UC Santa Barbara Chancellor Dennis Assanis
 
Opening Statement
"Hey, good morning, Gauchos. Yes, what a day. A dream has come true. We're basically going back to our roots, Commissioner, so I want to thank everyone for joining us today for this very monumental occasion, that we'll actually cherish, I think, for a very long time. I want to thank sincerely from my heart, and I know I speak for my wife Eleni as well, all the student-athletes, the coaches, the staff, obviously a great Athletics Director Kelly Barsky. Let's give Kelly, the coaches and the athletes a hand. I want to thank also many more people. Our faculty who are part of it, we have the faculty athletics representative here with us, staff who have been working tirelessly towards the success of our student athletes, the funds, the donors. Hey guys, from Zoom 48 hours ago, it's a reality. I move fast, I promise you that. We are obviously especially grateful to all of you who have come this morning to evidence this moment. UC Santa Barbara is thrilled to become the 12th member, that's a record number I know you know that, of the West Coast Conference and I know we're going to be the best member that you have and I promise that it's going to take us five years but people around the nation will be thrilled to watch the Gauchos. At UC Santa Barbara we're committed to excellence, and excellence is in everything we do. Excellence for our students, excellence for our student athletes, and our student athletes are student first. I always say that. And we believe it. We're one of the nation's premier public research universities, as a matter of fact, we're recently ranked the No. 1 public university for our science and engineering impact and No. 3 across all national universities No. 7 in the world, those are pretty big accolades. We have eight Nobel Prize winners. Two, since Eleni and I have arrived on campus again, we're moving fast. Academics, athletics, we have a story that we have not shared with the world yet, and we want to share that story, and that's what this is all about being at the highest level, creating the best memories, the spirit, the pride for our Gaucho community, and I know athletics, the elevated athletics under Kelly's leadership are going to take us to the level we all aspire to be. I want to say that, this move is part of a strategic vision that we have to elevate our athletics, our brand, our spirit, the experiences for all our students, for the fans, for the alumni, you know, everybody around the world who is a Gaucho, and so this will enhance our brand identity, our community engagement. It will create all those experiences. That it is very important to share our story, our story of excellence with people around the world. We have amazing students, we have world class faculty members, terrific staff, dedicated people, people need to hear about all that. I know that being now part of a platform with so many media impressions on ESPN and CBS will help us get there. It's no accident that the people who are in charge of the Santa Barbara airport, decided as soon as we arrived in town in town to have direct flights now to Seattle, to Denver, to Portland, to San Diego, to LA and San Francisco, so it didn't take me much, you know, to figure out that two plus two equals five. And so, you know we said yes this is the moment for West Coast Conference. You know our student-athletes can travel fast there, they will not miss any more class time than they used to. A bus ride now will become a quick plane ride and I hope the fans will be there cheering for us, as we have all these fantastic experiences. I think it's an important lever for us to to share our story with students in all these growing population areas. We can reach many diverse and socioeconomically disadvantaged students we can provide to them access to excellence and that's why I want to be to be able to share our story with the national media and I do believe this is going to be a story of, excellence in our education. In our research, in our discovery, in our community engagement, and obviously this alignment of academics and athletics is all we're after. I know we're going to bring a lot to the conference, but I also feel that we have a great set of new partners that, will be there with us, cheering when we win them and when, you know, we give them a hard time anyway. I want to thank in closing, our Commissioner Stu Jackson. He's a very good basketball player in case you don't know. The President of the University of the Pacific Chris Callahan, who is the Chair of the Board of Presidents for the West Coast Conference and all the presidents for the confidence and trust, we love being here. I feel that's where we belong and we're going to take the conference to the next level. Thank you.”


