Dave Heeke (pronounced Hee-key) was named Vice President and Director of Athletics at the University Arizona in February of 2017. Heeke’s vision for Arizona Athletics centers around a culture of excellence, a focus on a first-class student-athlete experience, championship-caliber competitive performances in competition and in the classroom; as well as enhancing fan experience and providing a tremendous workplace environment. His drive as a leader of a nationally-elite athletics program also aims to support the University of Arizona in its mission and goals as a point of pride around the nation. Making strategic enhancements in the operation of the athletics department has been Heeke’s calling card for building a thriving and secure foundation for growth and sustainable success.
The impact of the Heeke era on Arizona Athletics was immediate with an overhaul of facilities, groundbreaking academic achievements, the elevation of the department’s fundraising to unprecedented heights, and the enhancement of the overall organizational, employee focus and culture.
The 2022-23 academic year marked the sixth year of Heeke’s leadership as Vice President and Director of Athletics, and it proved to be another year of department-wide excellence and historical accomplishments. Arizona’s record-breaking success in the classroom continued as the athletics department posted its highest semester grade point average in school history with a 3.300 GPA in Fall 2022. Arizona followed that all-time high with a Spring 2023 GPA of 3.296, which marked the highest spring semester GPA in department history.
Athletic success in 2022-23 saw Arizona earn three individual national championships from Delaney Schnell in the women’s platform dive and a sweep of indoor and outdoor shotput titles by Jordan Geist. The trio of NCAA individual titles were the department’s first since 2017 and gave Arizona multiple individual national championships for the first time since 2015. The Wildcats also won conference championships in Arizona Men’s Tennis and claimed the Pac-12 Men’s Basketball Tournament title for a fifth time since 2015. Arizona Football won the 2022 edition of the Territorial Cup over its in-state rivals, which brought the trophy back to Tucson for the first time in five years.
Heeke’s sixth year leading the athletics department also saw an expansion of student-athlete resources and enhancements to Arizona’s “Wildcat Way” student-athlete experience. Arizona bolstered its position as a national leader in the Name, Image and Likeness space by growing its resources available to student-athletes. The athletics department’s continued investment in this key area of support has included national partnerships, bolstering of staffing through multimedia rights agreements, utilization of Pac-12 Conference resources. One of these new initiatives was Arizona Athletics’ NIL Open House, which was a one-of-a-kind, in-person symposium that connected student-athletes and local Southern Arizona businesses.
Another hallmark of the 2022-23 season was Arizona’s announcement of a generous anonymous gift to fully fund the department’s 5980 Academic Fund. The U.S. Supreme Court's decision in the Alston vs. NCAA case in 2022 paved the way for institutions to provide student-athletes with additional education-related benefits and direct financial support in the form of academic achievement, up to the legally established maximum of $5,980 per year. The powerful generosity of the anonymous gift made the University of Arizona one of the first and only athletic departments in the nation to fully fund its 5980 academic program.
The athletics department continued to thrive in Heeke’s fifth year at Arizona as the 2021-22 year raised the bar for excellence in all facets. Arizona student-athletes continued to reach historic heights in the classroom, posting a 3.157 overall semester GPA in Fall of 2021 that marked the highest Fall semester GPA in department history. Fall of 2021 also gave Arizona Athletics its seventh consecutive year of breaking its own overall semester GPA record for the fall. The department’s 3.089 overall GPA for Spring 2022 was the second-highest spring semester GPA in Arizona history. The athletics program also posted its second-highest Graduate Success Rate (GSR) score ever with an 86 percent while tying the department record for teams with perfect APR scores at 10.
Championship excellence in competition became another hallmark of the 2021-22 with Arizona winning a trio of Pac-12 team championships, which included Arizona Men’s Basketball’s sweep of the regular season and conference tournament titles under first-year head coach Tommy Lloyd. Arizona Men’s Tennis won its first-ever Pac-12 championship as the 2022 regular season champions in addition to Wildcat student-athletes winning four individual Pac-12 championships. Arizona Softball returned to the Women’s College World Series under first-year head coach Caitlin Lowe as she became the first coach to lead a team to the WCWS in her first year as a head coach since the NCAA Tournament expanded in 1988 and the only woman to accomplish it.
