It’s official: Interim to get job full- time

Cal will hold a news confer- ence Friday morning to confirm Mike Williams as its athletic director, the school announced Thursday evening.

Williams has been serving as Cal’s interim AD for the past 10 months. The Chronicle reported Tuesday that he will take over the position on a full- time basis.

“I am honored to accept the offer from Chancellor ( Nicholas) Dirks to serve as Director of Athletics at my alma mater, an institution that means so much to me and my family,” Williams said in a statement. “Ultimately, our goal is to build the strongest intercollegiate athletics department possible while furthering the right conditions for success.”

Williams replaces Sandy Barbour, who was the school’s AD for 10 years. Barbour is Penn State’s AD.

As a 1982 Cal graduate, Williams has long ties to the school. He’s vice chair of the UC Berkeley Foundation, a fundraising and advisory body that supports academic and athletic endeavors at Cal.

He was also a member of Chancellor Dirks’ task force on academics in athletics, a factfinding group that tried to improve Cal athletes’ academic performance. The task force suggested raising the academic requirements for athletes, among other recommendations.

Williams is not a traditional athletic director. He did not have a background in front- office athletics prior to taking the interim post. He was a wrestler on a Cal program that was cut during his time on the team. He had a long, successful career in finance, retiring in 2009 as the vice chair of capital markets for Barclays Global Investors.

His financial experience will help an athletic department that has been working to pay off $ 400 million in debt associated with much- needed renovations to Memorial Stadium.