Rutgers Launches Search For New Athletic Director After Patrick Hobbs Scandal

NEW BRUNSWICK, NJ — Rutgers announced Tuesday it retained executive search firm TurnkeyZRG to launch a national search for a new athletics director.

This will be the athletics director who replaces Patrick Hobbs, who last August abruptly quit the top job of running Rutgers Athletics; he said it was because he has a heart issue.

But this winter Rutgers President Jonathan Holloway revealed the truth: Hobbs quit after the university told him he was being investigated for having an affair with former women's gymnastics coach Umme Salim-Beasley, who was fired by Rutgers last week.

Salim-Beasley reported to Hobbs. He was married; she was not.

Neither one of them disclosed to their superiors that they were involved in a romantic relationship, and Hobbs also had a conflict of interest in supervising Salim-Beasley, said Rutgers. Additionally, many young women on the Rutgers gymnastics team said they were bullied by Salim-Beasley, and that she made mean comments to the gymnasts.

The students said when they reported the issue to Hobbs, he took no action. He also frequently traveled with the women's gymnastics team and did yoga with them, according to this exclusive report by NJ.com.

Holloway himself is also quitting; this June he will resign as Rutgers president, a job he held for the past five years. He told the Newark Star Ledger in this exclusive interview his decision to quit was partly due to criticism he received on the job, even coming from Gov. Phil Murphy, and the security risks to his wife and children during the 2024 professors' strike and pro-Palestine protests on campus last April.

So it will be the new university president, whoever succeeds Holloway, who will choose the new athletic director.

Rutgers is a member of the Big 10 athletic conference and competes at the Division-1 level in the NCAA.

TurnkeyZRG conducted many recent athletics director searches, including for the University of Iowa, Texas Christian University, the University of Pittsburgh and Northwestern University. TurnkeyZRG also assisted with the search for the new Big Ten commissioner and conducted the NCAA president search.

An advisory committee was also formed to support the search. It is composed of:

• Marco Battaglia (SMLR ’18); Senior Advisor to the Rutgers University Foundation President
• Arthur Certosimo (RC ’77); Professor and Chair, Board of Advisors, Rutgers Business School
• Meredith Civico; Field Hockey Head Coach
• Hollis Copeland (RC ’78); Rutgers Board of Governors
• Robert H. Friedman (RC ’74, NLAW ’83); Rutgers Board of Trustees
• Ann Gould; Academic Athletics Oversight Committee Faculty Representative and Dean of Academic Programs, School of Environmental and Biological Sciences
• Gary B. Taffet (RC ’88); Rutgers Board of Governors
• Brian Ballentine; Senior Vice President for Strategy and Chief of Staff
• J. Michael Gower; Executive Vice President – Chief Financial Officer

Rutgers Fires Women's Gymnastics Coach Accused Of Bullying, Weight Gain Comments (April 24)

Rutgers President Jonathan Holloway Announces He Will Resign At End Of Year