Dr. Charles Dougherty: Thank you all for joining us today, this is a new beginning for athletics at Duquesne. It's a great day for the University and I'm very pleased to be able to introduce to my left, our new athletic director, Greg Amodio. I'm also pleased to note that his wife and his children are joining us in Mrs. Kerry Amodio, Jake Amodio and Alexandra Amodio. They came in all the way from Cincinnati to be with us today until they become Pittsburgher's themselves. Welcome to our family.

I'd like to start by thanking the search committee for the outstanding work that they did. Let me first acknowledge the members of the committee. The committee was chaired by Fr. Sean Hogan; Mr. John Gamble, an alum; the head coach of our rowing team, Katie Kirsten; the dean of our School of Pharmacy, Dean Vanderveen; Mr. David DiPetro, the director of our Palumbo Center; Dr. Paula Turocy, the chair of our athletic training department in the Rangos School; Mr. Mark Dudash, who is also an alum; Ms. Carmen Bruce who is a student-athlete on the women's basketball team; Mr. Phil Racicot who is the Assistant Athletic Director for Student Services and Bill Zopf, an alumnus and more importantly, a member of the men's basketball team in the late 1960's. Thank you to the search committee for doing a marvelous job.

The committee took its responsibilities seriously, and spent its time generously in trying to get a perfect fit for the University in a new athletic director. We had a very strong pool of applicants, we had an outstanding short list of finalists at the end, but when the dust settled, the right person for Duquesne emerged and emerged quite obviously. We were looking for an athletic director who is dedicated to propelling all of our teams forward, we wanted somebody who is enthusiastic, who can share the good news about our program and we wanted somebody who can reach out to our alumni and the corporate community. We want to revitalize our Dukes Court and we want to bring our many friends and alums who have trailed off, perhaps, in their enthusiasm for our programs over the last few years. We want to bring them home and we think we have the person to do it in Greg Amodio.

Let me tell you what I told the committee when we started the search, what I said to Greg and what I said to several of our coaches, and I will continually repeat ... we expect three things from athletics at Duquesne. First we expect to have students who graduate and we do an outstanding job there. We expect to have secondly, students we can be proud of on the court and on the field as well as off the court and off the field and I feel that we have that. Finally, we expect student-athletes who will win, and we're increasingly getting there in many of our sports. Greg, I think is the one who can bring his experience from Xavier, his personal enthusiasm and his personality to bear on the task. As you know, he comes to us from Xavier. Xavier is a sister institution in the Atlantic 10, a University that shares many of our same values and a University that has had remarkable success across the board in athletics, particularly in recent years in men's basketball. We're looking to Greg's experience there to propel us forward in athletics. And now I'd like to turn it over to Greg to make some statements himself.

Greg Amodio: I thank you very much for the opportunity to be here, this is obviously a tremendous day for myself and my family. It is the culmination of some years work to be before you in the role of an athletic director. I sit here with great pride and it's an honor to be part of the Duquesne family. There is obviously a great history, rich in tradition in the athletic realm and obviously it's a fine, fine academic institution as well. By marrying those two, academics and athletics, we're providing a great opportunity for our student-athletes to contribute not only to the campus community, but to the greater Pittsburgh community as well. That's something that I am very excited about and very proud of.

Everybody's talked about my excitement and my desire to get into this role and I see a lot of people kind of smiling and nodding and maybe thinking I might be a little crazy. It is exciting, there are so many good things to be done here at Duquesne. I sense the excitement and the capabilities of the staff in the athletic department and their willingness to move this program forward. It is our charge, along with the vision set forward by the president, by the board of trustees, to go back into the community, whether that be the campus community, our student body, faculty, staff and have them understand who we are, how we fit into the campus structure and how we hope to elevate everything that takes place at Duquesne in terms of an athletic program ... to get back out with the alumni base, and rally support around those people and have them understand where we're going as a University, not only athletically but as an overall mission statement. And lastly, get back into the corporate community, a community that will be very beneficial to us in the long run in terms of finding support, bringing folks back into the Dukes Court scenario, corporate sponsorship, season ticket holders, things of that nature and provide a very exciting atmosphere for our student-athletes to be a part of.

Again, it's tremendous to meet with you here today and I'm very excited to take the experiences that I've been able to build up over the course of the years and hopefully be a part of what will be a tremendous future, not only athletically, but academically for the good of the University's athletic department.

Questions and Answers

Q: What are some of the similarities between Cincinnati and Pittsburgh?
Greg Amodio: I see very broad similarities between Cincinnati and Pittsburgh and the opportunities that the cities present each university. There is a great history and tradition here, not unlike Xavier and it's about going back into the community and fusing that excitement back to the folks that have been Duquesne supporters for a long time and even those that have not had a connection to Duquesne. I think it is important for us to go back to the entire community and have them start to understand the great programs that we have on campus and the great things that are going on in terms of looking at the football program, women's lacrosse and men's soccer and programs that have had great success but at the same time take a look at how we can grow other programs within athletics and bring them up to a similar level.

