Exclusive: CCU athletic director Matt Hogue is stepping down and changing roles at CCU

Coastal Carolina athletic director Matt Hogue is stepping down to take another position at the school, a spokesperson confirmed to The Sun News.

Hogue, named the 2020-21 Athletics Director of the Year by The National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics, told athletic department staff of his decision at a meeting on Thursday, April 25. The spokesperson of CCU’s athletic department said Hogue was staying on at the university to help teach a broadcast program. It’s unknown who will replace Hogue.

Hogue did not immediately return a request for comment.

Hogue assumed his current role of CCU’s Vice President for Intercollegiate Athletics and University Recreation in April 2021. He was previously a sports broadcaster for Fox Sports Net and ESPN for 25 years, working for 17 years as ‘The Voice of the Chanticleers’ on the university’s sports network. Hogue was named director of athletics at CCU in 2015 after serving as interim director starting in March 2014.

Since Hogue’s tenure with Coastal’s athletic department began, CCU athletics have seen success and a rise in status within collegiate sports. The baseball team won the 2016 College World Series, and the football team won two bowl games in three years beginning in 2021.

Hogue’s tenure has also seen the NCAA landscape change dramatically, with the adoption of name, image, and likeness (NIL) and the transfer portal reshaping college sports. Schools like Coastal have had their football team impacted by adopting NIL, making recruiting and roster cohesion more difficult. The prominent faces of Coastal’s athletic program have changed in the last two years, too.

Former head football coach Jamey Chadwell left for Liberty University at the end of 2022, with current Coastal head coach Tim Beck replacing him. Beck went 8-5 in his first season and won Coastal’s second bowl game in program history. Quarterback Grayson McCall, one of the most famous players to don the teal and black in football program history, departed at the end of the 2023 season, leaving for NC State in the transfer portal.

The changes reached outside of football. Cliff Ellis retired as CCU’s basketball coach before the conclusion of the 2023-24 season, and former Western Carolina University coach Justin Gray ultimately replaced him. Baseball coach Gary Gilmore will retire at the end of the 2024 season, with current CCU assistant Kevin Schnall replacing him.

Hogue remained bullish about CCU’s prospects as the department appeared to be beginning a new era. In a March 18 interview with The Sun News, Hogue said he believed that Coastal Carolina still had room to grow, and his ambitions were not limited to CCU’s current place in the Group of Five Conferences.

“If the ACC called and said, ‘We want you to be number 18.’ tomorrow, I think we probably would highly consider that,” he said at the time.