Estimated read time: 5-6 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
SALT LAKE CITY — After 31 years as the athletics director at the University of Utah, Chris Hill has decided to call it quits.
Hill, who was hired to be the director of the school’s athletics program in October 1987, was just 37 years old when he took the job at Utah. Prior to the announcement of his retirement, Hill was the nation’s longest active tenured athletics director in the NCAA.
“Chris Hill leaves a tremendous legacy at the University of Utah,” said University of Utah President Ruth V. Watkins in a prepared statement. “Chris has embodied all the traits needed to build a successful program: a student advocate, a skilled negotiator, a solid administrator with a keen eye for talent, an excellent fundraiser and a passionate sports fan.
"His leadership and relentless drive to raise the caliber and quality of our athletic programs over his 31-year career helped earn the university an invitation to join the Pac-12 Conference— a milestone that has proven to be transformational for our entire campus," Watkins added.
Hill said he made the decision back in January but wanted to wait until the end of basketball season to not "be a distraction." He will remain as the university's athletics director for the next two months before formally retiring.
In his remaining two months, Hill said he will be working hard to make the Rice-Eccles Stadium expansion a done deal. He said the university needs to raise $25 million and that he plans to earn $20 million before he leaves.
The actual details of the stadium expansion have not been released, as the program's feasibility study has not been finalized. However, the longtime wish for the football program appears close to being a done deal.
"I’m excited about it and it’s something that is really needed," Utah football coach Kyle Whittingham said Monday. Whittingham added that the hope is to have a stadium with more than 50,000 seats.
During an emotional press conference Monday morning, Hill said his heart told him it was time to retire.
"My heart is telling me it feels good, and so that’s all there is," Hill said. "The other thing is we’re in good shape, the program is in good shape. I think we have good things going. But at the end of the day, it’s from inside."
Hill added that he wanted to "be able to enjoy the regular stuff" and not worry about the daily decisions as an athletic director. But he added that he was grateful for an improbable job opportunity that he was able to do for more than 30 years.
"To the president who hired me, he took an unbelievable risk," Hill said. "I was teasing that he picked me up off the streets of Salt Lake City and gave me a job. And somehow we made it through the darkest of years in 1989, and I was just a pup."
During his tenure at Utah, Hill took the school’s athletics program from the Mountain West Conference to the Pac-12 and has hired several prominent coaches in several sports, including three national coaches of the year: football’s Urban Meyer and Kyle Whittingham and the late men’s basketball coach Rick Majerus.
"The way you really, in my estimation, gauge his run as athletics director is where was the program when he took it over and look where it is now," Whittingham said. "It’s night and day."
Hill has overseen a total of nine total NCAA team championships by the ski team and gymnastics team in his time as athletics director and has seen several successes in many of the other sports, including a 1998 NCAA championship appearance for the men’s basketball team and a Sugar Bowl victory over Alabama in 2009, among other things.
Although Hill has been a strong driver of raising Utah’s prominence in the NCAA, he was embroiled in an alleged abuse issue with a former swim coach. In 2013, parents of some of the members of the swim team claimed the athletics department was made aware of abuse by the coach but that nothing was done at the time.
Hill, a native of New Jersey, began his career at Utah as a graduate assistant basketball coach in 1973 before leaving to coach the boys basketball team at Granger High in Salt Lake City. Hill returned to the university to be an assistant coach to Jerry Pimm from 1979-81. Hill later served as the Crimson Club director from 1985-86 before accepting the role as athletics director in 1987.
Hill played basketball collegiately for Rutgers and was a team captain while earning an undergraduate degree in math education. He later attended the University of Utah to earn a masters in education and a Ph.D. in educational administration.
Although a new athletics director has not been named, Hill said he's talked to Watkins about associate athletic director Kyle Brennan as a possible replacement. Whittingham, too, echoed his support of Brennan as a viable replacement for Hill.
"I think Kyle Brennan is a superstar in the making," Whittingham said. "I think he’s ready for this. And if he does get the opportunity, I have no doubt he’d be successful."
In 2016, Brennan was hired by Montana State to be the program's athletics director, but after a week on the job he stepped down and returned to Utah. Brennan has long been considered a strong candidate for the athletics director position once Hill left.
In 2014, the Utah football program was a strong supporter of the Brennan family as their 8-year-old son Mac battled leukemia. Mac eventually beat cancer and remains a strong supporter of the program.
