Big East Conference

The mission was to identify an exceptional leader capable of navigating the changing collegiate sports landscape while advancing the BIG EAST’s position as a premier basketball-centric conference.

The search required finding a leader capable of driving commercial success in a turbulent collegiate landscape defined by NIL, revenue sharing, and shifting media rights. Elevate Talent needed to balance this high-stakes revenue mandate with the conference's non-FBS, basketball-centric identity, while building total consensus across all eleven university presidents. 

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Elevate Talent executed a cross-sector search targeting premier commercial minds from major professional leagues, media networks, and athletic administration. Elevate Talent delivered complete end-to-end executive search and governance consulting, cross-sector candidate mapping across professional sports and media networks, rigorous competency assessments, and full offer negotiation through final board approval and public transition.

Former Major League Baseball executive Tim Brosnan will be the Big East Conference next Commissioner. Brosnan’s deep expertise in media rights, modern college athletics, and NIL revenue generation will position the conference, home to four of the past 10 national champions, including UConn’s back-to-back titles in 2023 and 2024, for continued growth and long-term competitiveness. Over more than two decades at MLB, Brosnan helped spearhead the launch of MLB Network and the World Baseball Classic, while driving industrywide revenues from $1.5 billion in 1991 to nearly $8.5 billion by 2015.

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