ASU name Graham Rossini new athletic director, ‘I am excited to get to work’

New Director, New Era in Sun Devil Athletics

On Thursday, Rossini was promoted from his previous role as Arizona State’s executive senior associate athletic director and chief business officer to AD of the school. The university also announced that Lisa Young has become the next deputy athletic director as well as Scott Nelson now being the executive associate athletic director and managing director of the Sun Devil Club.

Rossini has a strong connection to Arizona State after he graduated in 2002 from the W.P. Carey School of Business with a Bachelor of Science and MBA degrees. He was the Sun Devils’ director of baseball operations for five years as well

Building up his resume at ASU, Rossini worked 13 years as the Arizona Diamondbacks’ vice president of special projects and fan experience. The 44-year-old secured the 2011 MLB All-Star Game and 2013 World Baseball Classic at Chase Field while also leading in the development and construction of Salt River Fields at Talking Stick, the D-backs current spring training facility.

Now that he has been back at Arizona State, he is ready to get started, knowing the demands and pressure he has on his shoulders with this important role for the university.

“Excited to get at this point of the process, excited to get on the other side of this announcement,” Rossini said. “We have a lot of work to do and tremendous opportunities in front of us. What I’d like everyone to know is I am a Sun Devil first and foremost. I feel like I have the credentials to lead us into what comes next. Out the gate, I am a proud Sun Devil, that’s always been a big part of my background and in my DNA and I can’t wait to represent this entire community of Sun Devils that care so much about what we do here at Arizona State University.

“I don’t take this opportunity lightly, I am excited to get to work. I am excited for the challenges and more importantly, the challenges that are in front of us. We have a group of passionate Sun Devils ready to take the charge on what comes next. We have great momentum behind us, we have the full strength of this university, we are going to work on earning the full strength of this community behind us and we can’t wait to get to work.”

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Prior to the promotion of Rossini, ASU’s senior vice president for educational outreach and student services Jim Rund has been the interim athletic director since November when former AD Ray Anderson resigned. Anderson decided to step down despite having three years left on his contract.

With him at the forefront of ASU Athletics, Rossini will oversee events, teams, staff, coaches, etc. He will also handle financial budgets and adapt to the new world of NIL amongst other duties.

Having the pleasure of announcing this news, the president of Arizona State Michael Crow expressed that the search for a new athletic director is over and is confident that Rossini can lead the Sun Devils to succeed going forward.

“The best executive was one who was with us who has 20 years of experience in sports administration, sports business, sports development, sports marketing,” Crow said. “He is a Sun Devil through and through himself who is a very, very able executive capable of operating within the ASU system which is high speed, highly entrepreneurial, highly driven by new ways to doing things.”