Shooting Star

When Marco Islander Ryan Witthoff was a freshman in Adam Peterson’s graphic design class at Lely High School just eight years ago, he never in his wildest dreams could have imagined he’d come so far so fast in the college basketball world. Witthoff, 23, just accepted the position of Director of Creative Content at the College of Charleston. 

“It's just been a surreal experience,” Witthoff said from his home in Charleston. "I can't be more excited because it's with such a great group of guys and a great team, great staff and such a sweet place like Charleston. I've been loving it. I've been here for about a month. I love this place."

It seems like Witthoff’s career trajectory has been nothing but vertical since he received a message from Florida State during his senior year of high school in 2019. He already knew he was heading to Florida State to study either graphic design or sports management.

He got a message on Twitter from Drew Longenecker, FSU’s Director of Marketing, who ran the social media for the Florida State basketball team. 

“It was strictly from posting on Twitter and Instagram in my free time,” Witthoff said. "I was literally sitting in Peterson's class when I got the message in school. I was like, ‘Is this really happening?’"

Witthoff stayed in contact with Longenecker and the FSU marketing department throughout the summer. When he started school in the fall, he was in the thick of things at one of the nation’s premier athletic programs. His first project was working with the FSU baseball team, who were experiencing arguably their finest season ever.

“I was doing the graphic design,” Witthoff said, "branding and social media package for Florida State baseball's College World Series run back in 2019.” 

Then FSU hired their new football coach, Mike Norvell. 

“My first year I'll always remember doing the whole branding package for Mike Norvell’s announcement back in the end of 2019.”

Talk about heady stuff for a young college freshman. But wait, it gets better.

"I made some stuff,” he said. "It all went on social media. I made like all the different sizes that they asked for. I wasn't really asking many questions. I just knew they needed this certain graphic with this certain size.”

Then Witthoff got a big surprise. Actually, it was a HUGE surprise.

"I was driving around town and saw that graphic on a billboard,” he said, "and I was like, 'Oh my gosh!’”

Witthoff spent most of his time at FSU working with the basketball team, coached by the legendary Leonard Hamilton. Hamilton, who has also coached Oklahoma and Miami, has led his teams to 12 NCAA tournament appearances, an Elite 8, and four Sweet 16s. Witthoff has immense respect for Hamilton and his program at Florida State.

"I was able to make some good connections inside Florida State and outside Florida State with how deep Coach Leonard Hamilton’s coaching tree is,” he said. "He always vouched for me. That whole staff was really great to me. I'll always have great things to say about them.”

When Witthoff was approaching graduation, he dreamt of becoming a full-time employee at his alma mater. But it wasn’t to be.

“Florida State just didn't have it in the budget to create a full-time position,” he said. 

Fortunately, one of his contacts, Alex Church, who ran a freelance design company, contacted Witthoff.

“He reached out to me and said I'd love to have you on our team,” Witthoff said. "I was able to make some really good connections in the basketball world through that."

A year later, Church told Witthoff about an opening on the University of Arkansas staff with head basketball coach Eric Musselman, whose impressive coaching resume includes head coaching jobs with the Golden State Warriors, Sacramento Kings, University of Nevada, and now USC.

Witthoff was more than excited about the opportunity to work with Musselman, especially given the coach’s love of social media.

“They had just brought in a big transfer class,” Witthoff said. “There was a lot of hype around the program. Coach Muss is huge on social media. He loves that stuff. He loves taking pictures. He loves getting creative with different ideas. I had a chance to work with one of the biggest social media coaches in the country. It was huge for me.”

Witthoff was Arkansas’s team photo and video person for social media as part of the social media team.

“I had a lot of good experience there,” he said.

Then Musselman took the head coaching job at USC. He talked to Witthoff about joining him.

“He talked to me about potentially going with him if there was a job available,” Witthoff said, "or if I wanted, he would make a job available.”

Witthoff said he was left in limbo with Musselman’s sudden departure.

“It kind of put me in a weird position,” he said, "because we're all at-will employees, so we didn't know what was going to happen. Like if they bring in a new coach, are we still going to have jobs? We were just kind of being left in the dark. We didn't know what was going on."

Witthoff packed up with Arkansas gear and headed to Arizona for the NCAA Championships to watch some basketball and do some networking. He was surprised at the reception he got.

"I probably had about 200-300 people in three or four days come up to me and say, ‘What are you doing?'"

Returning to Fayetteville, Witthoff was surprised when he looked at his phone after landing. While the plane was in the air, University of Kentucky head coach John Calipari was hired as the new Arkansas coach. Calipari is a Basketball Hall of Fame inductee, three-time Naismith College Coach of the Year, and winner of the 2012 NCAA National Championship at Kentucky. It was a hiring that shocked the college basketball world.

“I probably had about 50 texts from different people,” he said. “Cal was the last person I would have expected. I saw a bunch of names floating around, but I was pretty shocked. My first instant reaction was, 'I could work with one of the best coaches in college basketball history. A legend. I've got to figure out how to stay on this staff.'”

Witthoff had the opportunity to meet with Calipari.

"I had a conversation with him,” Witthoff said, “he's a great dude. We had a great conversation."

But a job with Calipari was not forthcoming.

“We got a call from the administration of Arkansas,” Witthoff said. "They said, ‘Hey, Cal wants everyone to clear out their offices. It sounds like he's going to bring in his whole staff.’

“I was kind of blindsided in a way,” Witthoff said. “It was shocking for me. It was an eye-opener."

The good news was that Witthoff would continue to get paid until July 1.

“I was like, ‘I’ll land on my feet,’” Witthoff said. In the meantime, he enjoyed what amounted to a nice paid vacation. Then, while out golfing with his buddies, Witthoff received a tweet.

“It was from Chris Mack,” Witthoff said, "who is the head coach of the College of Charleston. He had just recently got hired. He was at Louisville for a few years and was away from coaching for a year or two and he had gotten hired by the College of Charleston. At the end of the tweet he said, ‘DM me if you’re interested.’"

The next thing he knew, Witthoff was being interviewed for the Director of Creative Content position on Mack’s staff at College of Charleston.

Mack was the all-time winningest coach in Xavier history and led the school to its first number one seed in the NCAA Tournament (2018), an Elite 8, and three Sweet 16s. He coached Louisville to a 38-23 record from 2018-2022.

"I was like, what in the world?” Witthoff said. "I couldn't believe it.”

Now Witthoff is immersed in the Charleston program, meeting with Mack on a daily basis.

"I'm in the basketball offices,” he said, "I'm in staff meetings. I'm in recruiting meetings. I'm at every practice. I've got a lot of free rein.

One of his recent projects was designing the team’s uniforms.

"I just finished up working with Under Armour about designing our jerseys for this upcoming year,” Witthoff said. “He gives me free rein. I haven't been working with him long, but I can just tell he trusts what I can do, and he's given me the keys to make it happen.”

At 23, Witthoff may be the youngest person in the country to hold a Director of Creative Content position.

"I'm not trying to get ahead of myself or sound selfish or anything,” Witthoff said, "but I think I'm one of the youngest in the country to have a title like this. I always dreamed of being a creative director at some level. Even when I was at Florida State, I knew I wanted to do that. Now it's pretty cool to have it happen."