Chris Hill (born c. 1950) is an American college athletics administrator and former

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appr ...

player and coach. He was the

athletic director An athletic director (commonly "athletics director" or "AD") is an administrator at many American clubs or institutions, such as colleges and universities, as well as in larger high schools and middle schools, who oversees the work of coaches and ...

at the

University of Utah The University of Utah (U of U, UofU, or simply The U) is a public research university in Salt Lake City, Utah. It is the flagship institution of the Utah System of Higher Education. The university was established in 1850 as the University of De ...

from 1987 to 2018. His responsibilities included overseeing the athletic department and supervising all the coaches. During his thirty-one years in his position, he has hired several coaches, secured funding for facilities upgrades, and negotiated the University of Utah's entrance into the

Pac-12 Conference The Pac-12 Conference is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference, that operates in the Western United States, participating in 24 sports at the NCAA Division I level. Its College football, football teams compete in the NCAA D ...

Coaches hired

During Hill's tenure, the

Utah Utes The Utah Utes are the intercollegiate athletics teams that represent the University of Utah, located in Salt Lake City. The athletic department is named after the Ute tribe of Native Americans. The men's basketball team is known as the Runnin' ...

have shown success in several different sports. He has been responsible for hiring

Rick Majerus Richard Raymond Majerus (February 17, 1948 – December 1, 2012) was an American basketball coach and TV analyst. He coached at Marquette University (1983–1986), Ball State University (1987–1989), the University of Utah (1989–2004), and S ...

college basketball In United States colleges, top-tier basketball is governed by collegiate athletic bodies including National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), the United States Collegiate Athleti ...

and

Ron McBride Ron is a shortening of the name Ronald. Ron or RON may also refer to: Arts and media * Big Ron (''EastEnders''), a TV character * Ron (''King of Fighters''), a video game character *Ron Douglas, the protagonist in ''Lucky Stiff'' played by Joe A ...

Urban Meyer Urban Frank Meyer III (born July 10, 1964) is a college football TV commentator and former American football coach. He spent most of his coaching career at the collegiate level, having served as the head coach of the Bowling Green Falcons fro ...

, and

Kyle Whittingham Kyle David Whittingham (born November 21, 1959) is an American football coach and former player. He is the head football coach at the University of Utah, a position he has held since 2005, and is the all-time leader in wins at Utah. Prior to bec ...

college football College football (french: Football universitaire) refers to gridiron football played by teams of student athletes. It was through college football play that American football rules first gained popularity in the United States. Unlike most ...

. From 2004–2009, he served on the NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Committee, which decides which teams are accepted into the

NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Championship The NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament, branded as NCAA March Madness and commonly called March Madness, is a single-elimination tournament played each spring in the United States, currently featuring 68 college basketball teams from ...

tournament held each March. A March 2013 story appearing

Yahoo! Sports Yahoo! Sports is a sports news website launched by Yahoo! on December 8, 1997. It receives a majority of its information from STATS, Inc. It employs numerous writers, and has team pages for teams in almost every North American major sport. Bef ...

suggested that Hill ignored complaints from students and parents about abusive behavior from Greg Winslow, a swimming coach at Utah from 2007 to 2013.

Facilities improvements

Hill has helped improve the athletics facilities at Utah. In 1998, the school remodeled Rice-Eccles Stadium in preparation for the

2002 Winter Olympics The 2002 Winter Olympics, officially the XIX Olympic Winter Games and commonly known as Salt Lake 2002 ( arp, Niico'ooowu' 2002; Gosiute Shoshoni: ''Tit'-so-pi 2002''; nv, Sooléí 2002; Shoshoni: ''Soónkahni 2002''), was an internation ...

, which held the Opening and Closing Ceremonies at the stadium. In addition, the following facilities have been improved or built during his tenure: the George S. Eccles Tennis Center, Dee Glen Smith Athletics Center, and the McCarthey Practice Fields.

Pac-12 Conference

Hill and University of Utah president

Michael K. Young Michael Kent Young (born November 4, 1949) is an American lawyer and academic administrator who served as president of Texas A&M University from 2015 to 2020. Early life and education Young was born and raised in Sacramento, California. He ear ...

negotiated with the

Pacific-10 Conference The Pac-12 Conference is a collegiate athletic conference, that operates in the Western United States, participating in 24 sports at the NCAA Division I level. Its football teams compete in the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS; formerly Division ...

(Pac-10) to make Utah a member. Utah joined the Pac-10 for the 2011–12 academic year. The

University of Colorado at Boulder The University of Colorado Boulder (CU Boulder, CU, or Colorado) is a public research university in Boulder, Colorado. Founded in 1876, five months before Colorado became a state, it is the flagship university of the University of Colorado sys ...

also joined the Pac-10 in 2011, when the conference was renamed as the Pac-12 Conference (Pac-12).

References

External links

Utah profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hill, Chris Year of birth missing (living people) Living people High school basketball coaches in the United States Rutgers Scarlet Knights men's basketball players Utah Utes athletic directors Utah Utes men's basketball coaches University of Utah alumni University of Utah faculty American men's basketball players