UNLV President Neal Smatresk last night recommended that interim AD Tina Kunzer-Murphy's contract be extended through the end of '14, and added that while she will retain her interim title, there is "no doubt who is running the department," according to a front-page piece by Steve Carp of the LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL. Kunzer-Murphy, who was Las Vegas Bowl Exec Dir from '00-12, took over for former AD Jim Livengood in July on an interim basis through the end of '13. Her extension will be "subject to approval" of the school's Board of Regents at its Oct. 18 meeting. Kunzer-Murphy said that she "gets to implement her vision for UNLV athletics, which is to give all her coaches what they need to succeed, bolster the academic support system, form partnerships in the community and be accountable to Smatresk, both fiscally and ethically." Carp reports UNLV coaches "fought for Kunzer-Murphy when they met with Smatresk last Friday" about the matter. He said that this meeting "helped his decision." Smatresk: "It wasn’t just that they liked Tina. It was the specifics. They said she had a plan for each of their teams and they were supportive of that. She has a vision for athletics at UNLV and the coaches shared that vision and so do I" (LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL, 10/9). In Las Vegas, Taylor Bern reports the athletic department's relationship with the Thomas & Mack Center, which is "often contentious, was also cited by both Smatresk and Kunzer-Murphy as a positive during her time as the interim director." The finalists for UNLV's AD role included former Florida State AD Randy Spetman, current Univ. of Arkansas-Little Rock AD Chris Peterson and Washington State Senior Associate AD John Johnson. The school "did not pay for an outside consulting firm and instead used a local search committee" (LAS VEGAS SUN, 10/9).
