ASU’s Kenny Dillingham, Willie Bloomquist react to Ray Anderson’s departure

TEMPE — The news of Ray Anderson’s resignation as Arizona State vice president for university athletics dropped on Monday before Sun Devils head football coach Kenny Dillingham held his weekly press conference.

“I found out this morning in a staff meeting,” Dillingham said. “Thankful for him giving me the opportunity to be the head coach here at my alma mater, my dream job, so I’m very very thankful for him. He’s been supportive of me since I got here.”

Baseball coach Willie Bloomquist, who was present to talk about a special recruit signing, also gave his thoughts on Anderson leaving.

“I’m obviously very grateful for Ray,” Bloomquist said. “He gave me the opportunity to come back to this place which I love, obviously I love Arizona State, and the man gave me my job back here. So I’m forever grateful for him for that opportunity.

“For me, I see a side of Ray that you guys don’t get to see every day and that is the fact that Ray’s a good man and has treated me absolutely outstanding since I’ve been here and supported me and everything that I’m doing.”

Bloomquist, who was hired in June 2021, played his collegiate ball for the Sun Devils.

NIL money

The question of name, image and likeness (NIL) money came up in both press conferences on Monday.

In the notice regarding Anderson’s dismissal, ASU athletics wrote: “The next athletic director will help navigate ASU’s upcoming move into the Big 12 conference and other landscape-shifting issues including NIL, the transfer portal and recent Title IX challenges.”

Bloomquist admitted it’s part of the changing landscape of collegiate sports.

“It’s changing every day,” Bloomquist said. “If we’re gonna be successful in today’s landscape of college sports, we are going to need help and that’s every sport. We’re gonna need help and that’s not a that’s not a threat, that’s not a cry, that’s just the honest truth. We’re gonna fall further behind if we don’t start getting some help from people. … Now, if we can actually put rubber to pavement on that and get the ball moving on it, I think it can certainly help because we’re going to need it moving forward.”

“I think anytime there’s change, it rattles enough cages to get some people involved,” Dillingham said. “(With) NIL, we’ve got about a month, but we got to step it up and we got to get rolling at a rapid, rapid, rapid, rapid, rapid rate in this next three weeks to one month.”