Bryan J. Harvey returned to Bethune-Cookman University for his third stint with the Wildcats Athletic Department in January 2023, after serving seven months at Alcorn State University in Lorman, Mississippi.
"I don't think I have ever met a community of people that welcomed me the way the Braves Family did at Alcorn," said Harvey. "I absolutely fell in love with everything about Alcorn - the student-athletes, coaches, administrators and fans and alumni. But when I was presented with the chance to return to Bethune-Cookman, a school that I love just as much as my alma mater, I could not pass up the opportunity."
After stepping away from the world of intercollegiate athletics for just over three years, Harvey returned to the field of athletics in June 2022, working at Alcorn State as Senior Associate Athletic Director for Strategic Communications under Raynoid Dedeaux with the Braves program.
After spending seven years (2012-19) back at Bethune-Cookman University as Assistant Athletic Director for Communications in Daytona Beach, Florida, Harvey stepped away in March 2019. He was seeking a career outside of collegiate athletics, and dreamed of venturing into the world of professional soccer/football. During the 2021-22 football season in England, Harvey served as a freelancer for Doncaster Rovers of the English Football League in Sky Bet League One. He assisted with opponent information leading up to game day for both online and print editions of the Rovers Game Day Publication.
Harvey arrived back at Bethune-Cookman from the University of Miami in September 2012, where he spent just under four years as an assistant communications director in the Office of Athletics. In his time back with the Wildcats, he helped build one of the best mid-major communications offices/departments on the Division I level of intercollegiate athletics. He was able to secure assistant positions that excelled in broadcast, graphic design and videography – with all of his former assistants going on to work either as a head of their office at another school, going on to the professional ranks or working in owning their own business/company.
With the help of his staff, Harvey was able to help establish CatEye Network as a premier YouTube destination for fans of Bethune-Cookman through the guidance of Lynn W. Thompson (former Vice President for Intercollegiate Athletics) and Darian McCaskill (Director of the CatEye Network), as well as helping to increase exposure with visual graphics through assistants like Jasmine Alston, Andrea Wheeler and Michael Stambaugh throughout the years. Promotional videos and “hype” videos became normal with assistants like Christopher Bell, as well as the expertise of McCaskill and Thompson in those areas as well. Not to mention, writing went to another level with Dan Ryan (Senior Historian) able to concentrate on telling the story of BCU Athletics through print. His last addition to the staff was Nolan Alexander, who took the sound of CatEye Network and the on-camera appeal to greater heights. Additionally, graduate assistants such as Cesley Tafoya, Aaron Wilson and Bianca Cacho helped establish BCU Athletics on all social media as “the fourth-most interactive social media presence” among all colleges/universities in the state of Florida.
On the playing field, Harvey was able to cover Bethune-Cookman Football as the Wildcats amassed at least a share of four consecutive Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference (MEAC) Championships from 2012-15, in addition to the program winning a school-record eight consecutive wins over in-state rival Florida A&M as part of the Florida Blue Florida Classic. In baseball, Harvey worked closely with the nationally-renowned Bethune-Cookman Wildcats, as former head coach Jason Beverlin guided the Cats to the Gainesville [Fla.] Regional final against the eventual 2017 Men’s College World Series Champion Florida Gators.
While at the University of Miami, Harvey worked with a variety of sports, including serving as the primary contact for the nationally-renowned Hurricanes baseball team under the direction of legendary head coach Jim Morris. He also served as the primary contact all four years for the nationally-ranked Hurricanes volleyball team, in addition to the swimming & diving program that produced two Olympians – divers Brittany Viola (United States) and Reuben Ross (Canada), in addition to covering gold medalist Manon van Rooijen (4x100 freestyle relay – Netherlands) during the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, China. He also helped promote the school’s first-ever Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) Volleyball Player of the Year – Lane Carico, as she also claimed the school’s first American Volleyball Coaches Association (AVCA) All-America honors in 2010 and 2011, respectively.
