Now that the front door has slammed on Steve Patterson, who had been Texas’ athletic director for nearly two years before he and the university decided to part ways on Tuesday, it should have been simple for Greg Fenves, the university’s president, to find an immediate replacement.
All he had to do was look down the hall. Because there, at the same university, in the same athletic department, sits Chris Plonsky, a woman who for 14 years has been the Longhorns’ athletic director for women’s sports.
Plonsky, 57, would seem a logical fit, or at the least a top candidate, to replace Patterson, whose management style reportedly alienated boosters and alumni.