Arizona Athletics posted another banner year of fundraising success in 2021-22, which was punctuated by the department’s official announcement of the new $14.8 million William M. “Bill” Clements Golf Center. The new, state-of-the-art home facility for Arizona’s men’s and women’s golf programs will be constructed at Tucson Country Club.
Heeke continued his nationally-recognized leadership and service to college athletics with an appointment to the prestigious NCAA Division I Men’s Basketball Committee in 2022, becoming just the third athletic director in Arizona history to serve on the committee.
During the unprecedented challenges of the global COVID-19 pandemic, Arizona Athletics became a national leader in testing, tracing and treatment while overseeing a 2020-21 year that capped unrivaled championship success in a variety of sports as well as in the classroom. The athletics department’s cohesive collaboration with University of Arizona campus partners and the Pima County Health Department not only developed comprehensive re-entry strategies, but also allowed Arizona student-athletes and staff to be a part of a gold standard testing program that reduced cancellations and postponements of competition. The athletics department was able to complete its strategic and phased approach to fan re-entry during the spring and become the first Pac-12 program to announce plans for full capacity for the 2021 season.
By the end of the 2020-21 academic year, Arizona Athletics had posted one of its most successful years as a department with wholesale athletic and academic success across its 21 programs. Arizona Women’s Basketball’s historic run to its first ever NCAA Championship game appearance solidified the program’s position as one of the elite programs nationally. Trips to the Women’s College World Series by Arizona Softball and the College World Series by Arizona Baseball bookended a dominant spring athletically. Those trips to Oklahoma City and Omaha followed the first Sweet 16 appearance ever by Arizona Men’s Tennis and Arizona Women’s Golf becoming the only program in the nation to reach the semifinals of match play at the NCAA Championships in 2018, 2019 and 2021. Wildcat programs would end the year with its highest finish in the Learfield Director’s Cup standings in seven years.
Deep postseason runs at national championships capped successful spring seasons as three head coaches were named Pac-12 Coach of the Year while Arizona Baseball and Arizona Men’s Golf won Pac-12 championships as well. Five Wildcats won six individual conference championships in diving and track and field while student-athletes would go on to earn a total of nearly 40 all-american accolades.
The athletic highlights of 2020-21 were rivaled by the department’s continual record-breaking success in the classroom. Arizona student-athletes continued to reach new heights academically, culminating in the department’s highest-ever overall semester GPA with a 3.172 in Spring 2021.The all-time high GPA mark followed Arizona Athletics setting a new department record in Graduate Success Rate (GSR) with an 87 percent in the latest NCAA-released data in the Fall of 2020.
Arizona’s unparalleled success on the field and in the classroom in 2020-21 also saw Heeke provide strategic retainment of key head coaches with contract extensions, including Adia Barnes of Women’s Basketball, Laura Ianello of Women’s Golf, Jim Anderson on Men’s Golf, Clancy Shields of Men’s Tennis and John Court of Gymnastics. Other key coaching personnel decisions included the hiring of new head coaches in football, men’s basketball, soccer, softball and baseball in 2020-21.
Beginning in September of 2018, Heeke led a transformative capital investment of $66 million as Arizona Athletics made critical facility enhancements with renovations of the east side of Arizona Stadium, Hillenbrand Aquatic Center, Hillenbrand Softball Stadium, McKale Center locker rooms and the construction of the Cole and Jeannie Davis Sports Center. These construction projects were built around enhancing the student-athlete experience, improving game day environment and creating dynamic landmarks for the University of Arizona campus. He also initiated a market assessment study to examine further renovations of Arizona Stadium while completing a master facility planning process for all of Arizona Athletics.
During Heeke’s leadership, the department’s development efforts have achieved some of the biggest fundraising years on record, including the powerful $8 million naming gift for the Cole and Jeannie Davis Sports Center. Arizona Athletics’ fundraising efforts have surpassed its yearly fundraising goals every year since Heeke’s arrival in Tucson. The high-level success of the Wildcat Club includes nearly $35 million raised in the 2019 fiscal year, which was one of the top three fundraising years in department history. Arizona has raised $100 million in the last three years that also included an anonymous gift of $5 million to begin the $66 million facility enhancements.
