those pictures and kind of getting some good ideas as to what that forever home will look like. But we have to go out and raise money and then kind of go as fast as humanly possible to get this thing done.”