Paul Dee Answers Your Questions
August, 2001
Q: What is happening here at the University of Miami athletic department this fall?
A: We have a number of sports that begin in the fall.
Football of course is the one we are all most aware of and we are looking forward to a tremendous season under Head Coach Larry Coker. We have a number of important games but our focus has to be in winning the BIG EAST Conference if we want to get in to the BCS.
We also have an “old” sport, which is now fully funded with full scholarships, our women’s crew program. We have a new coach in Debra Morgan. They’ll be starting their fall racing series.
Our women’s soccer program is now fully funded for the first time with the full 12 scholarships. Coach Jim Blankenship is looking forward to a successful year in his fourth season as head coach. We’re expecting good things from them and looking forward to moving up in the eastern division of the BIG EAST Conference.
This year we also have a brand new fall sport in women’s volleyball. Head Coach Nicole Lantagne has brought in four scholarship players and has a squad of 14 including walk-ons she tried out last year from our student body.
Likewise our men’s and women’s cross county teams run in the fall. They will be getting started very soon and their schedule starts in early September. Women’s Head Coach Amy Deem and Men’s Head Coach Mike Ward both return.
Q: What is your role as far as all of these sports?
A: As with everything else, these sports require funding to operate, funding for scholarships and funding for facilities. Our job is to provide the resources for our student athletes through fund raising activities, through gifts to the Hurricane Club and all of the other methods we have available to raise revenue for the athletic program.
We pretty much spend most of our time in the fall making sure that we are raising enough money so that we can meet our annual budget.
Q: Talk about the new facilities. (click here to view facility photos)
A: I’m really thrilled about the fact that we’ve just opened our new Fitness Center, Weight Room, Locker Room facility, which includes team meeting rooms for our football team and a student lounge. We also have new locker rooms for our women’s programs in track, soccer and volleyball, and for our men’s track team. They’ll all enjoy new space to meet in the building.
Across campus we have the Ryder Center, (click here to view updated photos) which is underway and probably about one-quarter of the way complete. It began in April and the cement work is moving along. They are almost up to the concourse and one part of the building is well above the concourse.
We recently did a lot of maintenance on the Greentree Practice Fields.
Our new soccer stadium – the Cobb Stadium for Soccer, Track and Field – is maturing nicely. We’re pleased with the condition it’s in. As everyone knows it was named after the (Charles) Cobb family.
We want to congratulate Mrs. Sue Cobb, for her recent selection by the President of the United States and her approval by the Senate of the United States. She was sworn in by Secretary of State Colin Powell at a formal ceremony at the State Department as the Ambassador of the United States to Jamaica. We want to congratulate both the Cobbs — as Mr. (Charles) Cobb was the Ambassador to Iceland. They are only the second husband-wife team that have both been U.S. Ambassadors.
Q: Reflect on your summer. What was the primary focus?
A: We spent a lot of time working on the facilities getting them ready for the fall. We spent a lot of time in preparation for fund raising for the upcoming year. We’ve had a lot of conversations with regard to facilities improvement. Basically the summer was dedicated to physical plan and resources for the future.
