In the 2023-24 athletics season, TCU was considered one of solely 5 colleges nationally to win a number of NCAA Championships. In the earlier 2022-23 season, TCU turned the primary faculty within the College Football Playoff period to succeed in the CFP, NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament and College World Series in the identical educational yr. Under first-year head soccer coach Sonny Dykes, the Horned Frogs reached the College Football Playoff in 2022, defeating Michigan within the CFP semifinals of the Fiesta Bowl and performed Georgia within the nationwide championship recreation.
That identical season, TCU set a faculty file with six convention coach of the yr recipients: soccer, ladies’s diving, seaside volleyball, males’s golf, males’s tennis and equestrian.
Donati arrived at TCU in 2011 as Deputy Athletics Director, taking part in a serious position in fundraising and venture growth earlier than being named AD. His efforts enhanced the TCU student-athlete expertise by way of important facility upgrades totaling almost $500 million. The most up-to-date venture is a $50 million renovation and growth to TCU’s Athletics Human Performance Center.
Donati succeeds Ray Tanner, who has led the Gamecocks since 2012 and can change into athletics director emeritus and senior advisor to the president.
Under Donati, TCU additionally has loved file ranges of donor help for its athletics program. In the 4 years he oversaw fundraising within the Frog Club, TCU recorded its three highest totals in general athletics giving. Additionally, TCU reached file ranges in males’s basketball attendance in addition to setting new marks in ticket and licensing revenues.
In March 2019, Donati labored with TCU soccer legend LaDainian Tomlinson to create the Tomlinson Student-Athlete Development Endowment Fund to assist put together student-athletes from all of TCU’s sports activities packages for his or her lives and careers after commencement.
Prior to becoming a member of TCU, Donati was with Leigh Steinberg Sports and Entertainment as basic counsel and director of participant illustration. He has expertise in skilled and intercollegiate athletics contains fundraising positions with the University of Arizona Wildcat Club, Washington State University Cougar Athletic Fund and the Cal Poly University Mustang Club.
Donati earned a bachelor’s diploma in politics and authorities in 2001 from the University of Puget Sound, the place he was a basketball student-athlete. He obtained a Juris Doctorate from Whittier Law School in 2005 and is a member of the California Bar Association. He can be a member of the Big 12 Conference’s Athletics Directors Executive Committee and Football Working Group, Learfield’s AD Advisory Board, the Board of Trustees for the Davey O’Brien Foundation in Fort Worth and the Coalition Academy along with the National Coalition of Minority Football Coaches.
Donati and his spouse, Nicole, have two daughters: Colette and Naomi.
The seek for the brand new Director of Athletics started in September 2024 and was assisted by Funk Associates govt search agency.
THE DONATI TIMELINE
- 2017 – 2024: Texas Christian University (Athletics Director)
- 2016 – 2017: Texas Christian University (Deputy Athletics Director)
- 2013 – 2016: Texas Christian University (Associate Athletics Director and Associate Vice Chancellor for Athletic Development)
- 2011 – 2013: Texas Christian University (Executive Director of TCU Frog Club)
- 2007 – 2011: Leigh Steinberg Sports & Entertainment (General Counsel / Director of Special Projects / NFL Player Agent)
- 2005 – 2007: Durant Management Corporation (Director of Business Affairs)
- 2000 – 2002: University of Arizona (Athletics Marketing and Development Associate)
- 1998: California Polytechnic State University (Development Intern)
- 1997: Washington State University (Marketing and Development Intern)
Education
University of Puget Sound, 2001, B.A., Politics and Government
Whittier Law School, 2005, Juris Doctorate
About the University of South Carolina Athletics Department
The University of South Carolina is a member of the Southeastern Conference. USC sponsors 21 varsity sports activities packages and is house to greater than 550 student-athletes. Gamecock Athletics have gained 9 staff and 56 particular person nationwide championships, 82 convention common season and match championships. Gamecock Athletics’ mission is to develop our student-athletes intellectually, athletically, socially and culturally to compete relentlessly for championships and to realize excessive ranges of accomplishment on the University, and all through life, in concord with our college’s mission and imaginative and prescient.
