Virginia Tech: Quickie presidential search, with timing to help football, under way

For a lot of folks, the Virginia Tech presidential search story is more a Virginia Tech football story.

As such, the latest news in the presidential search, and by extension, the search for a new athletics director, is that the search committee is meeting virtually on Monday, May 11.

Tim Sands has said he will stay on through the transition, however long that takes, but two factors, including the need to hire a new athletics director, point to this search being a relatively quick one.

One is the announcement last month that Whit Babcock’s last day as the AD is June 30.

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ICYMI

• Why Tim Sands is stepping down at Virginia Tech: It’s not politics, it’s football
• Whit Babcock announces ‘retirement’ as AD at Virginia Tech

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The second: politics.

The BOV’s rector, John Rocovich, a Glenn Youngkin appointee, said last month that he expects a new president to be named before the academic year begins on July 1, which is also when four Abigail Spanberger appointees take their spots on the board.

The Youngkin appointees still have a 9-4 BOV majority on July 1 and going forward in the 2026-2027 academic year, with three of Youngkin’s appointees, including Rocovich, cycling off the board on June 30, 2027.

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Meeting details

• The meeting of the Virginia Tech Presidential Search Committee will is set to begin at 2 p.m.
• The agenda of the meeting will be posted to the Virginia Tech Board of Visitors website prior to the meeting, along with the link to view the livestream.
• Public comment will not be received during the search committee meeting.

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The push from the Youngkin sect to get a new president before that June 30, 2027, date is obvious – a 7-6 Spanberger majority BOV would be in charge of the process at that point, which is when Sands said he was intending to step down, at the end of his contract.

The push to get a new prez in place by the end of June 2026 is about athletics, specifically, football.

Getting a new president in place in the summer will get things moving toward hiring a new AD, which is important in the context of the launch of the school’s Invest to Win initiative, a scheme rolled out last year that has set a $229 million fundraising goal with the stated aim to modernize Tech Athletics.

The bulk of that money – $120 million – is budgeted to come from private donors, who have been making it clear behind the scenes that they don’t want the guy who pushed Frank Beamer out the door, and then had to fire the two guys he had replace Beamer, to be the guy anymore.

Ideally, you get a new AD in place to coincide with the position being formally open on July 1, which could factor into the presidential search process – it’s not hard to imagine one of the first questions for candidates being, who can you bring with you to be the new director of athletics?