ASU finishes on the rise in AD’s 4th year

In Ray Anderson’s fourth full year as Arizona State Vice President of Athletics, the needle began to move in a positive direction.

Yes, Anderson changed football coaches, a perhaps inevitable move for an athletic director with an NFL football background. But football had a winning record and played in a bowl game while men’s basketball came out on the plus side in a roller-coaster season and returned to the NCAA Tournament for the first time in four years.

Baseball suffered through a second straight losing season – a school first – but was the only big-three sport under .500 compared to 2016-17 when all three had losing records.

Roughly a third of ASU’s 24 sports made marginal to significant improvement with roughly another third holding serve, if you will, from 2016-17. Two sports – men’s tennis and women’s lacrosse – debuted in an era where few schools are adding inventory with tennis becoming an immediate postseason qualifier. Of the handful of sports that dipped, one was women’s golf coming off a 2017 national championship and still returning to nationals and another was volleyball (winless in the Pac-12) with a first-year coach.

ASU climbed to No. 29 nationally in the Directors’ Cup on Thursday and still has points coming for softball’s Women’s College World Series season and in women’s track. A top-30 finish when final standings are announced June 29 would be ASU’s highest since 2013-14, reversing a four-year slide from No. 18 (2012-13) to a school-low No. 43 (2016-17).

“We’ve made some really good strides,” Anderson said. “Across the sports as a group, we’ve done much better. The Directors’ Cup, when you look at the program holistically, is an indicator that we’re doing something.

“Overall, we have elevated the program and had a significantly upgraded year overall. Obviously we know where our struggles still are and where are biggest opportunities still lie. We’re excited about the way forward because we absolutely believe our sports are going to continue to rise. We haven’t broken through anywhere near where we intend to go.”

The Directors’ Cup, sponsored by the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics, awards points for postseason finish in up to 19 sports for NCAA Division I schools. Men’s and women’s basketball, baseball and women’s volleyball must be included – a scoring change instituted for 2017-18 – which is another incentive to be good in those core sports. ASU can only count up to 17 sports for 2017-18 because baseball and volleyball did not make the postseason.