Published: July 16, 2008 11:53 am         

Swarbrick new Notre Dame AD

SOUTH BEND — Notre Dame will announce its new athletic director on Wednesday.

The school declined to disclose who the new athletic director will be, although media reports indicated the likely choice would be Indianapolis lawyer Jack Swarbrick. He was a leader of the city’s successful bid this spring to host the 2012 Super Bowl and is a Notre Dame graduate.

The Chicago Tribune reported Tuesday that the school had targeted Swarbrick as its choice.

Swarbrick did not respond to telephone messages or e-mails sent to him Tuesday from The Associated Press. Notre Dame spokesman Dennis Brown said the school would not comment on the media reports.

Although Swarbrick has no experience as an athletic director, he has been considered for previous jobs in college athletics. He was one of two finalists to be Big 12 commissioner last year, a finalist for the athletic director’s position at Arizona State in 2005 and a finalist for the NCAA president’s position that went to Myles Brand in 2002.

In a 2005 interview with The Indianapolis Star, Swarbrick said if he were to become an athletic director, “it’s because I really want to change that paradigm.”

Swarbrick received an undergraduate degree from Notre Dame in 1976. The school has a history of turning to alumni for the job. Of Notre Dame’s previous 11 athletic directors, the only two who weren’t graduates of the school were Gene Corrigan, who was athletic director from 1981-87, and Kevin White, who announced May 31 he was leaving the position after eight years to take the job as Duke’s new AD.

Swarbrick also would not be the first Notre Dame athletic director to lack experience in college sports administration. Dick Rosenthal, who served as the school’s athletic director from 1987-95, was a retired banker before taking the job and Mike Wadsworth, who served as AD from 1995-2000, was the former Canadian ambassador to Ireland and a former senior vice president of U.S. operations for a Canadian life insurance company.

Like Corrigan, who played basketball for Notre Dame, and Wadsworth, who played football for the Irish, Swarbrick was an athlete while at Notre Dame. He played lacrosse for the Irish while it was a club sport.

Swarbrick served as chairman of the Indiana Sports Corporation, which works to bring sports to the state and helped in persuading the NCAA to move to Indianapolis in 2000, from 1992-2001.

Swarbrick also has served as the former general counsel for the governing bodies of USA Gymnastics and USA Rowing.