May 20--Illinois named Warren Hood as deputy athletic director, the school announced Friday.
Hood, who earned his bachelor's and master's degrees from Illinois, recently directed major renovation projects to Memorial Stadium and State Farm Center. He also helped secure a $60 million naming rights deal for State Farm Center, which is the largest corporate naming rights agreement for a college venue in the nation.
He will be the top assistant to new athletic director Josh Whitman.
"I could not be more pleased to promote Warren Hood to the critical position of Deputy Director of Athletics," Whitman said in a statement released by the school. "With more than three decades of involvement with the University of Illinois, his institutional knowledge and campus and community relationships are unmatched. His diverse body of work includes generating hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue and leading the two most ambitious building projects in the history of the University. He has an astute eye for talent and is a gifted leader.
"My relationship with Warren extends back more than a decade. I trust him implicitly and am excited for him to have an even more profound and far-reaching impact on the future of Fighting Illini Athletics."
