Whit Babcock on Thursday announced his retirement as Virginia Tech athletic director after 12 years leading the Hokies and will transition to a role advising the university president and new AD.

On July 1, Babcock will become athletic director emeritus, where he will support strategic planning initiatives and provide guidance on the shifting college landscape.

The announcement is the latest massive shake-up within the university. President Tim Sands announced earlier this month that he was stepping down after 12 years on the job. Meanwhile, longtime administrator John Ballein, who had been with the athletic department since 1987 and served as Babcock’s right-hand man, announced he would also retire in June.

“Serving as Virginia Tech’s director of athletics has been one of the greatest honors of my life,” Babcock said in a statement. “For me and my family, this wasn’t just a career stop, it was my dream job and a homecoming of sorts. To return to Virginia, to serve this university, and to be part of a community that lives and breathes Hokie sports, has meant more than words can express.”

The changes come after Virginia Tech hired James Franklin as football coach in December to help restore a proud football tradition. Alongside the hire, the Hokies announced a long-awaited massive investment in athletics: $229 million over four years, driven largely to help boost football. Virginia Tech has struggled for relevancy in the sport over the past 15 years, with one 10-win season since 2012 and zero ACC championships.

During an interview earlier this month with ACC Network, Franklin stressed the importance of alignment from the board of visitors, president and athletic director and added that his program was playing catch-up because it had fallen so far behind.

“There has to be alignment in everything,” Franklin said. “It’s got to feel aligned throughout the entire building. So, we’ve got a lot of work to do. … We’re investing now how we should have been really investing for the last 12 years, but we’re still trying to catch people that never took their foot off the gas.”

In a statement issued Thursday as part of the news, Franklin said, “The upcoming leadership decisions regarding both the next university president and athletics director will be critical to sustaining the momentum and progress of the football program.”

During his time at Virginia Tech, Babcock oversaw the transition from Hall of Fame football coach Frank Beamer to Justin Fuente, whose 10-win season in 2016 led the Hokies to the ACC championship game. But Babcock and Fuente clashed, and the program dipped. Fuente was fired in 2021, and Babcock hired Brent Pry, who had never previously been a head coach but had ties to the Virginia Tech program.

Pry was fired three games into last season after the Hokies started 0-3. Shortly thereafter, the Virginia Tech board of visitors agreed to the massive investment in athletics.

Outside football, Virginia Tech has won 30 ACC titles in the 12 years Babcock has been the AD.

Babcock is currently the second-longest-tenured athletic director in the ACC. Eight of the conference’s 18 teams have announced athletic director changes over the past 18 months — including the longest-tenured AD, Bubba Cunningham at North Carolina, who is stepping down this summer.

Virginia’s Carla Williams now becomes the longest-serving ACC athletic director, going into her 10th year on the job.