“I learned so much under Mark Pray and Chris Freet, each with a different style and approach to athletic communications, as a whole,” expressed Harvey. “Under Pray, I learned a lot of the dealings with media and conflict resolution. Meanwhile, under Freet, I learned all I currently know about social media and how to enhance fan engagement, while still serving the basic communications needs for the media. It really was a good mix under two phenomenal bosses.”
In his time with the Hurricanes, Harvey went to the 2011 NCAA Gainesville [Fla.] Regional for baseball, as well as three consecutive NCAA Volleyball Tournaments under the direction of former Canes head coach (current UC Santa Barbara head coach) Nicole Lantagne Welch. He also helped cover the national championship diving exploits of two-time NCAA champion Brittany Viola (2008, 2011). In 2009 and 2010, he worked the NCAA Coral Gables [Fla.] Regional for women’s tennis under head coach Paige Yaroshuk-Tews, and served as the primary contact for the Hurricanes as they made trips to consecutive NCAA Quarterfinals appearances. As individual tennis players, Harvey helped promote 2009 NCAA singles runner-up Laura Vallverdu, also a four-time All-American at UMiami. He also promoted 2009 NCAA Semifinalist Julia Cohen.
In addition, Harvey spent time as the secondary contact for the Hurricanes football team with former head coach Randy Shannon, and served as the third contact assisting with player interviews, statistics and day-to-day coverage former head coach Al Golden. He was also the secondary contact for the men’s basketball team under former coach – and most recently head coach at Tulsa – Frank Haith, working under primary basketball contact Margaret Belch from 2008-10.
In 2009, Harvey was selected as the NCAA Division I East Region Sports Information Director of the Year for women’s volleyball.
Prior to arriving at “The U”, Harvey spent three years as the Sports Information Director at Bethune-Cookman University in Daytona Beach, Florida. At BCU, he served as the contact for all 17 varsity sports for the Wildcats. In addition to the duties as SID, Harvey was responsible for maintaining the day-to-day operations of the Sports Information Office, as well serving as Licensing and Vending Coordinator for the Wildcats Department of Athletics.
Just before coming to BCU, Harvey spent three years as the Assistant Sports Information Director at Hampton University in Hampton, Virginia, where he worked under Jamar Ross (most recently Associate Athletic Director at Cleveland State University). While at HU, he served as the primary contact for women's athletics, as well as men's tennis and coed sailing.
Bryan Harvey is a 2001 graduate of North Carolina Central University in Durham, North Carolina, earning a Bachelor of Arts Degree in English with a concentration in Media Communications. He worked four years as a student-assistant within the Office of Sports Information under Kyle Serba (Executive Senior Associate AD at NCCU) – to whom Harvey contributes almost all of his professional success, contributing greatly with the creation and publication of the CoSIDA (College Sports Information Directors of America) award-winning 2001 NCCU Football Media Guide.
"Kyle Serba is my everything in this industry," remarked Harvey. "Two people will always be my 'fathers' in this industry - Kyle Serba and Lynn Thompson. Without Serba, I never would have thought about college athletics at all as a potential career."
Apart from Sports Information at NCCU, Harvey also worked with the campus radio station hosting a weekly radio call-in sports show Three Big Mouths on Sports. The sports show rave was an instant hit, and eventually was moved into a primetime spot with a separate telephone operator to handle incoming calls. He also served as the play-by-play announcer for all NCCU men's and women's home basketball games.
Aside from that, Harvey served as a sports columnist on the award-winning campus newspaper The Campus Echo.
In other duties around the world of athletics, Harvey has enjoyed volunteering his time with sports teams on minor league circuits of professional football. He served as the official statistician at all home games for The Daytona Thunder of the World Indoor Football League (WIFL) from 2006-08. He served in the same capacity with the now-defunct Norfolk Nighthawks of the Arena Football League 2 (AFL2) in the summer of 2002.
A native of Winston-Salem, North Carolina, Harvey also has large numbers of family residing in Reidsville and Thomasville. Harvey is also a member of Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity, Inc.
