Allen Greene to serve as Auburn’s first black athletic director

3:31 PMAuburn on Friday introduced Allen Greene as the university’s 15th athletic director, making him the first African-American AD in school history and the third ever in the Southeastern Conference.

Greene, 40, served in the same role at the University at Buffalo since 2015 and worked in the athletic department at Ole Miss from 2009-12. He joins Vanderbilt’s David Williams II and former Georgia athletic director Damon Evans as the only black ADs in SEC history.

This hiring brings the number of black athletic directors in the Power 5 conferences (ACC, Big 12, Big Ten, Pac-12 and SEC) to 12, including 11 men and one woman:

• Boston College: Martin Jarmond
• Florida State: Stan Wilcox
• Virginia: Carla Williams (the lone black woman)
• Maryland: Damon Evans (interim)
• Michigan: Warde Manuel
• Ohio State: Gene Smith
• Arizona State: Ray Anderson
• California: H. Michael Williams
• USC: Lynn Swann
• Stanford: Bernard Muir
• Auburn: Allen Greene
• Vanderbilt: David Williams II

Outside of the Big 12, which has zero, each Power 5 conference has at least two black athletic directors. These 12 men and women represent 18.4 percent of the 65 athletic director jobs in the Power 5.

The numbers are not set in stone. California’s H. Michael Williams plans to step down from his position in May. Evans, serving on an interim basis at Maryland since October, may replace an outgoing black athletic director (Kevin Anderson), much like Carla Williams did at Virginia (Craig Littlepage).

Auburn president Steven Leath said Greene had “the right combination of leadership, enthusiasm, experience and management to lead Auburn Athletics to success well into the future.”