The 2017-18 and 2018-19 academic years were record-breaking years in the classroom for Wildcat student-athletes. The athletics department set numerous academic records that began with a 3.028 semester grade point average posted by student-athletes in the Spring of 2018, which was the highest fall or spring GPA ever posted at the time. Arizona student-athletes broke that record the following semester with a 3.057 GPA. The student-athlete cumulative GPA rose to a record-setting mark of 3.102 in the Spring of 2019. These marks included new semester record GPA’s for nine of Arizona’s programs. The two years of academic excellence by Arizona student-athletes marked the first time in history that the 3.0 cumulative GPA threshold was crossed.
Competitive success by Arizona Athletics’ programs has delivered national and Pac-12 championships. Arizona Women’s Golf won the 2018 National Championship with a thrilling victory over Alabama in sudden death to give the University of Arizona its 22
nd national title. Arizona Men’s Basketball won regular season conference titles and the Pac-12 Tournament in the same season in both the 2016-17 and 2017-18 seasons, marking just the second time in Pac-12 history that a program has won four conference championships in two seasons.
The Wildcats continued their on-field excellence in 2018-19 as Arizona Women’s Basketball won six consecutive games in convincing fashion en route to a WNIT championship. The spring success continued as Arizona Softball advanced to the Women’s College World Series in Oklahoma City for the 23
rd time in program history. Women’s Golf, Men’s Golf, Soccer, Volleyball and Gymnastics would also participate in postseason competition to round out another stellar year of Arizona Athletics.
In his first year on the job, Heeke expanded the staff, mission, and priority of the human resources department within athletics by hiring a Senior Associate Director of Athletics for Human Resources. Since then, a critical emphasis of the department’s strategic plan is on the recruitment, retention, engagement and training of employees. The department has started a number of new initiatives focused on improving employee health and well-being while enhancing workplace culture. Another key area of emphasis has been the department’s overall commitment and expansion of educational efforts on Title IX for staff and student-athletes. Currently 100 percent of department staff and student-athletes participate in annual training. The department has also worked with campus leaders to integrate fully with the University reporting processes and to increase awareness, understanding, and respect for the department’s overall commitment to Title IX and gender equity.
In November of 2018, Heeke charged his department to initiate a comprehensive strategic planning process to define key values and initiatives that will direct organizational focus. Arizona Athletics introduced its first-ever comprehensive strategic plan “
The Wildcat Way” in September of 2019. The department and the teams of faculty, coaches, staff, campus partners, and students who participated in the process surveyed over 160,000 stakeholders in order to effectively identify opportunities for growth and development. The result was a strategic plan that aligned its pillars, values, and initiatives with the recently completed University of Arizona institutional strategic plan. The alignment was an intentional effort to demonstrate the importance of the role athletics plays in supporting the University mission while it strives for excellence.
As part of the University and department strategic planning processes, athletics elected to adopt the University core values as the department’s values. The lead value for the University and Arizona Athletics is “integrity”. Since arriving at Arizona, Heeke has championed and been committed to creating a culture of integrity and compliance. In July of 2017, he hired a nationally recognized leader in the compliance field to head the department while growing the staff from three to six full-time compliance administrators. The expansion of personnel has allowed for an increased commitment to education, support, research, and reporting.
Another area of emphasis for Heeke has been prioritizing a culture of supporting diversity and inclusion throughout the athletics department. Heeke created the new position of Assistant Athletics Director for Diversity, Inclusion and Employee Engagement in September of 2019 to support the expanded emphasis and energy behind education, programming, and training for all staff and student-athletes. In addition to this position, he also supported the creation of a robust Inclusive Excellence Council within the department. This vital group focuses on the importance of diversity and inclusion programing, educational events, outreach and recruitment of new hires, understanding and appreciating diversity, cultivating an inclusive & safe environment, and more. There are now over 25 ICA staff members actively participating in making the mission of this initiative relevant in all aspects of the department and beyond. Most recently, the department launched a new initiative to support advancing women in college athletics through education, mentoring, networking, and engagement.
