COLUMBIA - It took Jim Sterk 15 minutes to decide he wanted to be Missouri's athletics director.
It's a good thing, too, because MU interim chancellor Hank Foley did not want him to take too long to decide. Foley, though, was set on the former San Diego State athletics director.
"I was looking for people to tell me Jim's reputation is too good to be true, I really tried, I really did, but to be honest I couldn't find them," Foley said. "Instead I've heard words like highly-seasoned, inordinate passion, uniquely gifted. All the attributes of a proven athletic and academic leader."
Foley introduced Sterk as Missouri's new athletics director Thursday in the Columns Club at Faurot Field. Sterk walked onto the podium past Missouri's Golden Girls and to the theme of school's fight song. Truman the Tiger even welcomed him.
For most of the introduction, Sterk could not stop smiling. He laughed when Foley cracked a few jokes, and Sterk even made a few of his own. It was a stark contrast to the constant lifeless expression his predecessor, Mack Rhoades, made in Rhoades' last few months at Missouri. At the end of the introduction, Foley presented Sterk a white and grey No. 1 Missouri football jersey with the name "Sterk" on the back.
The crowd he addressed included football coach Barry Odom, former football coach Gary Pinkel, Columbia mayor Brian Treece, former MU chancellor R. Bowen Loftin, former basketball coach Norm Stewart, former A.D. Mike Alden and baseball coach Steve Beiser, among alumni and fans. Sterk promised the group his tenure as Missouri's A.D. would be closer to Alden's 17 years, rather than Rhoades' 14-months.
Even though Sterk is 60, he said he has the energy to be on the job as long as Alden. He joked if his 91-year-old father can drive a harvest truck for potatoes the last three years, he should be able to last 17 years in Columbia.
"This is a destination spot, and I would love to have the tenure of Mike Alden," Sterk said. "We don't jump around, that's not us. And we made this decision to stay here long term, and I have no intention of leaving, so you're stuck with me."
During the interview process, his wife, Debi, saw someone with a "Mizzou Tigers" shirt in front of her when hiking in Torrey Pines in San Diego. Jim Sterk saw someone driving with a Missouri license plate in front of him on the campus of San Diego State. Sterk said it was divine intervention telling him to go to Missouri.
Sterk does not have any Missouri ties, though Debi Sterk has family in southern Missouri. Still, as the son of a dairy farmer he said he appreciates the university's agricultural background.
That, along with with Missouri being a member of the Southeastern Conference, an Association of American Universities school and the flagship institution of the state, gave Sterk a rare opportunity he could not pass up.
"I'm not from Missouri, but I am now," Sterk said. "The character of people and the passion I felt the first time I met Chancellor Foley, and the advisory committee, and then everyone just as we've been here the last couple days. It really sold me on this opportunity that this is a very, very special place."
After three interim athletic directors, including himself for a week, Foley said he is relieved for himself and for the university to have the athletics director job settled with a "successful outcome." He added he can finally have a few days off now that the fast-pace search is finished, before getting back to other appointments.
While Foley is taking a short break, Sterk will begin his job almost instantly.
He does not officially begin until Aug. 22, yet he said him and Odom had scheduled to discuss the football facilities just hours after Sterk's introduction.
"I'm damn excited," Odom said of working with Sterk.
Sterk also plans to meet as many student-athletes as soon as he can.
At San Diego State, he frequently met with team captains, and even organized karaoke nights at his house. Keeping tabs on how student athletes as a whole are feeling is a top priority for him, especially now coming to a university that had its football call for a boycott last November.
"They're individuals and I admire anyone who feels strongly about something," Sterk said of players who would consider a similar boycott in the future. "Most of my efforts would be in preventive and not getting to that point where they felt they had to."
Foley beamed about Sterk's personal qualities, and how he believes Sterk will use them in developing relationships with student-athletes. That quality is what made Sterk stand out among some "fantastic people" Foley interviewed.
"Hands down there was one candidate who really embodied everything we were looking for in a candidate," Foley said. "Someone who had a winning record, someone who has taken good programs to greatness. A person who truly values success in the classroom and the mentoring of young athletes."