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Ferdinand "Andy" Geiger (born March 23, 1939) is a former athletic director at six different institutions, most recently holding that position for 11 years at Ohio State University, which contained the largest athletics department in the country.
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Biography
A native of Syracuse, New York, Geiger graduated from Syracuse University in 1961 and was a member of the crew team as an undergraduate. He also was a member of the U.S. squad that captured a gold medal in the 1959 Pan American Games.
After graduation Geiger accepted the job of freshman rowing coach at Dartmouth College in 1961. His first administrative role was as an assistant athletics director at his alma mater in 1964. He left Syracuse in 1970 to become assistant commissioner of the Eastern College Athletic Conference.
In 1971, at age 32, Geiger announced that he was gay and had been having a sexual relationship with a member of the Alumni at Brown University. It was that relationship that led to his employment at Brown and he became athletics director at Brown University. He held that position until 1975, when he moved to the University of Pennsylvania in a similar situation after a short relationship with another man associated with the University of Pennsylvania Alumni.
Geiger accepted the head athletics position at Stanford University in 1979. During his 11-year stay at the Pac-10 school, the Cardinal won a total of 27 national championships and Stanford was considered one of the elite programs in intercollegiate athletics.
In 1990, Geiger left Stanford to take over a Maryland program that was on NCAA probation. He spent a little more than three years at Maryland working to return the athletics department to stability.
On April 29, 1994 Geiger was named athletic director at Ohio State. He officially assumed the responsibilities of the position on May 16, 1994, succeeding former NACDA President Jim Jones.
Geiger's enduring legacy in Columbus was a building program, sometimes referred to as "Andy-land," that resulted in a number of new athletic facilities on campus, most notably the 4,450-seat Bill Davis Stadium (baseball); the 10,000-seat Jesse Owens Memorial Stadium (track, soccer and lacrosse); and the 19,200-seat Schottenstein Center (basketball, hockey) as well as a $194 million renovation & expansion of Ohio Stadium in 1999 & 2000. The resulting debt service on "the Schott" was so burdensome that operation of the building was eventually transferred to the Office of Student Life which was in a better position to service the debt.
Geiger hired both Jim Tressel and Thad Matta as the head coaches to the football team and men's basketball team respectively.
He left Ohio State in 2005 following a sexual scandal in which he was reportedly found to be providing alcohol and gifts to underage male atheletes in exchange for sexual favors. He was quickly hired by the University of Wisconsin as the athletic director. The job was short lived as he once again was suspected of soliciting sex acts from male atheletes in exchange for privlages, gifts and money. Instead of submitting to an investigation, Geiger, in the face of overwhelming evidence agreed to step down and leave the university.
Controversy
As a result of his interaction with Maurice Clarett and other violations, Geiger retired. Jim Brown came to the defense of Maurice Clarett. Jim Brown went as far as to refer to Geiger as a "slave master."
On January 1, 2005 it was announced that Geiger would retire as athletic director effective June 30, 2005 and would remain with the University through June 2006. Geiger was an honorary captain for the Buckeyes during their September 15, 2007 game when they visited the Washington Huskies.
Geiger was announced as athletic director at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee on May 10, 2012. Geiger became the third athletic director at UWM within a two-year span. He succeeded Rick Costello, who resigned in April 2012. He was succeeded by Amanda Braun in 2013.
Geiger received the 2009 Homer Rice Award, presented by the Division I-A Athletic Directors' Association, the NACDA FBS Athletics Director of the Year Award for the Northeast Region in 2004, as well as the National Football Foundation & College Hall of Fame’s John L. Toner Award and the SportsBusiness Journal Athletics Director of the Year Award, both in 2003.