Florida Atlantic hires a female director of football operations
Heather Henderson is becoming a maverick in college football.
After spending eight years as Florida Atlantic’s cheerleading coach, Henderson is making the unprecedented move to director of football operations for the Owls.
“There is going to be a lot on her plate,” Owls coach Carl Pelini told the Palm Beach Post. “I know she can handle it. She is very organized.”
The paper claims, Henderson is the first female director of football operations on the FBS level, but Pat Logsdon held the same position at Nebraska before eventually becoming an associate athletics director. Sarah Gigantino also holds the position at Georgia State, but the school is currently transitioning from the FCS to the FBS..
Henderson will fill the role that was vacated after Sean Todd was fired in December. Henderson has been helping with recruiting since November, but now she’ll be in charge of on-campus recruiting and football operations duties like road travel and summer camps.
Because Henderson will continue to coach cheerleading, Pelini has salary space to add a director of player personnel. The person who fills that role also will coordinate recruiting.
Henderson has been the Owls cheerleading coach since 2004 is also president and co-founder of CheerFormance X-Treme, a school that offers training to nearly 200 cheerleaders each year.
Pelini said he chose Henderson because of the job she’s done helping the program since November and her business acumen.
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