On how the relationship with the West Coast Conference started
"We have been at places, both me my wife Eleni, where athletics is indeed the front porch of the university. When we arrived, almost immediately, because the first event we had with students was at our Thunderdome. We basically said look, we have everything here. You know, it's brewing, it's ready to ignite so let's give them the opportunity. Yes, that was an active objective from day one. Again, we believe it's such a catalyst for other wonderful things that can happen for the university, the ability to tell our story share it with audiences nationally. I was looking very quickly, talking with our athletics director, how can we relay this story to other audiences? Can we do it right now in the conference? Where we are, which we obviously value, but you know it does have some geographic limitation that doesn't quite fit the vision we had. We really want to expand to compete at the highest levels, as I said, and give others the opportunity to do that. We're attracted to the fact that the WCC gets multiple bids to get in the big dance. We're currently limited to only one bid so those were factors, but as to how the dance then happens, we were not the ones who danced first. I know the WCC has expressed interest in Santa Barbara before, so the rest is history. Those who know me, I like to be a winner. I like to be with the best. I like to give others the opportunity to be the best, and I believe that we've got no time here, the more we wait, the worse it is for us. We have a lot of dreams we have to take the next steps, I'm glad that it happened.”


On the UCSB’s commitment to olympic sports
“We're really committed to the Olympic sports, as much as we love men's and women's basketball. We are absolutely committed to swimming, track & field, tennis, many others, soccer, volleyball. I mean, these are amazing opportunities for us. I hope I haven't missed anybody. My point is it's all a question of balance. It's no accident that last year we were ranked the number one program in NCAA Division I across all sports for schools that don't have football, and I might add don't have football yet.” 


On increasing revenue
"It is actually part of our thinking, universities resources are being squeezed all the time. We want to protect, invest, continue to invest in academic programs first. Everything needs to be balanced. We do think that the move to the WCC will help us increase the external revenue generation by a factor of five or six from today's levels, hence make the programs much more sustainable and successful, less reliant on university subsidy if you think about that. The other thing we believe is it's going to draw our students to participate and engage with the games much more than today. Obviously, people vote to do things they love and pay for them. We do hope that we have an opportunity to increase the revenue coming from student fees. In athletics right now our program is the lowest probably in the nation in terms of student investment in athletics. I don't blame them. Again, if you elevate your product your performances, then people invest in it. I do hope that this will come with time.”         


On how this move can elevate the student-athlete experience
"The branding and signage across campus and beyond downtown Santa Barbara and even nationally can be enhanced greatly. We're really looking at this opportunity. We're going to do it anyway, we may as well design everything for WCC. This is going to be a massive exercise, but we do want people to wear the spirit and the athletic gear, everywhere they go. Friday could be a dress down day on campus where we wear the gear. Gaucho day, we have students wear the jerseys everywhere, all our students, 35,000 of them, not just the student-athletes, we could have merchandise downtown Santa Barbara. We envision a lot of things with that expansion on 410 State Street, their destination campus that, Kelly was talking about downtown. We could certainly feature athletic things, performances, watch parties. It can be a lot of things we can do.”


On going through UC Regents through the process
"We did consult as extensive as we could have given the confidential nature of those procedures. Leaks start quickly the more people you reach out to. We've talked internally, as well as with the system with the office of the president. I know the president has consulted with the regents who are part of that athletics board. We have obviously a concern always about our decisions, the repercussions that may have on others, impacts on budget and everything else that we do internally. We reached out to the budget working group that we have with Senate members as well administrators, faculty of athletics, representative, and a newly instituted board in athletics with faculty members. We've talked about it with provost, I mean, as much as we can, we consult, but you understand the window that you have is narrow. To answer your question, we did have a more coordinated effort with the system as well."     
 
 
Arnhold Director of Athletics Kelly Barsky
Opening Statement
"Thank you, Chancellor, for the wonderful opening remarks. You said it all, very exciting. I want to thank, of course, start with Chancellor Assanis here for that introduction for your leadership and your vision. What a special moment for UCSB for UCSB athletics. I want to highlight for UCSB as you shared, there's a story to continue to tell, to grow, to expand to share, we're excited to be ambassadors part of sharing that wonderful campus story. Our success has always been built upon defined by exceptional people, that's our student-athletes, that's our coaches, our staff, our faculty, our alumni, our Santa Barbara community, greater community of fans supporters, thankful for the amazing people that are part of this Gaucho story. I want to thank Stu Jackson, WCC Commissioner, you'll hear from soon. He's here with us today, as you may know, he's part of the Men's Basketball Committee. He was at the Final Four, flew back a couple days later is in Santa Barbara to be with us here, joining us celebrating this momentous moment. We're inspired by what you do what the WCC does, we're really excited humbled to join in a mission alignment academics athletic competitiveness. We're thrilled, as you shared, to broaden our footprint from Seattle to San Diego and everywhere in between to be part of a really special conference with really great members, and we hope that Gauchos will show up everywhere. As we travel, Gauchos travel, as we look forward to sharing our story throughout this West Coast as well as national exposure. I'd like to take a moment to introduce Stu, because he'll be coming up next, and thank him for being here. He's the fifth commissioner of the West Coast Conference beginning on April of 2023, and had a vision of “We Rise in the West” and has grown that vision to pull together a really special conference of wonderful academic and athletic partners. Again, that's going to continue to grow in Division I, we’re excited you're here and we’re humbled and excited to be part of the conference. Thank you.”


