Sherika A. Montgomery is in her third year as Big South Conference Commissioner in 2025-26. She began her tenure on May 15, 2023 after being formally named the conference's fourth commissioner on April 10. A former women’s basketball student-athlete and Big South staff member from 2010-17, she succeeded Kyle Kallander, who retired at the conclusion of the 2022-23 season after 27 years leading the conference. In September 2025, Montgomery was appointed to the Women’s Basketball Invitation Tournament (WBIT) Selection Committee, where she will serve as Vice Chair in 2025-26 and Chair in 2026-27.
In just two years of leadership, the Big South Conference:
• Celebrated its 40th anniversary in 2023-24
• Elevated the student-athlete experience with ingenious approaches and enhancements to Conference Championships
• Coordinated the multi-year extension of the Big South’s long-standing partnership with ESPN
• Begun the conference’s updated strategic positioning process
• Had a student-athlete provide testimony before members of the U.S. House of Representatives as Radford volleyball player and Big South SAAC Chair Meredith Page presented during the “NIL Playbook: Proposal to Protect Student Athletes’ Dealmaking Rights” hearing of the House Innovation, Data and Commerce Subcommittee
• Had the women’s basketball championship televised on ESPN2 for the first time (2024)
• Had a men’s basketball program compete in the finals of a postseason event for the first time as High Point played for the championship of the 2024 College Basketball Invitational
• Sponsored the Atlantic Slam MTE, and sponsored both the Atlantic Slam and Western Slam in 2024-25
• In 2023-24, just the third time in Big South history that every full-time member won a conference championship – but with the most members from a number standpoint (9)
• Helped facilitate a new enhanced agreement for the Big South-OVC Football Association that will provide an opportunity to extend the original partnership through 2030 and beyond
• Conducted the first-ever Individual Tennis Championships in Conference history in October 2024
• Had 18 total victories over power conference members in 2024-25, including a win over the nation’s No. 1-ranked men’s soccer program
• Had a total of eight sports with multiple NCAA postseason participants
• Advanced in the NCAA Men’s Soccer Championship in 2024
• Had multiple National Softball Freshman of the Year finalists for the first time ever in 2025
• Enjoyed a record 81.22 percentage of student-athletes maintaining a 3.0 grade point average for the 2024-25 academic year
• Added associate members Bryant University (men’s tennis) and NJIT (men’s and women’s tennis)
Montgomery’s extensive experience spans more than a dozen years. She came to the Big South from the Missouri Valley Conference (MVC), where she was appointed Deputy Commissioner prior to the 2022-23 year. She joined the MVC staff in the summer of 2021 as Associate Commissioner and Senior Woman Administrator. During her time at the Valley, Montgomery was responsible for the organizational leadership of Conference operations, including administrative oversight of the Conference’s governance structure, facilitation of constituency communication, execution of future strategic initiatives and the primary sport administrator for basketball. She was the liaison to the Conference’s Chief Executive Officers and Directors of Athletics, with additional areas of leadership responsibilities within NCAA national matters, student-athlete experience enhancements, and Conference diversity, equity and inclusion efforts. In addition, she was a cohort member of the 2022-23 NCAA Pathway Program, a yearlong initiative designed to prepare senior-level athletics administrators for the next career step as directors of athletics or conference commissioners.
Prior to arriving at the Missouri Valley Conference, Montgomery served as Assistant Director of Enforcement (Investigations and Processing) at the NCAA. In her role at the national office, she was responsible for thoroughly and timely investigating and processing potential violations of NCAA legislation involving all three NCAA divisions and all sports. This included compiling and evaluating evidence of infractions, drafting necessary submissions, and presenting information and evidence to the NCAA Committee on Infractions. In addition to her enforcement responsibilities, Montgomery served as liaison to the inaugural NCAA Women’s Basketball Student-Athlete Engagement Group, which provided an amplifying voice for the sport of women’s basketball on key initiatives, legislation and various issues. Montgomery also served as chair of the NCAA People of Color Employee Engagement Group and was a member of the Women’s Employee Engagement Group’s Leadership Council.
Montgomery was at the Summit League from 2018-19, serving as Associate Commissioner for Governance and Compliance. She also served as Associate Athletic Director for Student Success at Big South member institution Winthrop University from 2017-18. Prior to her time at Winthrop, Montgomery spent seven years as a member of the Big South Conference staff. She started in 2010 as a compliance and administrative assistant before being promoted to Assistant Director of Compliance in 2011. Montgomery was elevated to Director of Compliance & Administration in 2013, and spent her final three years as Assistant Commissioner for Compliance and Senior Woman Administrator.
During her first stint with the Big South Conference, Montgomery served as a two-time chair (2016-2018) of the NCAA Committee on Women’s Athletics during her service from 2014-2018, and was also a member of the inaugural NCAA Board of Governors Ad Hoc Committee to Promote Cultural Diversity and Equity. She was named to the Top 25 Women in Higher Education and Beyond list by Diverse Education in 2016.
A former women’s basketball student-athlete at Big South member Gardner-Webb University, Montgomery earned her master’s degree in Sports Science and Pedagogy in May of 2011, and her Bachelor of Science degree in Sports Management from the institution in 2009.