Greetings from Haas Pavilion - 

I want to begin this newsletter by addressing the status of our women's swimming & diving program. As you may know, we parted ways last month with longtime coach Teri McKeever. After carefully reviewing an extensive investigative report that was recently completed by an independent law firm, I strongly believe this is in the best interests of our student-athletes, our swimming program, and Cal Athletics as a whole.

The report details numerous violations of university policies that prohibit race, national origin, and disability discrimination. The report also details verbally abusive conduct that is antithetical to our most important values. I was disturbed by what I learned in the course of reading through the report's 482 pages that substantiate far too many allegations of unacceptable behavior. I want to apologize, on behalf of Cal Athletics, to every student-athlete who was subject to this conduct in the past, and I want to thank everyone who had the courage to come forward and share their story with the investigators.

At my request, Dave Durden is continuing as acting director of swimming & diving. We will move as quickly as possible to decide on permanent leadership for the program.

Looking to the future, I acknowledge that there have been evolving standards in intercollegiate athletics when it comes to how we develop our student-athletes to be their best, on and off the fields of competition. While we have strong, existing policies that cover a wide range of unacceptable conduct, I believe areas remain where there is a lack of consensus and clarity, areas where practices acceptable in the past need to be updated. I will lead a collaborative effort across the Cal Athletics community to develop updated guidelines that will allow coaches to mentor and challenge student-athletes in an environment that enables our young women and men to thrive.

In the days ahead, we will begin this process through a series of conversations with our coaches, staff and student-athletes. We will provide ample opportunities for our teams to provide input and feedback. Once completed, we will educate our community about our new guidelines.

All of us who have the privilege of working for and with Cal Athletics know we have work to do when it comes to building a culture that provides an authentic sense of belonging, safety, respect, and inclusion for all. We have heard the expressions of concern and continue to do all that we can to ensure our policies and practices fully align with our words and values.  Our desire is for Cal Athletics to be a model for educating and developing young women and men, and we remain committed to constant improvement, to learning from the past, to never being complacent when it comes to student-athlete well-being, and all that starts and ends with me.
 
Shifting gears, last month we entered into a new three-year agreement to make Nike and BSN SPORTS our official provider of apparel, footwear, and other equipment needs. I'm excited that our 30 sports programs will be outfitted in Nike gear, as we continue to elevate our brand while giving our student-athletes and staff the resources they need to compete at the highest level. The new partnership begins July 1, and we are excited about rolling out new Nike gear in the months ahead to our Cal Athletics community.
 
Our women's basketball team has been battling all season, and at our game against Stanford last month we had the experience of hosting Steph Curry at Haas Pavilion. It was so gratifying to see Steph supporting the women's game, and he also had this priceless reaction to a 3-pointer by his namesake – our student-athlete, Jayda Curry. Coach Smith's squad continues to compete hard, and we'd love to see our Cal Family come out and support the Bears at the last few remaining home games of the season.
 
National Signing Day took place last week, and Coach Wilcox continues to build the foundation of our football program. We now have 24 new student-athletes joining the Cal family, and Coach Wilcox has expressed his excitement about the new talent joining the team at key positions. Some of our new players enrolled at Cal this semester, meaning they will join the rest of the team for the Spring Showcase on April 15. We've also announced our 2023 schedule – we will have six home games, including our first-ever matchup against traditional national power Auburn on Sept. 9 and USC's last appearance at California Memorial Stadium on Oct. 28. Season tickets are now on sale, and you can also visit the Cal Athletics Fund Cal Athletic Fund online to support the team via the Championship CALiber initiative.
 
We continue to celebrate the 50^th anniversary of Title IX in a variety of ways. At the women's basketball victory over Oregon State, we honored Colleen Galloway, who was the first female student-athlete to earn an athletic scholarship at Cal and until recently was the program's all-time leading scorer. Our women's swimming & diving program recognized 12-time Olympic medalist Natalie Coughlin, who was a three-time NCAA Swimmer of the Year when she competed for the Bears. And our men's swimming & diving program honored Karen Moe Humphreys, the first-ever coach of our women's program and an Olympic gold medalist.
 
I also want to congratulate two of our women's soccer student-athletes for being selected in the 2023 NWSL draft last month! Sydney Collins was the eighth overall pick by the NC Courage and Angelina Anderson went 27^th to Angel City FC. Sydney tied for being the highest draft pick in our program's history, and it was just the third time we have ever had multiple draft picks in the same year! 
 
The support of our Cal family continues to accelerate our efforts as we recently received several gifts that will make a tremendous impact on our student-athletes and programs for many years to come. Bud Lyons '72, a Cal rugby alum and emeritus UCBF Berkeley Foundation trustee, further cemented his legacy by establishing a $2.5 million bequest commitment through his estate plans. Men's basketball great Shareef Abdul-Rahim and wife Dee Dee made a significant gift to the Cameron Institute. Shareef shared that "In all of my close work with Athletics, I have not seen anything close to what the Cameron Institute is doing to enhance the student-athlete experience." Vigyan Singhal Ph.D '96 and wife Sonali Bhushan also chose to support the Cameron Institute by making a generous contribution to establish the Oski Technology Mental Performance and Life Skills Consultant, a position that will enhance and grow the institute's offerings. I am incredibly grateful to these individuals for their support and am continually impressed by the generosity of our Cal alums.
 
This is always an exciting time of year as we have overlap with our winter and spring sports. Right now, we have 14 sports competing – No. 2 men's swimming & diving, No. 4 women's water polo, No. 7 women's gymnastics, No. 12 women's swimming & diving, No. 20 men's tennis, No. 20 women's tennis, men's and women's basketball, rugby, men's and women's golf, men's and women's track & field, and men's gymnastics. Soon, they will be joined by baseball, softball, beach volleyball, lacrosse and men's and women's rowing to give us 20 sports competing simultaneously!
 
Go Bears!

  
 
Jim