April 18, 2004

By Mike Sullivan
North County Times

SAN DIEGO - One day last summer, Michaelyn Bohn was thumbing through her father's scrapbooks and yearbooks. When she found an old newspaper article featuring her dad as a star athlete at Boulder High in Colorado, she couldn't help but start reading aloud.

The words startled Mike Bohn.

"There was an article from the newspaper in Boulder during my senior year where I actually talked about having a goal to become an athletic director," Mike Bohn said. "I never knew I said that publicly until I saw that article that she dug out.''

At the time, Bohn was the athletic director at the University of Idaho. He now is six months into his stint as San Diego State's athletic director.

Mission accomplished.

"I always knew I wanted to be around athletics in some way, but that was really neat being able to read that and see that,'' Bohn said recently. "That was an interesting exchange with her."

Family and athletics are two things immensely important to the 43-year-old Bohn, who was hired in October to change the image of San Diego State's tarnished athletic department. Bohn is highly passionate about the task of restoring pride to the Aztecs' sports teams.

He's equally as enthusiastic when it comes to his wife and two children.

"We're a pretty close group," Bohn said. "We don't do real well being apart for extended periods of time."

The family currently is dealing with a challenge. Bohn and wife Kim, married for 21 years, live in Rancho Bernardo. The couple's two children are living in Moscow, Idaho. Michaelyn, 20, is a sophomore at the University of Idaho. Brandon, who turns 18 next Sunday, is a junior at Moscow High and is living with a close family friend.

Both Mike and Kim describe the move to San Diego as the toughest situation the family has endured. It severely reduces the opportunity for the entire family to spend quality time together, including occasions for a young adult to discover interesting tidbits about her father's past.

"She was looking through the yearbook and said, 'Dad, you were really a good athlete. You were really popular,' " said Kim Bohn, laughing as she recites the scrapbook tale. "I guess they don't think of their parents as being that way. It was really cute."

Mike Bohn strives to bring a family atmosphere to San Diego State. He's the leader of a department that has been riddled with tension, plagued by turmoil and known for underachieving.

Bohn's predecessor, Rick Bay, arrived in San Diego with a solid reputation. Eight years later, Bay was forced to resign after a California State University Chancellor's Office audit detailed mismanagement of the department.

Bohn's style is vastly different from Bay's. He is energetic, approachable and extremely positive. Longtime friends and new acquaintances find much to like about Bohn's management style.

"Michael's an easy guy to like," said Colorado senior associate AD John Meadows, who was Bohn's AAU basketball coach when Bohn was a Boulder teenager. "He's disarming. He's very blunt, but he's easy to laugh at himself. I just think he's terrific."

So does San Diego State senior associate AD Steve Becvar, who was hired shortly after Bohn's arrival. Becvar worked with Bohn for eight years at the Air Force Academy.

"He's got the ultimate can-do attitude," Becvar said. "The way he is at San Diego State is the way he's always been ---- extremely confident and very positive. Some people may say the energy can't be natural, but that's kind of who he is."

Padres owner John Moores, who contributed $28.6 million to the athletic department during Bay's tenure, is among the new admirers.

"I like him," Moores said. "I was in on the interview process and I see him all the time. Good guy. I think he'll do well. He's a high-ceiling guy because he's young. He's handled himself well. It's been a little bit of a stress situation. But high stress coming in isn't all bad."

An early opportunity to gauge Bohn's leadership arose in February when allegations in a lawsuit filed by strength and conditioning coach Dave Ohton rocked the university. Ohton, embroiled in a rift with football coach Tom Craft, alleged that Craft slapped lineman Mike Kracalik and engaged in a pattern of drinking on road trips in 2002.

One day after the allegations surfaced, a rare Saturday press conference was called. The only administrator on hand to field questions was Bohn.

"I believe that's the role of a hands-on athletic director," said Bohn, explaining why he was the sole person speaking on behalf of the university. "I recognize as an AD, that's an expectation. There are big expectations and big responsibility that comes with the job."

Six days later, Bohn made a surprise appearance at a press conference billed to discuss spring football drills. He read a statement that publicly supported Craft, then immediately left to participate in a Mountain West Conference football-scheduling conference call.

Thirty minutes later, he unexpectedly returned to field questions.

"It will be a very short period of time before San Diego State will learn how lucky they are to have his leadership," Air Force football coach Fisher DeBerry said. "He's a very, very talented young man."

Leadership has long been a Bohn staple. He was captain of the football, basketball and baseball teams at Boulder High.

Meadows will never forget something he witnessed after a poorly played first half during an AAU basketball game when Bohn was 16.

"I walked in at halftime and Michael was chewing out his teammates," said Meadows, whose daughter Brooke (women's basketball) and son Rocker (men's volleyball) played sports at San Diego State. "In the second half, we rallied to win.

"He's one of my poster childs as one of the most competitive people I've ever coached."

Boulder High won a state basketball title in 1979 during Bohn's senior campaign. But football and baseball were the sports in which he was coveted, and Bohn was set to attend Colorado to play both sports.