Heeke has developed a wide range understanding of college athletics that includes a number of vital roles. He has experience in department leadership, budget development, fundraising, compliance and sport supervision among other areas. As Vice President and Director of Athletics, he also has marquee experience in coaching hires and retentions, which includes extensions, renewals, enhancements, and very difficult changes when necessary to ensure stability and success in the department’s long-term foundation of Wildcat head coaches. Heeke’s work in this critical area includes hiring head coaches in football, swimming and diving, women’s tennis and gymnastics while making other modifications and enhancements to all other sport coach contracts.
While Athletics Director at CMU, Heeke instilled his vision of a “Championship Culture,” which included athletic success, academic excellence, national media exposure, record fundraising, and a commitment to facilities. The department was twice honored with the Cartwright Award, which recognizes the Mid-American Conference’s top overall institution based on excellence in academics, athletics and citizenship. CMU earned the Reese Trophy, which honors the top MAC men’s athletic program, three times, and finished as the runner-up for the Jacoby Trophy, which honors the top MAC women’s athletic program, four times under Heeke’s leadership. In addition, the football program qualified for bowl games in eight of his 11 years at CMU, while the men’s basketball team won four MAC division championships and one overall title.
The athletic exploits of CMU’s student-athletes were matched by their academic accomplishments. All of CMU’s sport programs exceeded NCAA Academic Progress Rate (APR) standards, while the department posted an 81% Graduation Success Rate (GSR). The cumulative student-athlete GPA surpassed 3.0 for 11 consecutive years, and the Chippewas earned the MAC’s Institutional Academic Achievement Award 10 times.
Facility upgrades and renovations for all sports were staples under Heeke’s leadership at CMU, which were highlighted by his coordination of a private campaign for $22 million in renovations to the basketball arena and fitness center. The project included a complete renovation of the arena in the Rose Center, as well as the addition of a dynamic entryway and new practice facilities for basketball, volleyball and wrestling. Heeke oversaw the planning and design of a $6 million lacrosse and soccer stadium, which opened in the fall of 2015, as well as $10 million in renovations for other facilities including baseball, gymnastics and softball.
Heeke is no stranger to the Pac-12 Conference after 18 years at the University of Oregon where he assisted the athletics director with the daily operation of the Ducks’ department of 17 sports and one of the largest budgets in the Pac-12. Heeke served on the AD’s executive staff and was responsible for strategic planning and financial models. In addition to representing the AD at University and conference meetings, he managed all facets of internal operations, while being responsible for revenue generation through external operations units. He assisted in the $95 million football stadium expansion as well as the construction of a $14 million indoor football practice facility and a $5 million soccer stadium.
Heeke is a nationally recognized leader among college athletics directors. He was appointed to the then-NCAA Division I Athletic Director Advisory Group in June of 2013. One of just 11 Division I Athletic Directors nationwide to serve on the group. The group met periodically with NCAA President Mark Emmert and his staff to provide feedback and perspective on issues affecting DI athletics. Heeke has also been a member of the NCAA Division I Baseball Committee and the Division I Football Issues Committee. He twice served on the baseball committee, first from 2006-08 and again from 2010-15, serving as the chair for the 2014-15 season. He was also a part of the football committee from 2008-13, serving as chair in 2012-13.
An East Lansing, Michigan native, Heeke received a bachelor’s degree from Albion College in 1985 and a master’s degree from Ohio State University in 1987. At Albion, he was a co-captain of the baseball team and a member of the club hockey team. He was a three-sport athlete at East Lansing High School and received the Distinguished Alumni Award from the East Lansing Educational Foundation in 2007.
Heeke and his wife, Liz, have three boys, Max, Zach, Ryan, and daughter-in-law, Merissa.
| University of Arizona Athletics Directors |
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Orin Kates
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1904-12
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Raymond Leamore Quigley
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1912-13
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J.F. "Pop" McKale
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1914-57
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Joseph Picard
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1957-58
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M.R. "Dick" Clausen
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1958-72
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David H. Strack
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1972-82
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Billy Joe Varney
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July -September 1982 (acting)
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Cedric W. Dempsey
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1982-93
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Jim Livengood
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1994-2009
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Rocky LaRose
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December 2009-April 2010 (acting)
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Greg Byrne
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May 2010 - January 2017
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Erika Barnes
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February 2017 - March 2017 (Interim)
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Dave Heeke
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April 2017 - Present
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