On how the relationship with the West Coast Conference started
"I'm really excited that we continued [conversations]. I've always enjoyed talking with Stu, enjoyed talking with colleagues and partners at the West Coast Conference. I'll tell you they were engaging, happy to get together for any questions we had. Initially there was great excitement. Then there's a lot of work to be done along the way. The Chancellor would ask questions, for those of you that know me know that brevity is not my strength. I would provide lots of documents, lots of thought, lots of positions, but ultimately getting to the same place. What a really special historic moment, to broaden the markets in which we can participate. To go to the homes of Gauchos all over, the West Coast to share our story as a campus, not just athletics, but certainly athletics as part of that, with the world, with the nation. What a great partner to do it with in Stu, his staff and also all of the great institutions, presidents, athletic directors, staff and student-athletes for in the West Coast Conference programs.”


On what attracted UCSB to leave the Big West for the West Coast Conference
"We're excited regardless of who's leaving or changing or adjusting. It's the landscape we've been navigating in Division I athletics for a number of years now. Under Stu's leadership, his staff in working with the institutions in the WCC, they're aligned commitment and investment, which is really important to continuing to grow the programs and create this wonderful West Coast dominance in the markets they're in. We think that hopefully Santa Barbara strengthens the conference, but we're humbled to be in with some really great institutions that are investing in aligning around competitive excellence, athletics excellence and creating excitement that we know Division I athletics can bring to communities.”


On when she felt it was time to leave the Big West
“We've been going through a national landscape for a couple of years now of change and adjustment. Our focus has always been, my conversations have always been around, how do we support, the student athletes, the coaches, the programs, the people, the community of UCSB and ensure that we're positioned strategically and appropriately to have growth, success, sustained success and growth? In terms of when is the moment, there's been an open evaluation for a number of years as we continue to look at what UCSB needs, what do we bring, and how do we continue to grow? A moment all aligned, right? A moment aligned with the great leadership of Chancellor Assanis. It aligned in working with Stu. It aligned in working with some of the WCC presidents and colleagues there, that is, we looked at for all the reasons we talked about the markets. Being able to share our story, the alignment and investment, academics, athletically, it all came together. So really, this has happened pretty quick in the last couple of weeks, but the evaluation of where UCSB needs to be is not an overnight. The other thing I do want to say is we have a long history and legacy in the Big West Conference. As we started off saying, they're very valuable and we are very thankful to everyone in the Big West, both staff and all the institutions. We love our peers at those institutions. This is about an opportunity for UCSB and us positioning ourselves where we think UCSB needs to be right now, but not anything disparaging or difficult about the Big West Conference. It's been a really great home for us for a very long time.”


On the expectations for UCSB in competition in the West Coast Conference
“The programs have been incredibly successful across the board. The reason they're successful is because of great people. We have great coaches, staff, student-athletes and a community around them that bought in to really develop. We focus here on serving, developing our student athletes. You've seen some of those outcomes. You mentioned it last year. We were the DI AAA, all sport, won the all-sport trophy, which is the highest honor for all of Division 1 non-football. We've seen student-athletes go on to be drafted, certainly in Ajay Mitchell in NBA right now, Tyler Bremner, No. 2 in Major League Baseball, Manu Duah No. 1 in Major League Soccer, just over a year ago. We have Amelia Honer in tennis who's off playing professionally, qualified for US Open qualifiers. You're just seeing student-athletes develop. They truly are student-athletes going to class all around campus living in Isla Vista, being part of our community. The answer is, I'm thankful for the great people, our goal is to continue to recruit outstanding student-athletes to retain and recruit outstanding coaches, staff, people that serve, connect our community. Our expectation is, as you said, to win, be successful, but that's in all areas, doing it the right way. So academically, athletically, we also recognize there's a time for development. When we fall down, we're gonna get back up, and we expect to win again. That's how the great people, great Gauchos here at UCSB do it."     


