Ryan Bamford

Ryan Bamford is the current athletic director of the University of Massachusetts Amherst.^[1] He was previously hired on March 23, 2011 as an associate athletic director by then Georgia Institute of Technology athletic director Dan Radakovich and promoted to senior associate in June 2013 by incoming athletic director Mike Bobinski. Bamford also served at Yale University as senior associate director of athletics for varsity sports administration.^[2][3]

Family and education

Bamford's father, Steve Bamford, is a long-time college athletics administrator. He served as director of athletics at Plymouth State University in Plymouth, N.H. for 13 years before joining the Eastern College Athletic Conference in 2000 as an assistant commissioner. The elder Bamford most recently served as the conference's interim commissioner, a post he was appointed to twice in the last five years.^[4] Bamford attended Ithaca College and was a guard on the basketball team. He left Ithaca as the school's 13th 1000-point scorer and all-time leader in single-season and career three-point field goals.^[2] He earned a degree in Sport Management in 2000, and added a Master's degree in athletic administration from Springfield College in 2003.

Early career

Bamford worked in the athletic department at Springfield College (2000–02) as a graduate fellow. He has also previously held positions with the Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC), Octagon Sports Marketing, Plymouth State and the University of New Hampshire.^[5]

Yale University

Bamford was hired at Yale University as an assistant athletic director in 2003. He was promoted to associate athletic director in 2006 and then senior associate director of athletics in 2007.

During his time at Yale, he oversaw the football, men's basketball and men's and women's fencing programs. In addition, he supervised Yale's varsity support service units of sports medicine, equipment operations and strength and conditioning, as well as the intercollegiate scheduling, event management and postseason championships for the 35-sport department.

Bamford has served on a number of NCAA and Ivy League committees, including four years on the NCAA Division I Women's Lacrosse Committee, which he chaired from 2009 to 2010.^[2] As part of the administration at Yale, Bamford was responsible for new parking regulations for annual Harvard-Yale football rivalry game,^[6] as well as dealing with student pranks associated with the rivalry^[7]

Georgia Tech

As senior associate director of athletics at Georgia Tech, Bamford has direct oversight of all internal operations and supervision of the football and men's basketball programs. In 2011, he assisted athletic director Dan Radakovich in the search process for a men's basketball coach. On March 28, 2011 the Jackets hired Brian Gregory as the 13th head coach in program history.^[8] Bamford oversees scheduling for both Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets football and Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets men's basketball and was involved in a January 2014 incident when Tulane University attempted to cancel a series against Georgia Tech, including a home game scheduled for September 6, 2014.^[9] Later that evening, Tulane reversed the decision.^[10]

Twitter exchange with ESPN executive

Following the 2014 Orange Bowl, ESPN senior public relations director tweeted about the network's television ratings for the game, prompting a reply from Bamford about Matt Millen, who was part of the ESPN broadcast crew for the game. The contentious exchange was documented on several blogs, though it later became clear that the pair knew each other.^[11]

References