Meet the SEC's Top Athletic Director

National championships and premiere NIL collectives may be the first thing that comes to mind when one thinks of the top athletic directors. There is another however in Knoxville that is not necessarily top of the pile in either of these categories, but results provde that it would be very hard to argue against Danny White being the top athletic director in the SEC.

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Lance Leipold (University at Buffalo)

37-33. That was current Kansas head coach, Lance Leipold’s record during his six years as head for the University at Buffalo. That may not seem that impressive, but since joining the MAC conference in division one in 1999, the Bulls only had two winning seasons before Leipold. In his six years with the school, he led them to three-straight winning seasons in his final three years at the school.

This impressive hire of White was yet another where he identified a new head coach to give his first head coaching opportunity to at the division one level.

Although not hired by Leipold for his current role, you may be most familiar with Leipold as the head coach of the Kansas Jayhawks where he has been since 2021 and is in the middle of turning around yet another program.

Scott Frost (University of Central Florida)

Most are familiar with this name. Frost is the former Nebraska Cornhuskers quarterback and UCF head coach before being fired from his most recent position in 2022.

During his time at UCF however where he was hired by White, Frost led the UCF Knights to their memorable 13-0 season in 2017, capping it off with a win over the Auburn Tigers 34-27 in the Peach Bowl.

Frost would go 19-7 in two seasons with the Knights.

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