As college athletics continues to adopt an increasingly professional structure, the general manager position has turned into a must-have for major teams as they navigate the collision of amateur athletics and its billion-dollar business.
Around the country, programs have taken a variety of approaches to what the GM position entails and the prerequisites to fill it. Last week, Sacramento State hired NBA Hall of Famer Shaquille O’Neal in an unpaid, voluntary GM role. O’Neal joined a list of former and current athletes in similar positions, including NBA stars Steph Curry and Trae Young, who’ve taken on assistant GM roles at Davidson and Oklahoma, respectively, and Andrew Luck, who holds the full-time position for Stanford football.
Adrian Wojnarowski notably left ESPN to become the GM with St. Bonaventure men’s basketball, but many are turning to former professional executives. Duke hired long-time Nike executive Rachel Baker. Butler hired Tony Bollier, the former GM of the Milwaukee Bucks’ G-League affiliate. Syracuse hired a former Knicks scout in Alex Kline, Cincinnati hired Wes Miller, a former OKC Thunder scout, and North Carolina turned to Jim Tanner, who was a successful agent for nearly 30 years.
At UConn, Tom Moore split the last three years working both as an assistant coach and as the “quasi-GM” for men’s basketball. As Moore moves into the full-time general manager role ahead of the 2025-26 season, with the Huskies hiring Mike Nardi to fill his coaching position, his exact job description is still being worked out.
“It’s sort of a catch-all,” Moore said Sunday. “I think Dan (Hurley) and I are thinking about the position as we sort of go through it, what we think is essential and what we think isn’t… You can use the position in a lot of different ways. And I think Dan is so smart and so calculated and so ahead of the curve that he’s got a lot on his mind with how this thing can look as we go forward. He and I have talked quite a bit about how it will be best served at UConn and what the role will look like. And we’re still trying to make sure we figure out, is this something that fits me the best, too? And am I the best person for it? To be honest with you.”
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Moore has spent more than three decades as a basketball coach. Last season was his 20th at UConn, coaching under Jim Calhoun from 1994-2007 and under Hurley since he arrived in 2018. His four national championships, two in each stint with a decade as Quinnipiac head coach in between, are the most for any assistant coach in the modern era of the NCAA Tournament.
Now, as he put it, Moore is spending less time around the conference table with Hurley and assistants Kimani Young, Luke Murray and Nardi, and more at his own desk, in his own office.
“At some places, what they’re doing with this thing is the general managers are trying to run it like a pro sports organization, where their office is also responsible for bringing in the talent and basically the coaching staff is tasked with coaching the talent that is brought in. Now, that is not the way it’s gonna look here,” Moore said. “Obviously with Dan Hurley, who is, I think one of the best evaluators of talent and has been one of the best roster construction head coaches I’ve ever seen. And then with two recruiting assistants like Kimani Young and Luke Murray, I mean, that thing is on lock. So we don’t have to really worry about that.
“We’re looking at it from a different angle, in a different lens right now. We see the position as more of a donor education, donor outreach, game scheduling, dealings with the Big East Conference on day-to-day issues there, and then some oversight in our own basketball support staff, working with our strength coach and trainer and medical team, and academics and sports information. … It’s sort of evolving and it’s something that Dan and I are discussing, feels like on a weekly basis, on how we want the thing to look.”
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While Moore is still trying to find the challenges and get excited about them, the transition out of coaching wasn’t a shock to his system. The whistle wasn’t ripped off of his neck.
The need for the position first “smacked (UConn’s staff) in the face”, he said, in the spring of 2022, when Tyrese Martin and RJ Cole each had a year of eligibility left, but UConn’s NIL wasn’t established enough at the time for them to make any sizeable amount of money.
“They both turned down opportunities to come back because they had to just start earning money as basketball players, because they only have a finite amount of years, all of these kids, to earn money (playing basketball),” Moore said. “It was then when I think Dan, me and Kimani and Luke were just like, we have to start doing something with this.”
So Moore was “weaned off” coaching and, on Sunday, spoke as general manager, discussing NIL management and revenue sharing and the chaotic, ever-changing business model of college athletics – which he, along with everyone else, is still trying to figure out.
“It’s a different perspective for sure,” Moore said. “I was at every practice, I was on the bench every game. I felt okay with putting my focus and my energies on the GM duties. So it’s been okay, yeah, it’s been alright. It’s been something that I think is bad, in a way, but it’s also exciting at the same time. And I’m blessed to be back here at UConn and have it come full circle, because the place means so much to me.”
Originally Published: May 5, 2025 at 1:47 PM EDT
