Seventeen years ago Under Armour CEO Kevin Plank slept in the visiting locker room inside Notre Dame Stadium.

That weekend Plank’s first collegiate client, Georgia Tech, faced Notre Dame in the stadium’s rededication game. Under Armour was a bit player back then, to the point its CEO couldn’t find a hotel room around South Bend.

Now Plank’s billion-dollar company will outfit Notre Dame for the next decade.

On Tuesday, Notre Dame confirmed reports of the past few weeks that the University had decided to dump adidas after a 17-year relationship. The Under Armour contract will take effect on July 1 and run until 2024.

Athletics director Jack Swarbrick called the deal the biggest of its kind in the history of college athletics, including the financial impact of it for Notre Dame. Swarbrick did not reveal the dollars of the deal but said Notre Dame could accept Under Armour stock as compensation.

Under Armour will supply gear for all of Notre Dame’s athletic teams.

“By any measure, it's the largest deal of its kind in the history of collegiate athletics,” Swarbrick said. “An opportunity to reflect our belief that we can help build Under Armour, continue the rocket ride it's on, and Under Armour's belief that they can have a major impact on the University of Notre Dame.”

Swarbrick said the substantive genesis of the deal began in late November or early December during a rights negotiation window built into the adidas contract. Swarbrick met with Plank after the football regular season as Under Armour began its presentations to the University, including one in late December.

The parties also met at the American Football Coaches Association convention in Indianapolis last week, which Brian Kelly attended, as the deal moved toward completion.

 

Swarbrick cited Under Armour’s strong identity, its separation from other outfitters, its commitment to Notre Dame as a partner and the company’s competitive edge as bedrocks of the relationship. But the differences between Notre Dame and Under Armour fueled the switch too in some unconventional ways.

“We can be pretty slow to pull the trigger and a little cumbersome,” Swarbrick said of Notre Dame. “Partner with people who understand the challenges of how to be an entrepreneur and how to do that. And hopefully that makes you more entrepreneurial.”

Swarbrick said he wanted Notre Dame to be the premier brand of its next apparel partner and its largest client, similar to the University’s relationship with NBC relative to college football programming. Michigan’s preferred status with adidas had been seen as an irritant to Notre Dame in recent years.

“I wasn’t prepared to do this if we weren’t our partner’s biggest deal,” Swarbrick said. “Whoever we were going to do business with, we had to be the biggest deal they had.”

It’s unclear how much on-site representation Under Armour will have at Notre Dame moving forward, but that presence may be substantial considering the compressed nature of the transition. Football equipment manager Ryan Grooms submitted orders with adidas for the 2014 football season last October.

Now Notre Dame must restock its gear for every varsity sport, with its biggest program the top priority. Swarbrick called the transition schedule “less than ideal” and noted that Notre Dame would prefer 18 months lead time instead of the six afforded to it.

“It’s not going to be perfect this year, there’s no way,” Grooms said. “But Under Armour has done an incredible job on the communication side of things, getting us product that we’ve had.”

Swarbrick said the University would control the look of the football uniform moving forward, although the Shamrock Series gear will be open for collaboration.

Plank offered assurances on Tuesday that Notre Dame’s football uniform future wouldn’t deviate stylistically from its past, even if Under Armour plans to enhance its technology.

“The first thing that I think I've learned along the way is listening more than you talk, and so we have some listening to do,” Plank said. “We're not anticipating doing anything unusual, crazy. We need to honor and respect the history of the University.”

But clearly Swarbrick sees Under Armour as part of the athletic department’s future. He described Notre Dame’s student-athletes as real-time laboratories for Under Armour performance research and the brand’s youth marketing as an area the University can tap.

“What was a factor for me was their extraordinary penetration of the youth market generally,” Swarbrick said. “Because one of the things we really have to make sure we do at this place is to continue to develop the next fan base. Focus on the younger generations, not just the elite athlete that has to pick a college, but I want to be a brand that resonates with 12-year olds in church leagues.

“I don’t think we’ve done enough of that.”

Swarbrick got a reminder of that when met with questions from some University leadership about the move, not because it had a negative perception of Under Armour but because it barely had a perception at all. That began to change as the calendar flipped. Notre Dame’s apparel partner followed soon after.

“(The University leadership) sort of weren’t tracking on this and weren’t really aware and then their grandkids’ Christmas list was all Under Armor,” Swarbrick said. “They said, ‘I wasn’t really familiar with where (Under Armour) had gotten itself. Now I’m buying it.”