Q: Have you had a chance to get a feel for Duquesne and how it compares to Xavier?
Greg Amodio: The similarities are unbelievable. I look at the two and I look again from my experience and obviously coming from the mold of a private institution and an institution with a Catholic belief. I look at the Atlantic 10 and the understanding I have of the conference and how it will help us move forward as an athletic department, not only now, but in the future. Again, looking at Cincinnati and Pittsburgh, I look at the similarities in the market and I think one of the things I hope I can really bring to the table is my background in revenue generation and being able to help build different programs like the Dukes Court and build a sponsorship base to try to bring additional dollars into the University which will only help strengthen the programs across the board.

Q: In terms of budgetary figures, how does Duquesne rank with Xavier for athletic purposes?
Greg Amodio: It's a similar environment, but there are more sports here at Duquesne, so that affects the overall budgetary picture. There is definitely the funding in place here to make advances. I think the charge for us is to go out and find external opportunities to raise additional funds and determine how those funds can be best used to benefit our student-athletes.

Q: We've heard revenues and fundraising a couple times now. Is that the number one focus, is that the top priority as you start?
Greg Amodio: I think if we continue to look at improving our programs across the board, we can't continue to ask for more and more dollars internally. So, in order to have dollars to do things that may enhance the rest of the athletics programs, it's going to be essential to find influencers and friends of the program out in the community that we can bring back into the fold. Many of those people have associated with the program and one time or another and may be somewhat disenfranchised and we want to go back out and let them know that there is a new sense of excitement, there are new goals and new priorities in terms of what we are doing in athletics and getting those folks excited.

Q: What was the Xavier basketball program like when you got there?
Greg Amodio: Terrible (joking, crowd laughs). I actually started there about 10 years ago. I started when it was Skip Prosser's first year and our last year in the MCC. So, I went through the process of moving from the MCC to the Atlantic 10. Really, it's a very similar situation in terms of winning the NIT back in the 50's and some success in sending players to the NBA and then we went through a period where we were down a bit and when Bob Staak came on we were able to do some good things, Jeff Fogleson was our AD at the time and Bob later went on to become our first coach to go to Wake Forest. We seem to be feeding the ACC with coaches. It is a very similar situation and I think one of the things that helps to move the programs forward, is again an institutional mindset to really make it a priority. That's what I see here at Duquesne. I see an absolute priority to move the programs forward, knowing what the success of those programs can do for the overall university.
Dr. Dougherty: Let me just add something to that. The appointment of a new AD, particularly someone with the skills that Greg has, is part of the picture of change here. A second part is a major renovation of the Palumbo Center, which has already begun and will be complete by December. It will make the Palumbo Center much more entirely focused on varsity athletics, particularly men's and women's basketball. We will deal with the recreational needs of our students in another building and we will break ground for that on Forbes Avenue, probably at the end of this academic year. Finally, the third change is, the athletic director will now report directly to the president and that is symbolic in the sense of underscoring the significance being attached to athletics, but is also real in the sense that I'll be able to share with Greg the concrete steps of moving forward. The last AD reported only to Father Hogan, the Vice President for Student Affairs and to me, periodically. So, we had kind of a hybrid situation. We decided that for the sake of this transition, we will have the AD report directly to me.

Q: Greg, what do you think is a reasonable timeframe or expectation we should have for the men's basketball program to be competitive again?
Greg Amodio: I've thought about that a lot and it really becomes a difficult question to answer at this point until I really get inside and we start to take it apart and really see where the program has been. You can see from an external area, being in the Atlantic 10 as far as wins and losses where it's been, but to really get inside and determine where the program's been, where it is now and what we need to do in order to move that program forward. That's really what we'll be doing and part of the charge for me from Dr. Dougherty is to go ahead and do a full assessment of where we are, using the folks in the athletic department, going through and trying to find out exactly what we are doing right, where can we go ahead and improve a little bit and turn this thing into a program that is a perennial contender in the Atlantic 10.

