Tanner Gardner was named the director of athletics at Pepperdine University in March of 2024 and began his duties in June 2024.
 
Since being named to the position, Gardner has hired new coaches to lead the men’s basketball program (Ed Schilling), women’s basketball program (Katie Faulkner), and baseball program (Tyler LaTorre). In Gardner’s first fall, Waves student-athletes saw great success, with the women’s soccer team winning a West Coast Conference championship and hosting the first round of the NCAA tournament, women’s volleyball and men’s water polo finishing as conference runner-up, and two tennis student-athletes earning NCAA All-American status.  Gardner’s first fall also saw the department achieve a five-year high in tickets sales for women’s volleyball and women’s soccer and a 79% growth in men’s basketball ticket season sales.  Keeping with the changing landscape of NCAA Athletics, Gardner also announced the launch of the Waves Excellence Collective, an independent organization supporting Pepperdine student-athlete NIL opportunities and the first NIL collective with a Pepperdine-only focus.
 
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.