The University of Texas at Austin Athletics
Chris Plonsky to retire from current role at Texas at end of 2026-27 academic year
09.01.2026 | Texas Athletics
Longtime Longhorn staffer who is in her 39th year at UT will continue in future role working with athletics after that.
AUSTIN, Texas - Longtime Texas Athletics staff member Chris Plonsky will be retiring from her current role as Chief of Staff/Executive Senior Associate Athletics Director and Senior Woman Administrator at the end of the 2026-27 academic year, UT Vice President and Lois and Richard Folger Athletics Director Chris Del Conte announced on Tuesday. Though Plonsky is retiring from her current role — where she supervises staff leaders in student services: academics/learning, compliance/risk management and sports medicine/health and wellness/strength performance — she will be continuing on in another role working with Texas Athletics that will be announced at a later date.
This year marks Plonsky's 39th at The University of Texas, dating back to her first role with the Longhorns as Women's Sports Information Director in 1982. She served in that role from 1982-86, and after seven years with the BIG EAST Conference, returned to Texas in 1993 as Associate Athletics Director for External Services. Plonsky's responsibilities and reach in Texas Athletics have steadily grown and expanded from there, as she served as Senior Associate AD for Men's and Women's Athletics from 2001-02 before moving into the role of Director of Women's Athletics while still maintaining critical responsibilities in Men's Athletics for 15 years from 2002-17. She moved into her current role in 2018.
"CP is an absolute rock star. She's a legend who has poured her heart and soul into The University of Texas and our athletics department for four decades," Del Conte said. "She's a trailblazer who advocated for the advancement of women's sports while also having a huge impact on our men's sports programs and helping our athletics department grow into one of the most powerful brands in the world. She has worn many hats, served in virtually every role possible and worked with so many legendary figures on our great campus, but at the end of the day, she has always remained steadfast in putting our student-athletes first and foremost in everything she does. Her passion, pride and dedication to the Longhorn family, our student-athletes and coaches, and The University of Texas are unmatched."
"The success we've had across the board in all sports — from conference championships and national championships to Olympic and World champions — is in part a tribute to all she has done to support our student-athletes, coaches and programs. She's a tireless worker and an incredible servant leader, and though she's retiring from her current role with us at the end of this academic year, we're thrilled she'll be moving into a position that will allow her to continue to have a significant role working with our athletics department going forward. We'll take this year to celebrate all she's done in her current role and the many roles that came before it, but we're so fortunate she'll continue to be a part of Texas Athletics — a place she has meant so much to and been such a huge part of for a long, long time."
Plonsky is a USA Basketball board member and a board member of the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame. She is a former USOPC Collegiate Advisory Council member and an emeritus board member of the National Football Foundation/College Football Hall of Fame. She is a former president of NACDA, NACMA and Women Leaders in Sports (formerly NACWAA) and a former board member of the U.S. Sports Academy.
A past member of the NACDA board and executive committee and the LEAD1 board (formerly Division 1 Athletics Directors Association), Plonsky has also served on NCAA committees on Academic Performance, Women's Basketball Competition and NCAA commercialization activities, and she chaired the NCAA Division I Management Council in 2003.
A member of the Texas Athletics Hall of Honor, the NACMA Hall of Fame, the CoSIDA (now College Sports Communicators) Hall of Fame, and the Greater Austin Sports Foundation Hall of Honor, she was inducted into the Texas Sports Hall of Fame in 2025. Recently, she was named to Sports Business Journal's 2026 Class of Champions: Pioneers & Innovators in Sports Business. She was the 2023 Women's Basketball Coaches Association Administrator of the Year as well as the Naismith Outstanding Contributor to Women's Basketball that year, and Plonsky was the Honorary Referee at the 2024 Clyde Littlefield Texas Relays.