Q: Being at Xavier and in the Atlantic 10, what was your impression of Duquesne from afar?
Greg Amodio: Again, with being in the Atlantic 10 we had an opportunity to understand a little more what Duquesne is all about and that they are a great academic institution and that a lot of there programs are quite successful across the board, maybe in a lot of ways, more so than Xavier. What I didn't realize until I got here is the quality of the individuals that are working here and how excited they were to see a new path set for athletics and a new vision and with myself working with Dr. Dougherty, going ahead and moving the programs forward. There is a great sense of excitement that I felt when I was here and I feed off of that as well. That's why I really think, in looking at this opportunity for myself, there is a great opportunity for change and change will take place here. This will be change with a purpose, it will be positive changes that we make that will result in positive changes on the court and positive changes in the classroom, making those areas that much stronger.
Dr. Dougherty: It will be interesting to note here, because not everyone is aware of this, but in comparing us to other member schools in the Atlantic 10, Duquesne University, every year, consistently, by every measure, leads the Atlantic 10 in academic performance of student-athletes. There is nobody that is even close. That is part of our tradition that we will retain with Greg's commitment. Greg Amodio: Throughout the process of what we do, we can not, at any time, go against the principles of this University and the athletic program must be Mission driven in order to be successful. Our thoughts and our vision in terms of what we do in athletics become congruent with what the overall mission of the University is.

Q: You mentioned the Dukes Court. Is that primarily an alumni program and what is its status?
Greg Amodio: From what I've been able to gather at this point, it's a friends program, it's a fundraising type of program to bring in additional assets, whether it is personnel or it is financial backing of the athletic program to help fuel the programs and things of that nature. Some dollars go to specific programs and others are used in a general manner. I've gotten the sense that it's been somewhat limited in its movement forward lately and that's something we want to go back in and rekindle, because that can be a valuable asset in terms of making improvements down the line.

Q: Greg, you came from Cincinnati and there you had competition with Xavier and Cincinnati. Now you're in Pittsburgh and it's Duquesne, Robert Morris, who claims they are ahead of us and our friends out in Oakland with their vast resources. How do you look at that challenge?
Greg Amodio: I had a conversation with Mark Schmidt last week, who came from Xavier to Robert Morris and he felt that this town might not be big enough for the two of us. I told him he probably needed to pack up and move out then. Mark's a great friend of ours, of Kerry and me, and his wife Janine and their kids, and I think we can't try to make it a competition. We are who we are. At Xavier we had competition with the Reds and the Bengals and UC and fit a niche quite nicely in our community and I think the same thing is going to happen here. There is obviously a vast network of alumni and friends of Duquesne here in Pittsburgh and those are the people we want to go back to and bring back into the fold in order to move forward. I'm not worried about the competitive balance at all, we are who we are and we will continue to accentuate the positives that surround Duquesne and try to make this the best University in Pittsburgh.

Q: What kind of things can we expect as far as reaching out to the alums and what worked for at Xavier as far as how to make the initial contacts to get the ball rolling?
Greg Amodio: I think the first thing is for me to be out in the market as much as possible. It's important for us as we move forward to find out who the influences in the market are and how we can get the folks that can help open additional doors for the athletic department and the University in general. So, we'll spend a lot of time doing those types of things. I think with the alums, what we want to do also, and we had great success with this at Xavier, is create more of an event around the basketball games. Not just being about the basketball game, but being an event to the point that, it's a multi-dimensional approach. A basketball game is not just, come to Palumbo, sit down, watch the game and go home, but prior to that there may be development functions, there may be alumni functions, there may be admissions functions, things of that nature. How can we use Duquesne basketball and Duquesne athletics as a hook to bring people on campus? Not only to be associated by an athletics event, but for other entities on campus, so that we're strengthening all the components. We need to be viewed as a positive on campus, the campus community, faculty and staff and especially with our student body. Part of that will also entail us coming back to the student body and really having them be involved, because these programs really belong to the students. We want them to know that. These are their peers that are out on the court, performing on a nightly basis and they need to have a sense of pride and support. I think that once we have all these different groups come together to rally around, it will continue to build itself and we'll see a successful alumni base come back into the fold.

Q: What type of contacts are you planning with the news media and FOX Sports to try to increase coverage of our activities here?
Greg Amodio: Just to give you a little understanding from a historical prospective, I handled all the TV and radio at Xavier. Some of the things we were able to do in that situation through local programming and FOX Sports Net Ohio was a 10-game package that broadcast our games throughout the whole state. We were on 700 WLW in Cincinnati, a 50,000 watt Clear Channel program, we competed on that station which also carried UC, the Reds and the Bengals. It was kind of a sports home for Cincinnati. So, I have a great history and understanding of how that business works and those will be some of the first things we go out into the market and do. Fortunately, I have some good contacts still at FOX Sports Ohio who said "We'll come down and introduce you to the guys at FOX Sports Pittsburgh" and I said you can't do that fast enough. So, looking out into the community to make sure that we are providing an opportunity for our athletes to play in a larger arena and hand-in-hand that is very important in the recruiting process, especially in basketball and football. The student-athletes like to know that their parents will be able to see them on TV, that there will be opportunities for exposure and things of that nature and that is something we would like to provide in the long term.

Dr. Dougherty: I think you have a taste now of why I am so grateful to Father Hogan and the search committee. Thank you Greg it is a pleasure to have you aboard.