Fargo  (Valley News Live)  North Dakota State University has named Matt Larsen as the new Director of Athletics for the Bison.

President Dean Bresciani Larsen, made the announcement on Monday.  Larsen has been the senior associate athletic director, at Stony Brook University in New York.Larsen succeeds Gene Taylor, who left NDSU to become the deputy director for the intercollegiate athletics at the University of Iowa.

The past six years, Larsen was Senior Associate Director of Athletics at Stony Brook.  As a member of the senior management team he was a part of Stony Brook’s rapid ascent in intercollegiate athletics from the department’s transition to Div. I to becoming one of the top athletics programs in the Northeast Region.

Larsen is a 1996 graduate of Stony Brook, earning a B.S. in Biology. As an undergraduate at Stony Brook, Larsen was a standout student-athlete as a three-year starter at wide receiver for the football team, earning GTE/CoSIDA Academic All-District honors as a senior in 1995.

After graduation, he continued his education at Stony Brook, earning his Master of Arts & Liberal Studies in 1998 while serving as a graduate assistant coach for the football program and athletic facilities. He also has participated in the Sports Management Institute’s Executive Program.