Sport Marketing

Windy Dees, PhD, is a professor of sport administration in the School of Education and Human Development at the University of Miami. She has served as associate chair of the department of kinesiology and sport sciences. Her research expertise is in corporate sponsorship effectiveness and event marketing strategies and in how sport organizations can use these forms of marketing communication to enhance live events and generate revenue. Dees’ research has examined a multitude of variables, including brand awareness, brand and event personality, image transfer, sponsorship effectiveness, purchase behaviors, and a multitude of event marketing and management factors. Her research has been published in Sport Marketing Quarterly, International Journal of Sport Management, International Journal of Sports Marketing and Sponsorship, Journal of Sponsorship, and Sport Management Education Journal.

Dees serves as the graduate program director for sport administration at the University of Miami. She has served as president of the Sport Marketing Association, executive editor of the Global Sport Business Journal, editorial board member for Sport Marketing Quarterly, and guest reviewer for many other sport management academic journals. Prior to entering academia, she was an account executive for Synergy Sports Marketing in Orlando, Florida, selling and servicing corporate partnerships in professional golf.

Dees earned her bachelor’s degree in psychology and communications from Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida, where she was an All-American tennis player. She earned her master’s degree in exercise and sport sciences from the University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida, and her doctorate in sport management from Texas A&M University in College Station, Texas. She is frequently invited to be a sport business expert in publications such as Forbes, Bleacher Report, Variety, and Dallas Morning News and has been a guest on ESPN Radio.

Patrick Walsh, PhD, is a professor of sport management in the David B. Falk College of Sport and Human Dynamics at Syracuse University. He previously held faculty positions at Indiana University and the University of Miami. His research focuses on the brand management practices of sport organizations and how they can best harness the power of their brand to further their business objectives. He has examined topics such as the effectiveness of brand extensions in sports, the rebranding of sport organizations, and the use of new media forums—specifically sport video games and social media outlets—as marketing and branding tools. His research has been published in journals such as Sport Marketing Quarterly, Journal of Sport Management, Sport Management Review, International Journal of Sports Marketing and Sponsorship, and Journal of Consumer Marketing. Walsh has also served on the editorial boards of Sport Marketing Quarterly, International Journal of Sport Management, and Journal of Global Sport Management, and he was an executive board member of the Sport Marketing Association. In 2016, he was named a research fellow of the Sport Marketing Association, which honors individual accomplishments and excellence in sport marketing research.

Prior to entering academia, Walsh worked in marketing with the National Football League’s Buffalo Bills and was an associate with Velocity Sports and Entertainment (now MKTG), where he developed and executed strategic marketing plans for a number of today’s top sponsors of professional and collegiate sport properties. Walsh earned a bachelor’s degree in marketing and entrepreneurship and emerging enterprises from Syracuse University, a master’s degree in sport administration from Canisius College, and a doctorate in kinesiology with an emphasis in sport management from the University of Minnesota.

Chad McEvoy, EdD, is dean of the College of Applied Science and Technology at Illinois State University, having previously served as vice provost for faculty affairs and chief of staff to the executive vice president and provost at Northern Illinois University from 2020 to 2023. McEvoy served as chair of the department of kinesiology and physical education at Northern Illinois University from 2015 to 2019, after holding the rank of professor at Illinois State University and Syracuse University.

McEvoy’s academic expertise is in sport management, where he was president of the Sport Marketing Association (SMA), and he has also held roles as founding editor of Case Studies in Sport Management and coeditor of the Journal of Issues in Intercollegiate Athletics. McEvoy is coauthor of seven sport management textbooks, and his scholarship on the business of professional sport and intercollegiate athletics has been cited in major media outlets, including The New York Times, USA Today, and The Wall Street Journal. McEvoy was the 2014 recipient of the prestigious Sutton Award, awarded by SMA each year to an educator best exemplifying the association’s mission to expand the body of knowledge in sport marketing through close connection to the sport industry.

Steve McKelvey, JD, joined the Mark H. McCormack Department of Sport Management at University of Massachusetts–Amherst in 2002, after spending 15 years in the sport industry in New York City.

His sport marketing, sponsorship, and sales experience includes six years in the corporate sponsorship division of Major League Baseball, where he served a pivotal role in the creation of the league’s corporate sponsorship program and was instrumental in the generation of over $50 million in corporate sponsorship revenues. He subsequently spent six years building a profitable in-house sport marketing agency within one of the country’s leading sport magazine publishers, developing and implementing sales promotions for clients such as Wise Snacks, Beck’s Beer, Century 21 Real Estate, U.S. Postal Service, and Suzuki.

Prior to joining the University of Massachusetts faculty, he taught as an adjunct professor of sport law at the Seton Hall School of Law. He has authored articles on sport marketing, licensing, and the law for publications such as American Business Law Journal, Virginia Sports and Entertainment Law Journal, Seton Hall Journal of Sport Law, Entertainment and Sports Lawyer, Journal of Legal Aspects of Sport, Journal of Sport Management, Sport Management Review, Sports Business Journal, and Brandweek.

McKelvey holds a bachelor’s degree in American studies from Amherst College, a master’s degree from the University of Massachusetts sport management program, and a juris doctorate from Seton Hall School of Law. He was admitted to the New York State Bar in 1993.