People and Pop Culture
Closing Shot: Departing Demon Deacon
This week, Wake Forest AD Ron Wellman will put the wraps on a 27-year career at the school. Before he starts packing boxes in his office, he will be dealing with a packed schedule of final business.
Ron Wellman had plenty of reasons to celebrate during his nearly three decades as AD, including Wake Forest winning the 2016 ACC championship in men’s soccer.ap images
Ron Wellman will retire this week after 27 years as athletics director at Wake Forest. If Wellman had scripted his final act before stepping away, it would look a lot like what he had scheduled for the final Monday of his tenure — the longtime AD planned to hunker down in his office and put out fires before going to an evening event to celebrate the accomplishments of Wake’s student athletes at the Black & Golden Globes awards gala.
As Wellman progressed toward retirement in recent years, he began to appreciate the routine and the long days even more. It’s what he will miss as much as anything.
“I will just miss coming to the office every day and working with the people that I have an opportunity to work with,” Wellman said. “I remember a couple of weeks ago, it was a full day of meetings and most of them were challenging meetings. And on my way to the car that night, I was thrilled with the day. Because I had an opportunity to try to solve problems for people and work with individuals who I trusted, respected and enjoyed being around. That’s a pretty fulfilling day.”
Then there’s the other side of the job — the part he won’t miss.
“Making life-altering decisions about people,” Wellman said. “Whether it be coaches or administrators or the student athletes. Some of that comes with the territory. But it’s something I will not miss at all.”
Talent pipeline
Current ADs who worked with Ron Wellman at Wake Forest:
■ Hunter Yurachek, Arkansas
■ Joel Nielsen, Kent State
■ Michael Kelly, University of South Florida
■ Tom Kleinlein, Georgia Southern
■ Mike Buddie, Furman
■ Samantha Huge, William & Mary
■ Perk Weisenburger, Ferris State
■ Dan Hauser, High Point
A lot of proud Wake Forest fans might take that as a reason why Wellman didn’t fire basketball coach Danny Manning at the end of last season. And there might be some truth to that. Ultimately, Wellman landed on the side of keeping Manning because he believes in him personally and professionally, despite a 65-93 record in five seasons.
Except for that sport’s setback, Wellman leaves Wake competitively strong, said Teall Capital founder Ben Sutton, who is a board member at the school.
“Ron’s legacy will be that he leaves a program that has probably never been in better shape, top to bottom, in history,” Sutton said.
Wellman’s last day on the job will be Tuesday; John Currie takes over the next day. As for what he’ll do for an encore, Wellman hasn’t slowed down enough to plan one. He’ll turn 71 on Thursday and his children and grandchildren are close by, so he intends to remain engaged with Wake Forest.
Until then, “there’s an awful lot to do,” Wellman said. “We have our board of trustees coming in and then we have committee meetings. It’s going to be a busy week.”
First Look podcast, with athletic directors discussion at the 8:28 mark:
