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UCLA’s Athletic Director Dan Guerrero placed No. 28 in Sports Illustrated’s ranking o

SI ranks UCLA’s Guerrero No. 28

Hannah Gordon
Published: Tuesday, May 6, 2003

UCLA Athletic Director Dan Guerrero never expected to land on the cover of Sports Illustrated next to LeBron James.

“When I heard that I started laughing,” Guerrero said. “I couldn’t see the correlation.”

The connection is both Guerrero and James were both among the magazine’s “101 Most Influential Minorities in Sports.”

And while James and his Hummer may get more time on television, Guerrero actually beat out James, No. 101 on the list, by quite a bit. One of only four Latino athletic directors in Division I-A, Guerrero was named the No. 28 most influential minority in sports.

“Where you are placed relates to perception, and this shines a really positive light on UCLA,” Guerrero said. “It reflects that UCLA is an institution of opportunity. That has been true for me and (head football coach) Karl (Dorrell).”

It was Karl Dorrell’s hiring, in part, that may have landed Guerrero on the list. SI wrote, “How do you let everyone know there’s a new sheriff in town? Hire a black football coach after less than eight months on the job.”

Dorrell is currently one of only four black head coaches of 117 head coaches in Division I-A football.

“I wish they would have looked at the whole body of work, but it is a sound bite,” Guerrero said.

That body of work includes nine years as the athletic director at UC Irvine where he was named the 2001-2002 Division I-AA West region National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics Athletic Director of the Year. During his tenure, Guerrero also served for several years on the NCAA’s minority opportunities and interests committee.

A Bruin alum, Guerrero returned to UCLA as athletic director in July 2002. Since then, he has spent more time in the spotlight than most athletic directors in his first nine months because he has fired both the head football and head basketball coaches.

“We’ve got to stop meeting like this,” Guerrero joked with the media before introducing new basketball coach Ben Howland at a press conference in April. Between December and April, his press conferences became regular programming on ESPNews.

“It’s not like he’s hiring because of race or color. I just think he’s finding and hiring the qualified people,” sophomore quarterback Drew Olson said. “I think that’s pretty cool (that he is on the cover). He’s obviously an influential man.”

Guerrero made waves both with the hiring of Dorrell and Howland. After satisfying the fans with the firing of the much maligned Steve Lavin, Guerrero then snatched the 2002 National Coach of the Year, Ben Howland, from Pittsburgh.

In doing so, Guerrero hired a man with enough credentials to appease Bruin fans looking to reclaim the glory of the John Wooden era. Dorrell, meanwhile, who brought both a UCLA background and NFL experience, has infused new energy in the football program.

“I think it is a great tribute to him and to this university to have a guy like Dan represent us,” football defensive coordinator Steve Kerr said.

“Coach Dorrell will be on there next year by himself, maybe Jan. 3, after the national championship,” he added.

Guerrero was the highest-ranked athletic director on the list and one of two Latino athletic directors on the list. The other athletic directors were Virginia’s Craig Littlepage (No. 46), USC’s Mike Garret (No. 49), Arizona State’s Gene Smith (No. 57), Hawaii’s Herman Frazier (No. 59), Tennessee State’s Teresa Phillips (No. 91) and New Mexico’s Rudy Davalos (No. 94). There are only 25 minority athletic directors at the 944 nonhistorically black colleges.

“I’m glad that Sport Illustrated took the opportunity to write this issue. It is important to recognize who the players are from that standpoint,” Guerrero said.

And Guerrero learned something from the experience as well.

“I didn’t realize so many of my friends have Sports Illustrated subscriptions,” he said.