Source: Pitt athletic director Heather Lyke under consideration to be next AD at Northwestern

Heather Lyke, whose seven-year tenure as Pitt athletic director has included firing, hiring and extending contracts of several coaches, is under consideration for the same position at Northwestern, a source told TribLive.

Lyke, whose Pitt contract is due to expire this year, is expected to meet with Northwestern officials this week.

The Chicago Sun-Times reported that Lyke is among three “finalists” to replace Derrick Gragg, who is being reassigned within Northwestern’s athletics department. The others are Villanova athletic director Mark Jackson and former Washington Commanders president Jason Wright, the first Black team president in NFL history.

Former Pitt Chancellor Patrick D. Gallagher hired Lyke in 2017 to become the first female athletic director in school history. She replaced Scott Barnes, who left for the same position at Oregon State. Her contract was extended in 2018.

Lyke previously served as athletic director at Eastern Michigan and in several capacities in the Ohio State athletic department.

Previously, Lyke’s name was linked to athletic director positions at Michigan State, Ohio State and USC.

Lyke hired and extended contracts of several coaches at Pitt, including wrestling coach Keith Gavin and men’s basketball coach Jeff Capel. She did not hire football coach Pat Narduzzi, but she extended his contract twice, most recently after Pitt won the ACC championship in 2021.

She also extended the contracts of women’s volleyball coach Dan Fisher, who has led Pitt into three consecutive Final Fours, and men’s soccer coach Jay Vidovich, who led Pitt to its most successful season in 67 years during the 2020-21 season.

Women’s soccer coach Randy Waldrum was hired in 2017, months after Lyke assumed leadership of the athletic program. He rejuvenated the program and led it into the NCAA Sweet 16 in 2022 and the Elite 8 in 2023.

Lyke fired men’s basketball coach Kevin Stallings, who preceded Capel, and former women’s coach Lance White in 2023, five years after he was hired. Also, Joe Jordano, the winningest baseball coach in school history, resigned under Lyke’s watch in 2018.

Lyke also has pushed vigorously for funding for the $240 million Victory Heights project, which is under construction on campus next door to the Petersen Events Center. It will serve 16 of Pitt’s 19 intercollegiate programs and include a 3,000-seat arena for gymnastics, volleyball and wrestling.

Victory Heights is expected to open in the fall of 2025.

Last year, the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics named Lyke a recipient of the Cushman & Wakefield AD of the Year Award.