Hands-on approach doesn’t shock those who know Jay

At Ohio State they tell a story about the time a 50-something Ben Jay charged out like a pulling guard to “protect” a Buckeye football player on campus.

Never mind that Jay, an OSU associate athletic director at the time, was smaller and lighter than both the athlete he sought to shield and the alleged stalker. He still took it upon himself to run interference until security got involved.

So it wasn’t with much surprise that they read reports of Jay, the University of Hawaii athletic director, wading in to try to help quell a disturbance in the Stan Sheriff Center seats Sunday. Sympathy, for the injuries suffered, to be sure. But not shock that he would intervene.

“Ben is hands-on,” said Pete Hagan, an assistant AD at OSU. “That’s the way he was here, too.”

Whether it is ambling up a ladder to change burnt out light bulbs in dim athletic department passageways or deputizing himself for security detail, the 56-year old Jay has not been reluctant to roll up his sleeves and get hands-on involved during his 10 months at UH.

Agree or disagree with some of his decisions in Manoa — underwriting the postseason basketball tournament appearance, the process of the nickname change or issues regarding a 13th football game — or question his tweet-punctuated style, but it is clear the man has put his all into his first job as a Division I athletic director.

Just how much he was still painfully reminded Wednesday while working at home recovering from lumbar fractures and a bloodied kidney suffered in the incident on the final day of the Bank of Hawaii Rainbow Wahine Classic. Arena manager Rich Sheriff, who was also involved in trying to break up the melee, suffered back pains and multiple lacerations, UH said.

Jay was released Tuesday from Straub Clinic and Hospital and might return to campus next week.

Jay said he does not second-guess the decision to become involved.

“We had to try to defuse this thing before it became fisticuffs,” he said. “We had innocent fans caught in the way, women, children and elderly people, that’s one reason we tried to get in between the parties.”

It has been a memorable tenure at UH, where budget battles, an 0-10 football team, and now a brawl have made his stay unlike any other debuting AD at the school. Something he acknowledges, reflecting from a hospital bed this week, waiting for the swelling to subside and pain to abate.

“It (the 10 months) has been a tremendous test, that’s for sure,” Jay said. “I think it has just shown how much work we’ve got to do. There are a lot of challenges that present themselves. And, we’ll solve them. It is just going to take time. More time than I had thought it would. But, I mean, we have a good program, we just have to make it better.”

In the meantime, Jay said he is cheered by the outpouring of sympathies from UH fans and appreciative of those who comforted his 10-year old son, Bryan, at courtside Sunday when Jay was in pain.

“The fans have been great,” Jay said. “Together, we’ll get this program going where we want it to be.”

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Reach Ferd Lewis at flewis@staradvertiser.com or 529-4820.