A little more than a month and a half after Jen Cohen left Washington to become athletic director at USC, the Huskies have found her replacement.
The school announced Saturday that Troy Dannen, the AD at Tulane for the past eight years, will become UW’s 16th athletic director.
Here is some quick analysis of the hire, a look at Dannen’s background and my thoughts on why UW selected him.
- Among the four reported finalists for the job, Dannen possesses the most encouraging football résumé — far and away the most important factor in any AD search — both in terms of overseeing a thriving program and in hiring and retaining the head coach of said program. In his first act as Tulane’s AD — eight days after he was officially announced, in December 2015 — Dannen hired Willie Fritz from Georgia Southern. The Green Wave had finished 3-9 in both 2014 and 2015, but Fritz had them back in a bowl game in his third season, and responded to a 2-10 dip in 2021 by assembling one of the greatest seasons in school history: a 12-2 record punctuated by a thrilling comeback victory over USC in the Cotton Bowl.
The particulars: Dannen grew up on a farm in Iowa and graduated with a communications degree from Northern Iowa in 1989. He’s used to being in charge: before his eight-year tenure at Tulane, Dannen spent seven-plus years as the AD at UNI, and was the executive director of the Iowa Girls’ High School Athletic Union for seven years before that.