CHAMPAIGN — Kevin Hambly got to know Josh Whitman in the mid- to late-2000s when Hambly was an assistant on Don Hardin’s volleyball staff.
Whitman was finishing up his law degree at Illinois and working with former Illini athletic director Ron Guenther.
The opinion Hambly started to form in that brief intersection of their respective careers didn’t change in the intervening years. Whitman was impressive then as a law student.
And Hambly considered him equally as impressive Thursday morning when he was officially introduced as Illinois’ next athletic director.
Hambly’s insight into the Illinois alumni base through his wife, Mary, who played volleyball at Illinois the same time Whitman was playing football for Ron Turner, presented the picture that the Hamblys aren’t the only ones impressed by Whitman, the athletic administrator.