College Sports Information Directors of America

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Matt Sullivan – University of Louisiana at Lafayette, Director of Athletics Communications

CSC 25-Year Award

by Fred Neusch – Texas A&M Kingsville // CSC Special Awards Committee

Matt Sullivan joined the Louisiana Ragin’ Cajuns staff as an assistant in August 2013 and currently serves as Director of Athletics Communications. He is primarily responsible for media relations efforts for baseball, women’s soccer, men’s golf and is the secondary contact for football.  Prior to his Louisiana work, Sullivan spent 13 years in the SID office at Southeastern Louisiana University, his alma mater. He began his sports communications career as a student intern under the direction of long-time sports information director and Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame member Larry Hymel in 1994, before rejoining the SID office in 1996-97 as a graduate assistant
 
For his work in football, he and the Louisiana football media relations staff was awarded with a Football Writers Association of America (FWAA) Super 11 honor in 2016. The "Super 11" is given to departments which were deemed the best in the NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision. (The award was also the first for a Louisiana FBS program since its inception in 2009.)
 
 
Where have you been either a student SID or professional SID?
MS: 1994 – Southeastern Louisiana University (Student intern SID)
1996-97 – Southeastern Louisiana University (graduate assistant)
1997-2000 – Samford University
2000-2013 – Southeastern Louisiana University
2014-Present – University of Louisiana at Lafayette
 
When and why did you decide to make sports information your profession?
MS: After changing majors more than once and working in other areas on campus (campus activities, student union), I finally decided what I wanted to do when I completed my first day as a student intern in the spring semester of 1994 at Southeastern Louisiana University.
 
My advisor in the kinesiology department (Dr. Wayne Lee) was originally going to place me in a sporting goods store for my internship and I asked him if I could go instead to the SID office. He made a call to Larry Hymel, the longtime sports information director, and got it set up.
 
I loved the ability to be close to athletics and working in the sports information department at SLU was a chance to pursue my dreams. After graduation, I worked a couple of jobs while enhancing my writing ability doing freelance work covering sporting events for the Baton Rouge Advocate. Between graduation and getting a graduate assistant position saw a lot of rejection letters, but I kept working and waiting for an eventual opportunity.
 
What are the pluses of being an SID?
MS: The ability to travel to places I would more than likely not be able to get to. Our men’s basketball team at Louisiana made a summer trip to Cuba in 2017 and it is an experience that I will never forget.
 
Competing in some of the storied venues in college basketball – Kansas’ Allen Fieldhouse, UCLA’s Pauley Pavillion, “The Barn” at Minnesota, “The Pit” at New Mexico – have been personal “bucket list” items for myself as a college basketball fan.
 
Primarily working with basketball, four teams that I have worked for have made trips to the NCAA Championships beginning in 1999 with Samford’s first-ever trip (facing St. John’s) and subsequent trip the following year against Syracuse. Watching my alma mater Southeastern Louisiana University play in the 2005 NCAA Tournament against Oklahoma State is one of the highlights of my career and going to the 2014 Tournament with Louisiana was part of an incredible string of events during my first year with the Ragin’ Cajuns.
 
What are some other career moments that stand out?
MS: Personally, moving from a FCS to FBS (football championship series to football bowl series) school in 2013 saw a list of things in a six-month period that myself (or others) might not ever experience: A bowl game for football, an appearance in the NCAA Men’s Basketball Championships, hosting both NCAA Regionals and Super Regionals in baseball and softball and a trip to the Women’s College World Series.
 
The biggest plus for me as an SID has been working with incredible student-athletes, telling their stories and watching them grow from the time they arrive on campus, earn their degree and follow their progress once they enter the professional world. Many have gone on to have incredible careers post-graduation and I am proud to have played a small part in their collegiate experience.
 
What are the minuses of being an SID?
MS: Time away from family. My time at SLU from 2000-13 featured a near 100-mile, back-and-forth daily commute which resulted in missing time away from my wife and son. Missing the majority of his t-ball games, school and family events are things that I regret, but the best part of the day would be when I brought him to school in the morning on my way into work.
 
I didn’t get easier once I moved halfway across the state to Lafayette just before he was about to enter high school. That lasted for just over four years before he finished school and I was able to get them here. We now live just over a mile from where my office is, and I am able to go home for lunch, dinner and spend much-needed quality time with them.
 
With your quarter century of experience, what do you think can be done to make this a better profession and attract more students into the field?
MS: With the growth of our profession over the last 10-20 years highlighted by the advent of social media, creative graphics and video, there must be a better work/life balance.
 
The profession must be more enticing to the next generation. University administrations should focus on investing more in support staff positions (i.e., communications, athletic training, academic services, compliance) – especially at lower levels of the NCAA model and NAIA institutions. Otherwise, the profession will continue to see tremendous turnover.