Mary McElroy Director of Athletics Georgia State University

Mary McElroy became Director of Athletics at Georgia State University in July 2005, as Georgia State was joining to the Colonial Athletic Association (CAA) a year earlier than planned.  The President of Georgia State University, Dr. Carl Patton, took a calculated risk hiring McElroy as the first female Athletic Director at Georgia State, and making her at the time the only female African-American Athletics Director at a non-historically black college at the NCAA Division I level.

McElroy’s athletic management career began in 1992 where she worked her way up to assistant athletic director at the Naval Academy. She was Senior Woman Administrator and oversaw compliance for 29 sports. She also served a stint as Director of Alumni Services at Navy. 

From June 1999 to July 2005, McElroy had been in downtown Atlanta on the athletic management team at Georgia Tech. She left as Senior Associate AD and Senior Woman Administrator. During that time, her responsibilities included overseeing five sports: basketball (men’s and women’s), tennis (men’s and women’s) and softball, and supervising the game day operations for basketball, as well as overseeing the compliance staff.

Within the NCAA and ACC, McElroy was appointed to the NCAA Management Council in April 2005, and was a member of the NCAA Volleyball Committee. For the ACC, McElroy served on several committees, was chairperson of the Softball Committee, was on the Women’s Basketball Committee, the Head Trainer’s Committee, the Senior Woman Administrator’s Committee, and an Ad Hoc Committee on student-athlete welfare

The former Marine Corps Captain and graduate of the Naval Academy shaped up the athletic department and now has it poised for progress and consistent achievements.  One of her major accomplishments was to develop and implement the Strategic Plan that established the athletic department vision and defines the pathways to those objectives.  Every unit within the department knows its methods to carry out the plan. Every team within the program understands what is expected and where the sources of growth will come from to meet the intended goals. Every student-athlete understands the expectations and support system to fulfill the purposes.

A native of Great Mills, Maryland, she is married to a fellow Naval Academy graduate, Terry (‘86) and they have two sons, Darrin and Austin.