Scott Barnes restructures Pitt athletic department

Nearly one month after shaking up the basketball program, the University of Pittsburgh has decided to modify the entire athletic department.

Pitt announced the restructuring of its athletic department Wednesday afternoon, highlighted by the implementation of two new “units” and various promotions.

The school announced the formation of individual Internal and External Affairs Units, which former Director of Compliance Dan Bartholomae and newly-hired Julio Freire, former athletic director of the University of Tennessee at Martin, will head, respectively. Bartholomae’s department will oversee the school’s facilities and management, while Freire will focus on merchandising and revenue.

Pitt athletic director Scott Barnes was pleased with how smoothly the process went.

“I’ve been involved in a number of restructurings and strategic planning processes during my career,” Barnes said in a release. “But the level of commitment and buy-in to the process that I have witnessed from our staff at Pitt has been the absolute best.”

The Internal Affairs department will, “Support the mission and vision of Pitt Athletics through the oversight of the administration of all 19 intercollegiate sports,” as well as overseeing the Facilities, Operations and Event Management division, Pitt’s Performance Team, the Student-Athlete Development division and acting as a liaison to Academic Support Services for Student-Athletes.

The External Affairs Unit will oversee the Panther Club, fundraising initiatives, ticket sales, marketing, branding, multimedia rights, licensing and merchandising.

“We are positioning our department in a way that allows us to best serve the needs of our student-athletes, internal constituents and external stakeholders,” Barnes said.

Various Pitt employees also received promotions to fill roles in the new departmental areas.

In Internal Affairs, others besides Bartholomae received promotions. Pitt named Jennifer Tuscano the associate athletic director for sports administration and senior women’s administrator, as well as choosing former Associate Athletic Director of Sports Administration Paul Klaczak for the role of associate athletic director for facilities and event management.

Blari Dunckel, who served as the director of facilities and operations, will join Klaczak as the assistant athletic director for facilities and event management.

Wendy Meyers will continue her tenure as executive associate athletic director and chief financial officer while taking charge of the Business Administration of Human Resources units. Additionally, former Assistant Athletic Director for Business and Finance Ryan Varley will become the associate athletic director for business services.

In addition to these promotions, Barnes elevated former Pitt basketball player and 10-year member of the athletic department, Marcus Bowman, to senior associate athletic director and chief of staff. He will report directly to Barnes and assist in “various planning and partnership initiatives.”

Barnes said these moves will further Pitt’s department’s ability to compete against other ACC schools.

“We are very excited about what the future holds for Pitt athletics and this is an important step in making our championship goals a reality,” Barnes said.