Director of Athletics and Professor of Physical Education Jon Hind ’80 has announced his retirement, effective April 30, 2025. Hind has been Hamilton’s Director of Athletics since the summer of 2007. During his tenure as director, Hamilton women’s lacrosse captured the first NCAA team championship in athletic department history in 2008. Additionally, athletes from the men’s track & field, men’s cross country and women’s swimming teams have collected a number of individual national titles over his tenure.
Hind came to the Hill in 1976 as an opportunity program student from Henninger High School in Syracuse. Hind graduated from Hamilton in 1980 with a Bachelor’s degree in Mathematics and Economics. He played football and lacrosse for the Continentals for all four years. On those teams, he won the department’s Jean-Marius Gelas Memorial Award as a senior. Hind was a four-year letter winner and two-time captain as a defenseman on the lacrosse team. While on campus, he also taught math and religion at St. Mary’s School in Clinton.
After graduating, Hind served as a part-time assistant coach for football and men’s lacrosse at Hamilton in 1980-81. He then started his full-time coaching career as a lacrosse coach, as the men’s team at the College of Wooster for five years. Hind then accepted a job at Butler University and became the first head coach of the men’s lacrosse team in 1991. His Butler teams had just one losing season in seven years, and he was named the National Coach of the Year by the U.S. Intercollegiate Lacrosse Association in 1998 after leading the Bulldogs to the NCAA tournament. The following year, he switched to athletic administration and was the associate athletics director for operations at Butler with a focus on management responsibilities in marketing and promotions. In 2005, he was promoted to a position overseeing the department’s event management, facilities and budget. From May through August 2006, Hind served as Butler’s interim athletic director.
During his tenure on College Hill, Hind led the College’s efforts to integrate fully into NESCAC play, effective by the 2011-12 academic year. He subsequently supported the work of a trustee committee whose goal was an intercollegiate athletics program that provided students with facilities, infrastructure and teams that are competitive within NESCAC.
While acting as Hamilton’s Director of Athletics, Hind upgraded nearly all of the College’s athletic facilities. Under his leadership, new facilities for baseball and softball (Loop Road Athletic Complex), field hockey (Goodfriend Field) and men’s and women’s tennis (Tietje Family Tennis Center) were built. He has oversaw the construction of the Bob Simon Golf Center, the addition of new locker rooms in the Delaney Team Center and the construction of Henry W. Harding Field House, a large indoor practice facility with artificial grass and a state-of-the-art batting cage.
Furthermore, since Hind arrived at Hamilton, Steuben Field and Withiam Field replaced their surfaces with artificial grass, and in 2019 Love Field received a new natural grass surface and drainage. Margaret Bundy Scott Field House has refurbished seating for the basketball and volleyball teams and the indoor track was resurfaced. The Alumni Gym underwent extensive renovation during the summer of 2019. The Bristol Pool went through a $12.8 million renovation from March 2022 to February 2023, and the Russell Sage Rink is currently undergoing updates thanks to a $13 million investment by the College.
Deidre Pierson, an Associate Director who has worked with Jon for the past five years, will step in as Interim Athletic Director while the college prepares to launch a national search, assisted by a search firm which will do an initial review and be assessed by the department in order to fill the position permanently.
