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Doug Dull – Retired, CoSIDA Hall of Famer and Past President
American University, University of Maryland, Kansas State University, UC Davis, California State University Chico

CoSIDA Lifetime Achievement Award

by Patrick Stevens – Washington Post Contributor

Mike Robles was only a month into a job at UC Davis, still sorting out what the gig entailed.

What he already knew - and what an afternoon-before-a-holiday-weekend escape to a nearby restaurant demonstrated - was the welcoming personality of his new boss, Doug Dull.

“We sat down in the booth and bought some local spirits and we sat there from 2 in the afternoon until 11 o’clock at night because people came in and would sit down and join us for an hour,” Robles says. “They would leave, and someone else would come in and see Doug and sit down for an hour. We were literally there nine hours. It felt like we were on a talk show. We kept having guests come in. that was really a testament that everyone wanted to sit down and talk with Doug.”

It was a scene that would unfold countless times over a 30-year career for the CoSIDA Hall of Famer, whose professional journey took him to the West Coast before eventually boomeranging back to the Washington, D.C., area with a stop in the heartland in between.

From Chico State to UC Davis to Kansas State to Maryland to American University, Dull’s trademark was forging relationships with all the constituencies he would encounter along the way — and is the centerpiece of a three-decade run celebrated with a 2020 CoSIDA Lifetime Achievement Award.

“I’ve worked with assistants who have become life-long friends and that’s absolutely a product of being able to take a backseat and let the talented and committed and passionate people that I worked with have their time in the sun,” Dull says. “I’m a huge believer in collaboration and having teams achieve great things together. At each of my stops, I’ve been fortunate to be able to surround myself with people who had similar values.”

The Maryland product spent his first eight years after graduation in a variety of roles at the Hagerstown Herald-Mail but found himself looking south and west while looking for the next role in his career.

He pursued jobs at newspapers as he sought a logical next step. But given his experiences with Jack Zane (an institution at Maryland) and Joe Browning (then at Shepherd College in West Virginia), sports information had some appeal, too.

“They all seemed like they were having a good time, and always seemed like they were enjoying what they were doing,” Dull noted.

Soon enough, he was figuring out precisely where Chico, Calif., was and loading up a car for a four-and-a-half-day trek across the continent. There was also the matter of learning the profession; at Chico, Dull was a one-man band and figured things out on the fly while picking up ideas from mentors like Sam Goldman from San Francisco State.
 

He moved up to Division II power UC Davis a few years later, and that’s where he first crossed paths with Robles, now the director of sports info and communication for the California Community College Athletic Association (and 2020 CoSIDA 25-Year Award recipient). By then, Dull had already figured out good relationships with a constellation of surrounding people was vital to any professional success.

“Kill them with kindness --- that’s what I believed in already, but it was reinforced,” Robles says. “One thing about our office is we had really good relationships throughout our department with coaches, with staff, with everybody. We were respected by everybody because Doug made it a priority, [saying] ‘We’re in the PR business.’ That’s why Doug went so far in his career because he put relationships at the forefront of what he did. That’s natural for him. He’s that kind of guy, very outgoing and very gregarious.”

Those skills would carry lasting value. He would work with both Ralph Friedgen (football) and Gary Williams (men’s basketball) at Maryland, a pair of strong personalities who were also Terrapin alums and enjoyed extended success.

Then there was the meticulous Bill Snyder, one of the top coaches in college football over the last 30 years who built a thriving program at Kansas State.

“He was pretty regimented to the point where he would approve all interview requests either pregame or postgame, but his loyalty to me and my family when I was at Manhattan and even a year or two after was palpable and taught me a lot,” Dull says. “When I was leaving Manhattan to go to Maryland, I remember having a conversation where he said ‘Your mom lives close [to D.C.], and the biggest reason I’m going to let you go so you can go take care of your mom.’ He always had family first. It was a tremendous lesson to be able to learn.”

Dull is arguably best known in CoSIDA circles for his stint at Maryland, and it was during his tenure there he served as the organization’s president in 2006-07. But the chance to work with a large group of students was an important part of his legacy in College Park, and many of those who learned from Dull at Maryland are now in the industry themselves.

That approach also was vital at American, where Dull had a youthful staff of professionals.

“Whenever you get to work with somebody who’s a former CoSIDA president and a future Hall of Famer, you know you’re in good hands with that person,” says Nick Guerriero, who Dull hired at American. “The one thing Doug always talked to me about all the time was being with the right people and having the right staff. From the first day I met him to the last day I was with him, he was always a true professional."

Dull relished the personal touches that came with the job, including providing historical perspective for his teams (which was a particular strength during his time at Maryland). Media members could count on his regular lap around the perimeter of the court during basketball season, checking in to make sure everyone was situated properly before a game got underway.

And, of course, there was humor (occasionally generational in nature) that permitted Dull to connect with those around him.

“You could see how proud he was of his staff and the work we were putting out and by the way an event went or how a meeting went,” says Guerriero, who serves as the chair of CoSIDA’s Continuing Education Committee. “With him, we would joke about how you could teach an old Doug new tricks, saying ‘Doug, this is social media; this is Twitter; this is Instagram.’ But he allowed other people to do their thing, and that was gracious of him.”

A self-described “Internet dating success story,” Dull and his wife Patty now have more time to pursue their shared love of wine. But he also keeps tabs on proteges who had quite the model to emulate when it came to building relationships.

“From a student standpoint, Patty and I don’t have kids, so when I was working with student staff at American or Maryland or something like that, they became family,” Dull says. “Teaching them and having them thrive and succeed makes me really happy. That’s meaningful to me and makes me feel good. To have a tiny scrap of a legacy is a nice thing.”

A legacy not soon to be forgotten by those who crossed paths with Dull in his 30 years in college athletics communications.