The following interview is part of our ongoing Expert Series that asks C-level professionals, team presidents, league executives, athletic directors and other sports influencers about their latest thoughts and insights on new technologies impacting the sports industry.
Name: Gene Smith
Company: Ohio State University
Position: Director of Athletics
Gene Smith is currently in his 12th year as the director of athletics at Ohio State University where he oversees 36 varsity sports and more than 1,000 student athletes. Smith is the eighth person to hold the athletics director position at Ohio State. He previously served as director of athletics at Arizona State, Iowa State and Eastern Michigan and is in his 32nd year in the role.
Smith received his bachelor’s degree in business administration from Notre Dame in 1977. Following graduation, he joined the Notre Dame coaching staff under Dan Devine and remained in that capacity until 1981. The 1977 Notre Dame team captured the undisputed national championship. A native of Cleveland, Ohio, the 60-year-old Smith has the unique distinction of winning national championships in football as a student athlete, coach and athletics director.
1) What utilization of technology in college sports has recently blown you away and why?
Wearables and the invaluable feedback to our student athletes. It helps our trainers and physicians determine the best training and recovery methodologies for each individual student athlete. Our creative designers, fan experience and digital teams worked together to put out something that really blew my mind: augmented reality. Using your phone you scan say a team poster, game program, what have you, and an interactive video plays right there on your smartphone. So cool. Our fans have loved it. AR is akin to when LEDs became a fixture in stadiums. LEDs fundamentally changed how games were presented; it was a new medium for game enhancement, fan engagement, sponsor activation and ultimately, a new and lucrative revenue stream for the team.
2) If money were no object, what technology would you build or buy to help you do your job better?
Continue to build the best wireless (DAS) and Wi-Fi infrastructure to be prepared for whatever technologies emerge over the coming years. We would love to implement full Wi-Fi services to our fans inside Ohio Stadium. The benefits are immeasurable. It is a tall-task and one that many programs across the country are working to achieve as well. We obviously want to be a leader in this area and provide our support base with the ultimate game day experience and we continue to explore avenues to do so.
3) As a sports fan, what sports-related service, app, product, etc., could you not live without and why?
I might sound “old-school” nowadays, but Twitter is my go-to for news and to keep up to date. I now am on Instagram and keep up with family and the grandkids that way. Since our website moved to mobile responsive, that has been much more convenient, and I use it much more frequently now to follow all of our sports and student athletes.
4) If you had to project 20 years into the future, how will most fans watch their favorite college sports teams?
In-stadium and at-home with some form of augmented/virtual reality. I cannot imagine where technology like virtual reality will take us. What will the in-game experience be like? I’m sure as time passes, the game day experience will become much more immersive whether in-venue or at home. It will be interesting to see how that on-going battle plays out.
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5) What are some of the ways in which the OSU athletic department has integrated new forms of technology into The Shoe to enhance the fan experience?
We have worked to improve the networking infrastructure at a stadium that was built in 1923. This has allowed us to improve our point of sale systems for both food and merchandise vendors to deliver a faster experience at our stands. We have also improved the wireless experience over the past few seasons with a neutral host distributed antennae system.
The fans is our No. 1 priority, and we want them to feel included in game day. For many years, we have been sharing their social messaging on our fascia and video boards, and we certainly ramped that up this season. Fans love to see themselves on our video boards, but they love even more to see their own photos and selfies up there. We also introduced a pilot program this season called “experience” for a few games to offer new and exciting options for our fans. It is in a postseason evaluation process at this time, and we will revisit a possible extension for 2017.
6) Give us your bold prediction about a form of technology that will be integral to college athletics over the next 12 months and why?
Analytics of big data. As we collect data about our student athletes, thru wearables and other performance monitoring systems, we will learn even more about how to enhance their training and recovery experience.
Through data about our fans, we can learn much more about their experiences and how to build new ways to connect with them. It seems the ever-changing regulation of the forms of digital communication between coaches and prospective student athletes has had a huge impact on our off seasons.