Griffith Hunter joined UAlbany Athletics as Assistant Athletic Director for Marketing in November of 2015 and was later elevated to Assistant Athletic Director of External Relations in the summer of 2021.
Currently, Hunter oversees the areas of Marketing & Fan Experience, Communications, Creative Content and Gameday Production. He also oversees the UAlbany Cheer and Dance programs and is the departments' direct contact for the Marching & Spirit Bands.
In 2020, Hunter served as project manager of the UAlbany Athletics brand refresh which included a full logo rebrand with primary, secondary, tertiary, spirit and athletics foundation logos as well as the development of the first comprehensive athletics brand guidelines document for the Great Danes. He also led the successful direction and implementation over the brand launch plan, in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, which garnered over 300,000 social media impressions on the July 22nd release date alone. During the 10-month process, Hunter served as the primary contact with VIP Branding, led the Athletics Brand Committee and presented the new brand to various campus constituents and committees.
In his role as Assistant Athletic Director for Marketing, Hunter oversaw all aspects of the marketing, advertising, event design, event production and brand management for all 18 division I programs. During those six years, the department saw unprecedented success. Hunter has presided over the largest season and single-game attendance numbers in UAlbany history at all five ticketed sports, including a NCAA Tournament First Round record crowd of 6,472 fans for men’s lacrosse in 2017.
During his time with the Great Danes, UAlbany has been awarded thirteen Group II "Best Of" national awards from the National Association of College Marketing Administrators (NACMA), including six gold, three silver and four bronze awards. UAlbany's six gold awards, highlighted by wins in the categories of Season Ticket Sales Campaign (2), Digital Promotion, Static Promotion Ad, Single Game Campaign and Revenue Producing Video rank the Great Danes T-3 overall since the 2016-17 season out of 225+ schools that qualify in Group II.
From July 2012 to February 2015 he took a brief hiatus from college athletics and played golf professionally, competing as a member of the E-Golf and SwingThought.com tours, while also playing in multiple PGA Tour qualifying events.
In his prior stop in collegiate athletics, Hunter served as the Marketing Coordinator at Georgia State University from 2010-12, being one of two full-time staff members and helping with the launch of the school's Division I football program. He spearheaded the creation of the branding campaign "Make Your Move" to focus on ticket revenues and improving the GSU brand image, helping GSU football have the 10th largest home attendance in FCS in 2010, generating $950,000 in revenue, plus developing marketing and advertising plans for women's basketball and baseball.
Hunter began is career as the Assistant Director of Marketing & Promotions at Radford University, developing and executing marketing plans for men's soccer, women's basketball and baseball and assisting with the creation/relaunch of a corporate partner program that generated almost $100,000 in new sponsorships. He also served as the interim director of marketing in 2009 during a transition period in the department.
Hunter graduated from Radford University with a bachelor of science in sport administration in 2008 and currently resides with his wife, Kelly, and his two boxers, Cira and Remi, at their home in Schodack Landing, NY.
