LSU hires new athletic director Woodward away from Texas A&M

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — LSU has formalized an agreement to bring in Scott Woodward as the university’s next athletic director.

Woodward, whose hiring was announced Thursday morning, has been Texas A&M’s athletic director since 2016 and held the same post at Washington for eight years before that. He takes over at LSU on the heels of the university’s announcement a day earlier that 11th-year athletic director Joe Alleva would be stepping down and be reassigned to another job within the institution.

Woodward is a Baton Rouge native and LSU graduate who returns to his alma mater following a pair of high-profile coaching hires for the Aggies within the past 18 months.

Woodward hired Aggies football coach Jimbo Fisher away from Florida State in December 2017 and this month hired men’s basketball coach Buzz Williams away from Virginia Tech.

Woodward’s homecoming coincides with a period of uncertainty for LSU’s men’s basketball program. Coach Will Wade was reinstated from suspension by Alleva on Sunday, days after denying he broke NCAA rules when making a recruiting offer that he discussed in a leaked FBI wiretap transcript.