Previously, Gardner served at Rice University’s athletics department as the deputy athletic director for external affairs.. While at Rice University, Gardner and his team were responsible for a growth of more than 85 percent in transactional revenue. Achievements include record highs in season ticket sales across all sports and sponsorship revenue. His team also oversaw the 2016 brand refresh of Rice Athletics, including a partnership with Adidas, leading to unprecedented licensing revenue. Gardner also played a pivotal role in the development of Rice Athletics’ strategic roadmap, “Vision for Victory,” in 2018. His leadership directly contributed to securing an invitation to the American Athletic Conference in 2021.
 
A distinguished scholar-athlete at Stanford University and member of the Stanford Athletics Hall
of Fame, Gardner received a bachelor of arts in public policy and a master of arts in sociology and was a three-time All-American in wrestling, a two-time Academic All-American, and the recipient of the Pac-10 medal. Gardner went on to receive his MBA from Harvard Business School.
 
Prior to his professional career at Rice Athletics, Gardner worked as a consultant at Boston Consulting Group, a corporate strategy summer analyst at Nike, an assistant wrestling coach at Harvard,  and as a senior staff project manager at Stanford Athletics.  
 
He and his wife, Emily, enjoy running, golfing, and traveling in addition to parenting their children, John Henry, Lucy Grace, and Boone David.