Boyages Named To Mid-American Conference Men’s Basketball Position – Ohio State Buckeyes
12/29/2005 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Dec. 29, 2005
CLEVELAND – Rick Boyages, a 17-year college coaching veteran, including experience as a Division I head coach and the associate head coach of Ohio State’s 1999 final four team, has been named as Associate Commissioner/Director of Men’s Basketball Operations for the Mid-American Conference (MAC). The announcement was made today by MAC Commissioner Rick Chryst.
Boyages comes to the MAC after spending last year as a Special Assistant to the Athletic Director at Ohio State. At the MAC, Boyages will have primary oversight of all Men’s Basketball activities. Including scheduling, game management, television, marketing and promotion, and MAC Tournament operations. Additionally, he will serve as a liaison with Sam Lickliter, MAC Coordinator of Basketball Officials.
“We are fortunate to have someone with Rick’s varied coaching background and outstanding basketball pedigree join our conference staff. The creation of this senior position, and the commitment it represents from the Council of Presidents to aggressively advance men’s basketball in the Mid-American Conference, is exciting. Rick has the enthusiasm, the intellectual capacity and the administrative skills necessary to truly make a positive difference for the men’s basketball coaches and student-athletes in the MAC.”
The 44-year-old native of Wakefield, Mass., spent three seasons on the Ohio State staff as associate head coach from 1998-2000 before taking over as the head coach at William and Mary in June of 2000.
Boyages began his Division I coaching career at Boston College in 1991. He went to the Eagles’ staff from Bates College, where he had been head coach for four years. When named head coach at Bates in 1987, Boyages, then 24, was the nation’s youngest collegiate head coach.
At both Ohio State and Boston College, Boyages was a part of amazing one-season turnarounds. At Boston College he helped turn the Eagles around from a 9-19 team in 1995 to a 19-11 team that went to the NCAA tournament in 1996. Then with Ohio State, he had a part in turning the Buckeyes from an 8-21 season to a 27-9 mark and a berth in the Final Four in 1999, the fourth-best single-season improvement in Division I history.
In his career, Boyages has coached 15 NCAA tournament games in five appearances, including making the Final Four once and the elite eight twice. In each NCAA showing, his team has never failed to win its first-round game. In addition, his teams have won Big East and Big Ten tournament championships.
Boyages’ coaching talents have led him around the world. Over the years, numerous international federations, national teams and professional club teams have recruited his services. Boyages has conducted basketball clinics in Africa, Canada, the Czech Republic, France, Greece, Slovakia and Sweden.
He recently was asked to sit on the Board of Overseers for the Institute of International Sport. In 1995, the organization named Boyages as one of 15 Honorary Sports Ethics Fellows for consistently demonstrating a commitment to ethics and fair play. He joined a distinguished list that included 1984 Olympic gold medalist in the marathon, Joan Benoit Samuelson, and Baaron Pittenger, former executive director of the U.S. Olympic Committee.
A 1985 graduate of Bowdoin College, Boyages was an All-New England basketball honoree. He was awarded the Allison Haldane Cup for outstanding leadership and character at his commencement. He holds a master’s degree in Education from Boston University.
Boyages and his wife, Deana, have three daughters, Alexis, Noelle and Sophia.
