UConn booster Robert Burton has a reason to celebrate.
As you’ll recall from several months ago, Burton, a CEO of Burton Capital Management, LLC, demanded a $3 million refund for his dissatisfaction -- to put it politely -- with UConn athletic director Jeff Hathaway.
The source of Burton’s frustration can be traced to coach Randy Edsall’s decision to move to Maryland, and the subsequent hire of Paul Pasqualoni.
“The primary reason Randy took another job is because he couldn’t work with you,” Burton wrote in an angry letter to Hathaway. “You are not qualified to be a Division I AD and I would have fired you a long time ago. You do not have the skills to manage and cultivate new donors.”
Turns out, UConn felt the same way. Or, at the very least, similarly enough to relieve Hathaway of his duties.
According to the New London Day, and citing sources close to the situation, UConn president Susan Herbst is “working on a deal to negotiate athletic director Jeff Hathaway’s departure.”
Hathaway is currently operating within a six-year rollover contract and will be bought out for multiple reasons that indicate that Hathaway was incompetent in various degrees of his AD duties.
The Day explains:
State media outlets reported in recent days that Hathaway’s job has come under serious scrutiny. The Journal-Inquirer of Manchester first reported an outside firm interviewed key athletic department personnel, including coaches, about Hathaway’s job performance and the overall state of the athletic department.
The firm’s interviews, according to report, suggested that Hathaway’s shortcomings as athletic director are numerous, including micromanagement and an inability to make timely decisions, such as with hirings and contract issues.
But Hathaway’s most serious deficiencies, the sources said, centered primarily on fundraising revenues in consistent decline and a lack of attention paid to NCAA compliance. In both cases, the sources said, Hathaway failed to hire experienced replacements for former athletic fundraiser Paul Pendergast and former compliance director Bill Shults.
So, it appears Burton wasn’t completely off his rocker; only a little bit off.
Reportedly, no search has begun for a new AD.