Report: New England Patriots Announce Death Of Former CEO

Sam Jankovich who served as Chief Executive Officer of the New England Patriots, passed away Wednesday at 85. The team confirmed the tragic information.

Jankovich was CEO of the patriots on Dec. 20, 1990, following a seven-year tenure at the University of Miami. He left the Patriots in 1992.

During his time with the Miami Hurricanes, Jancovich was really successful.

“Our hearts are broken with the passing of legendary former UM AD Sam Jankovich,” current Hurricanes athletic director Blake James wrote in a statement on Twitter. “No one personified what being a Cane meant more than Sam. The Hurricane Family sends its love to Sam’s family and friends.”

Jankovich, a Butte, Montana native who lived in Hayden Lake, Idaho according to UM Sports Hall of Fame executive director John Routh, became in charge of Miami’s athletic program in 1983 in the midst of the dominant decade.

“A great man, hero, dad,” Jankovich’s daughter, Sue Ellen Jankovich, posted on Facebook at about 10 a.m. Wednesday. “… God welcomed him home. He was a gift of love to all of us. I was blessed to call my dad my best friend…”

“I got to know him very well,” Dennis Erickson, who played at Montana State in the mid-60’s when Jankovich was a defensive assistant, told the Miami Herald. “The reality is he was the one who helped make my career because he hired me at UM. When Jimmy left, Sam gave me the opportunity to get in one of the best programs in the country. If it wasn’t for him, who knows where my career would have been?”

Jankovich also revived UM’s men’s basketball program in 1985.

He was inducted into UM’s Sports Hall of Fame in 2001.

“I was just informed of the passing of Sam Jankovich, who was athletic director here, really, when it all started, in ’83 through the run of the first three national championships,” football coach Manny Diaz said Wednesday. “Just on behalf of the entire University of Miami family, I want to express our condolences to his family and just our thoughts to all of his friends — and certainly what he meant to helping build, leading what this is today and his impact on that.”

“He and I talked many, many times that both of us should have stayed at UM forever, but we didn’t,” said Erickson, 72. “About a month ago, I was at his house and we talked about a lot of memories from our UM days.”