GNAC Announces 2020-21 Sport Chair Liaisons
The GNAC is pleased to unveil its new administrators in sport-by-sport leadership positions for the upcoming academic year.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Four admins stepping
into new liaison roles
WINTHROP, Mass. – The Great Northeast Athletic Conference is pleased to unveil four new sport chairs for the 2020-21 academic year, as announced by GNAC Commissioner Joe Walsh.
Across all 22 of the GNAC's championship sponsored sports, a sport chair is an administrator appointed by the conference office to help assist and oversee each coaches' committee.
The chair helps coordinate and chair mandatory preseason and post-championship coaches' meetings or group calls, fielding questions from championship directors, and ensuring that GNAC guidelines are adhered to.
The new sport chairs for the upcoming academic year are Anna Maria College's Joe Brady (baseball), Emmanuel College's Brendan McWilliams (cross country), and the University of Saint Joseph's (CT) Amanda Devitt (men's basketball) and Wole Oke (women's tennis).
For the complete list of GNAC sport chairs, please click HERE.
Brady takes over for Suffolk's Cary McConnell as the GNAC baseball chair. The former Associate Director of Athletics and Recreation at Clark from the NEWMAC enters his second year as the Anna Maria Athletics Director. The 1996 AMCATS alum previously was the AMC women's soccer head coach and sports information director in the 2000s.
McWilliams, the former Saints men's lacrosse head coach who also chairs GNAC MLAX, will work hand-in-hand with Emmanuel head coach Reava Potter as EC hosts the 2020 GNAC Cross Country Championships at Boston's Franklin Park in the fall.
Devitt enters her second year as the USJ Athletic Director in 2020-21. Formerly the Senior Associate Athletics Director at Hartford, Devitt began 2019-20 as the GNAC women's tennis chair before sliding into the men's basketball chair role in place of former Saint Joseph's College of Maine Director of Athletics Brian Curtin. Devitt brings extensive hoop experience to the table, having spent six years as the Wentworth head women's basketball coach from 2007-13.
Oke was named the Associate Athletic Director at USJ in September 2019, overseeing compliance, student-athlete welfare, facility scheduling, and recreation/wellness. Oke graciously accepted the women's tennis chair role after Devitt slid into the men's basketball role.
No stranger to the league, Oke was named the GNAC's Director of Conference Communications back in 2009 after spending two years working in the Simmons athletic department. He has also held collegiate athletics roles at American International and Wheelock.
Commissioner Walsh and GNAC Assistant Commissioner Michael Ghika will continue to work with all coaching groups and sport chairs, while Walsh will again serve as the conference's indoor track & field chair. The league sponsored its inaugural indoor championship event in February 2020 at Boston University and plans to return to BU in 2021.
The Great Northeast Athletic Conference (GNAC) is an NCAA Division III association made up of 13 member institutions and over 3,000 student-athletes across the New England region. Founded in 1995, the GNAC annually sponsors and administers 22 championships, while balancing academic integrity, athletic opportunity and community involvement in an effort to enhance the student-athlete experience.
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