Football coach Bill Mallory was fired, however, and new coach Chuck Fairbanks wasn't dangling a scholarship in Bohn's direction. One of Mallory's assistants joined the staff at Kansas, and Bohn followed to play football and baseball for the Jayhawks.

He was a part-time player in both sports. When his playing career ended, he began eyeing a career as an administrator.

In 1984, he was five months into an internship at the Air Force Academy when an assistant athletic director position opened. Air Force's AD at the time, John Clune, offered the 23-year-old Bohn the job on a one-year basis, paying him $17,000.

"He said, 'If you do a great job, we'll give you a new agreement, and if not, we gave you a chance,' " Bohn recalled. "I'll never forget him helping me and being such a great mentor."

That was the opening Bohn needed, and it jump-started his administrative career. He stayed in that post until 1992 and later served as an associate AD at Colorado State from 1995-98.

Bohn left Colorado State to become the athletic director at Idaho. He oversaw that university's move to Division I-A status. Idaho's football program won a bowl game in 1999.

He was credited with increasing the donor base and traveled all over the state to do so. He also was able to increase the athletic department's annual budget from $5.3 million to $8.5 million.

Bohn described his Idaho stint as "very rewarding." His family loved the college town atmosphere of Moscow and lived on an acre of land surrounded by wheat fields.

Yet Bohn didn't hesitate to throw his name into the mix when the San Diego State job opened last year. He was intrigued by the challenge, smitten by the names of great athletes produced by the school, and impressed by the school's facilities.

He felt he was the right guy for the job, and university president Stephen Weber agreed. Bohn was hired, agreed to a five-year contract, and was introduced as athletic director on Oct. 6.

"He is off to a great start," Weber said recently. "One of the reasons we chose Mike is because he has a great tradition of interacting and working with the community. As you probably know from people you've talked to, he's been all over this place.

"Even in this short amount of time, he's made some very good progress."

Bohn has been on the move since his hiring. He even knows the exact number of speaking engagements he has made.

"Fifty-six," Bohn said. "I think I'm on a pretty good pace. But I want to get to more people. I'm really hustling."

Said baseball coach Tony Gwynn: "He has a fire about him. I think he likes the challenge. I think he wants to prove to people that he can do the job."

Next Sunday marks an important day for the Bohns. Not only will it be Brandon's 18th birthday, but it marks the 27th anniversary of Mike and Kim's first date.

Mike was a sophomore at Boulder High and Kim a junior when they met. Mutual friend Steve Jouard ---- who played sports with Bohn ---- introduced the two and would be best man at the eventual wedding. The first date was spent viewing an on-campus production of the play "The King and I."

"My life was never the same," Kim Bohn recalled. "He was just so thoughtful and so loving and so kind. He's just a really compassionate person."

The attraction was shared.

"I think we recognized we had something pretty special from the beginning," Mike Bohn said.

During the couple's 21 years of marriage, Kim Bohn has come to understand the high-pressure life of an athletic director and has excelled at playing the supportive role. She marvels at her husband's exuberance and positive approach.

"He loves making a difference in people's lives, whether it's children he's coached in youth sports, the student athletes, corporate sponsors or friends," Kim said. "He has such a warm heart, and he always tries to reach out to do something for somebody else.

"He loves his work. He just really loves life in general, and he's always striving to do his very best."

Many believe he's exactly like the type of person San Diego State needs after the recent turmoil in the department. Yet all the compliments about the demeanor of the new boss prompts wonder over what a bad day is like for him.

"He doesn't have many bad days," Kim Bohn said. "A few times I have seen him down, and it scares me because he's never like that. But it never lasts really long."

How long Bohn will last at San Diego State is an interesting question. If he works wonders with an athletic program often viewed as underachieving, more prestigious universities are bound to seek his services.

Easier to dissect is that Bohn was meant to run a Division I-A athletic program --- even if he needed an old newspaper article to remind him that it already was an aspiration while he was hitting baseballs, throwing footballs and shooting basketballs at Boulder High.

"He never took shortcuts to get there," said Becvar, the Aztecs' senior associate athletic director. "There's no doubt his passion has prevailed everywhere he's been.

"Mike is a dreamer and he dreamed he could run an athletic department. He's done a great job everywhere he's been to put himself in a position to be the best AD that he could be."

The Mike Bohn File

AGE: 43

HOMETOWN: Boulder, Colo.

EXPERIENCE: Was athletic director at Idaho for 5 1/2 years until he accepted San Diego State's job in October. Also held high-ranking administrative positions at the Air Force Academy (assistant AD from 1984-92) and Colorado State (associate AD from 1995-98). Served as director of marketing for the College Football Association from 1992-95.

ATHLETIC CAREER: Played football and baseball at Kansas.

PERSONAL: Married for 21 years to wife Kim. Has two children: daughter Michaelyn, 20, and son Brandon, 17.

QUOTABLE: "He has a fire about him. I think he likes the challenge. I think he wants to prove to people that he can do the job." ---- Aztecs baseball coach Tony Gwynn