Fiesta Bowl win: check. CFP National Championship: check. Clemson AD Dan Radakovich can now check off Sports Business Award Athletic Director of the year, taking the honor for the first time in front of a packed house in N.Y. last night. On top of Clemson’s on-field accolades, Radakovich helped lead the $63M renovation of Littlejohn Coliseum and the construction of a $55M football operations center. “This is really a Clemson award," he said, "and we do this because of the support we have from our board and president. Everyone else who makes us look good.” Radakovich has served on the CFP Selection Committee and also was on a board that helped ESPN establish plans for the soon-to-launch ACC Network. Personally, Radakovich called the AD of the Year award “awesome,” having beaten out Auburn’s Jay Jacobs, TCU’s Chris Del Conte, UCLA’s Dan Guerrero and Virginia Tech’s Whit Babcock. Radakovich said most of Clemson’s success both on and off the field can be attributed to his department’s effort to focus on doing what’s best for Clemson and not worrying about what other institutions are doing. “You always need to make sure you’re doing what’s right for your zip code: what’s right for Clemson," he said. "What we’re doing at Clemson might not work somewhere else.” Radakovich noted CU’s success on the football field in ’16 could be paying dividends for both the athletic department and school for the foreseeable future. “When our engineering department goes to a national convention, they’re introduced as the engineering department for the national champion Clemson Tigers,” he said. “You can’t put a value on that.”