On how this move will elevate the overall student-athlete experience
"I will say that we have, you know, again, a vision of growing and bringing in great teams from WCC, great rivalries for non-conference games, meets, matches, events and we're looking to do a lot of elevation around how we engage students. I'm gonna need your help, and I'm gonna need a lot of student help. The Chancellor's gonna need some help from AS students to different student groups on campus, but we know there's a way, number one, to build connection and school spirit, that could be things like tailgates outside of games. That's us getting into Isla Vista, celebrating and then walking into the Thunderdome for a game, our baseball team wears Isla Vista jerseys on Tuesdays. It's a City Connect jersey, and highlights things like that. I think we're just at the start. I'm really excited about it, but just at the start, we need your help. We need your engagement. We need you to help us know what is it that students want and then get you into these amazing, elite athlete, high performing teams that are competing at the highest level. Then we need you to be loud and some great chants and traditions, band and cheer and dance and everyone else out there, but we're gonna be actively looking for opportunities, not just in our facilities throughout campus in Isla Vista downtown, creating a destination for our students, for our parents, for our alumni, to come together and share in our school spirit and athletics can be a true ambassador for that. We want to highlight our campus. The other things we can do on games, on our ESPN broadcasts, other things, student success, faculty success. We can integrate all of these to telling the story bringing people together."
 
 
West Coast Conference Commissioner Stu Jackson
Opening Statement
"Good morning to all of you. Thank you for those kind remarks about our conference, Chancellor Assanis and Kelly, you as well. When you enter a place this today, you get a little bit of a sense of the energy and the excitement for what this day brings. But I will say this to you, that today is an exciting day for the West Coast Conference, as well. I'm honored to officially announce that UC Santa Barbara has accepted our invitation to join the West Coast Conference. This moment reflects a clear priority established by our President's Council to thoughtfully add a 12th member by identifying a valued institution that aligns with the WCC's expansion vision. From the outset, our focus has been on the Western region and on universities that share what has always defined this conference. That is academic achievement, competitive success, and an unwavering commitment to the student-athlete experience and welfare. UC Santa Barbara embodies those values. UC Santa Barbara is nationally respected for its academic excellence in research profile, and it brings a strong tradition of athletic accomplishment competitive ambition. Just as important UCSB shares the WCC's belief that athletics should elevate the student-athletes supporting their health, well-being, success in the classroom and beyond. I want to recognize the leadership that has made this achievement possible. Under Chancellor Assanis, the university has demonstrated a clear vision and sustained commitment to investing in athletics and expanding UCSB's national visibility. As he like to say, athletics can be the front porch of a university. I also want to commend Director of Athletics Kelly Barsky for her thoughtful strategic leadership, one grounded in elevating UCSB athletics to serve better the student-athletes and the Santa Barbara community. For all of these reasons, UC Santa Barbara is a perfect fit for the West Coast Conference. Their values align with ours, their aspirations match our trajectory, and their addition strengthens the WCC competitively, academically and geographically. We are thrilled to welcome the Gauchos to the WCC, and we look forward to building an exciting future together. We rise in the West.”


On the start of the relationship with UC Santa Barbara
"We first reached out to UC Santa Barbara well over a year ago with no success. When the change in leadership happened, we decided to take a shot again. We found an enthusiastic caller on the other end of the phone this time. That made me smile, and certainly it's been a process to get to this day, but it's one that was done with similar minds in terms of coming together as partners to this day.” 


On what drew UCSB to leave the Big West for the West Coast Conference
"What makes the West Coast Conference a bit unique than other conferences or the one that you mentioned has come true. As a conference, we historically at the WCC have had pretty darn good performance in men's and women's basketball. We've been a multi-bid conference for 10 of the last 12 years. Five times on the women's side, as well. But I always felt that what made this conference unique is the following. The West Coast Conference historically has had great success in Olympic sports as well, and the combination of being successful in the basketballs and Olympic sports truly makes this conference special, unlike any around the country. It’s starting to come to fruition. Having 12 members now, by adding the likes of UC San Diego and now especially with UC Santa Barbara, the depth and breadth of the strength of our conference has become very strong. What that means to recruiting student-athletes, what that means metrically to performance throughout all of your seasons, what that means in terms of your ability to access NCAA championships, I would match against anyone. Now, we are who we are. We're a mid-major conference. We're not the power 4. But that doesn't mean that we can't have opportunities the same as they do with access to championships. Someone mentioned the last thing I'll say. It takes resources. I would just encourage all of you, whether you're a student, a student-athlete, an alumnus of UC Santa Barbara, a current donor or a past donor, pool your resources. The summation of all those parts will help elevate programs in this great institution to get access to more revenue. I would just encourage all of you to do that.”    


On if there will be more institutions added to the West Coast Conference
“It's been a mandate of our President's Council, dating back to a year and a half ago, understanding two things: the landscape of collegiate athletics with realignment nationally and the constant change for many conferences and institutions. Secondly, knowing that, we potentially at the time, we were at nine members. Being a nine-member conference leaves a conference vulnerable and susceptible to not only financial disadvantages but also instability. It became the aggressive mandate of our presidents to grow our conference to 12 members. We proceeded to do so. Fortunately, we are here today at our 12th member, and we feel comfortable where we are now. Everything's on the table, but I can tell you confidently in the foreseeable future, I don't see us going beyond 12 members. We have UCSB coming into the conference in 2027. Let's stabilize and see who we are going to be going forward. After that, we'll make some decisions.”


On the conference’s TV contracts going forward
"I would say the current landscape, in terms of broadcast, there's been a shift in the industry in this regard that even as recently as five years ago, the networks like ESPN, CBS Sports Network and others, there was a real effort to try to get volume of events. In other words, get as many events as you could for your streaming platform. Get as many events as you could to fill windows that you currently have. That has shifted. It shifted to a place where the networks are now interested in what I would term as premium content. Put another way, matchups. High-level matchups. So when you add schools to your conference, that has to be one consideration. Who are you adding? What do they bring? What's their brand? Because at the end of the day, if we can pit a UC Santa Barbara against a Santa Clara, that's potentially a premium matchup in any sport, and that's what they care about. So while we may not necessarily in our new agreement, get the volume that we've had previously with all of our Olympic sports, we are hoping that what we do bring is a level of premium matchups that is attractive to them. So it's not necessarily the size of the conference. Size of the conference really speaks to scheduling, as many of the coaches in the room would say. It's just easier with 12. It's easier with an even number. But with our broadcast partners, it's the brands that you bring to them that they're most interested in.”


On the impact of conference tournaments
"Well, it depends what sport. Recently, we've added three new championships to the WCC that will begin playing next year. I was having a conversation with Joe Evans before this event, by way of example, we're going to have a softball championship, right? We're going to have soccer championships, which we've never had. With respect to the basketball at The Orleans, we will be at The Orleans for next year. We extended our option. We had an option with The Orleans Arena for our basketball tournament. We will be playing there in 2027. After that, we don't know yet. It could be we remain at The Orleans in Vegas. I will tell you that our fans enjoy the experience of going to Las Vegas for that five-day period to watch men's and women's basketball. It will be difficult to leave, but we are exploring all of our options for a new venue.”  


On what the conference basketball schedule will look like
"We currently play an eighteen-game unbalanced schedule. And the reason for that is that by giving our basketball coaches the flexibility to schedule games outside of the conference that can strengthen their resume. We want to give them that opportunity. Again, we are a basketball-centric conference. I say that, we've all gotten comfortable in the WCC with that notion because our financial model is such, our ability to perform in the basketballs fuels the operations for the other sports. It's vital that we gain access to the NCAA Tournament by having multiple bids. And in an effort to try to get those bids, we want to give our men's and women's basketball coaches the flexibility to go out and schedule higher-level games that they may get anywhere else. I don't anticipate we would go to a 22-game conference schedule. Perhaps our membership might resonate with a 20-game conference schedule, but I don't see that today.”