Longtime NCAA hockey, Yale administrator Dean calls it a career

Wayne Dean (left) poses with longtime Yale hockey SID Steve Conn (photo: Yale Athletics).

Wayne Dean, a former NCAA hockey committee chair who ran numerous regional tournaments, has retired.

Dean had been at Yale since 1986 and most recently served as the school’s deputy director of athletics. He was also the sport administrator for men’s and women’s hockey and oversaw Ingalls Rink.

Also the chair of the NCAA men’s and women’s hockey rules committee from 2018 to 2020, Dean was a member of the men’s hockey championship committee from 2001 to 2005, chairing the group during the 2004–05 season. He also served as the co-director of the regionals at the Webster Bank Arena in 2009, 2011, 2012, 2014 and 2018.

During the 2014 Frozen Four held at the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia, he served on the tournament organizing committee. In addition, he served as the tournament co-director for the 2004 women’s Frozen Four.

Dean served on the Board of Directors for College Hockey Inc. and the ECAC and is an ECAC past president.

A 1977 graduate of Lyndon State College, where he is a member of its athletics hall of fame, Dean has an MS and CAS from Springfield. He and his wife Betsy live in Westbrook, Conn. They have three children, Amy (Springfield), Matt (Quinnipiac) and Jake (Cornell).