Blue White Illustrated

her transition. The opportunity to return to administration at an even bigger school than the one she had just left "was too much not to look at," Barbour said. "When Dr. Barron extended the invitation to me, it was clearly an opportunity that I jumped on because this is a very, very special place." The overall athletics program that Bar- bour has inherited is, from a competitive standpoint, as healthy as it's been at any point since the Sandusky scandal shook the school to its foundations in 2011. Nit- tany Lion teams won three national cham- pionships during the 2013-14 academic year – in wrestling, women's volleyball and fencing – and finished fifth in the Directors' Cup with a school-record 1,113 points. Hopes are also running high in the school's flagship athletic program, with Franklin putting together the school's best football recruiting class in more than a decade. Barbour, who previously served as deputy athletics director at Notre Dame and as athletics director at Tulane, made note of those accomplishments but also emphasized that there's more to do. As far as she's concerned, three national titles in one year are not an end point; they are a good start. The Directors' Cup, she said, "is probably the very best indicator of comprehensive and depart- ment-wide success. And it's something we coveted at Cal. We finished third in 2011, the highest finish in their history. "Stanford has won it 13, 14, 15 years in a row. We're going to go after taking it away from Stanford. We're going to look at what we need to do strategically to get that done. Because we've got the coaches, we've got the student-athletes, we've got the resources, we've got the know-how to do that." Barbour was athletics director at Cal from 2004 through July 2014, when the university said a "change in leadership" was needed in the athletics department. The change occurred after Cal's Academic Progress Rate, which the NCAA uses to determine postseason eligibility, dropped to 935 overall for a four-year period ending in the 2011-12 academic year. A score less than 930 can result in sanc- tions. In the five major conferences – Big Ten, and months. Having worked with five athletics directors during the past five years, Franklin said he's comfortable with whatever management style Bar- bour brings to Penn State. He said some ADs want to be in daily contact with the football coach, while others are less hands-on. "I'm comfortable with either one," he said. Barbour said that their initial conversation set a positive tone. "I think we hit it off," she said. "I'm looking forward to working with him and his staff and being a part of our success in the future. I have spo- ken with a couple of the coaches on the phone, had an opportunity to meet a number of the staff, and it's just start- ing." Franklin, who has stressed the im- portance of building good relation- ships both within and beyond the Penn State community, has a history of working smoothly with his ADs. Deb- bie Yow in 2009 named him Mary- land's head-coach-in-waiting, but when Yow left for North Carolina State, that plan went awry, as her suc- cessor, Kevin Anderson, brought back Ralph Friedgen in 2011 for the final year of his contract. Anderson's decision prompted Franklin to leave for Vanderbilt, where he developed a strong bond with Com- modores AD David Williams. Williams tried hard to keep him from departing for Penn State, reportedly offering a 10- year contract worth $50 million. That offer wasn't enough to prevent him from leaving Nashville behind for his native Pennsylvania, and he was on hand at Beaver Stadium for Barbour's introduction, posing for photos on the field before heading back inside to field questions. Of the university dignitaries who spoke at Barbour's introduction, Franklin was the longest-tenured, hav- ing been on the job for more than half a year. A recent arrival himself, he said he was "probably the last person to ask" about helping her integrate into the community. "I know three restaurants and the airport and that's about it," Franklin said. "But I hope to be a resource. I've been here for seven months. I have some perspective. And we've got great coaches who have been here for 10, 15, 25, 30 years who are also tremendous resources. So I'll do whatever I can do to help everybody move forward and get adjusted, because we don't really have a year to waste building that rela- tionship. We've got to hit the ground running. I know that we'll spend as much time as we need to so that we can start building." – M.H. ONE TEAM Franklin, Barbour and Barron pose for photos in Beaver Stadium following Barbour's introduction as Penn State's new athletics director. Photo by Ryan Snyder

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