Robert Shelton speaks during a news conference at the Ziegler Fiesta Bowl Museum in Scottsdale. Pat Shannahan/The Arizona Republic

Robert Shelton, who is leaving his post as the University of Arizona president to become the executive director of the Fiesta Bowl, is now on another side of the Bowl Championship Series.

He has been a member of the presidential oversight committee for the BCS, which is the often-controversial system that has determined college football’s national champion since the 1998 season by matching the top two teams — as established through polls and computer rankings.

The Fiesta, along with the Rose, Sugar and Orange, is one of the four BCS bowls, with each of those organizations also staging the national championship game on a rotating four-year basis.

Whether it’s in his old or his new position, it probably wouldn’t behoove him to speak ill of the BCS, but he was asked about his thoughts on the BCS on Tuesday at his Fiesta Bowl introductory news conference. Shelton said:

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A little after 5 p.m. on Tuesday, new Arizona athletic director Greg Byrne offered his first “Bear Down” on his Twitter account.

Byrne was in Tucson on Tuesday to meet with the athletic department staff, one day after his hiring was announced and one day before he was to hold his introductory press conference at McKale Center.

After Monday’s spring practice, football coach Mike Stoops was asked what his reaction was to the hiring of the 38-year-old Byrne, who had been the athletic director at Mississippi State.

“I got a call from him today and it’s great,” Stoops said. “He’s a well-respected AD and has done some good things down there, so we’re excited to get him here. I think he’s good for us and we’re excited to have him.”

University president Robert Shelton said he spoke with “a number of head coaches as I starting into the process and mentioned to them all that I am open in case anybody wants to talk with me. Some of them took me up on that to get their sense of what they were looking for, to ask them for candidates that they might like to nominate.”

Stoops was asked Monday is he was one of the coaches who approached Shelton about the qualities he wanted to see in a new athletic director. Stoops said he hadn’t, but his priorities are well known: He needs the new AD to bear down on the process of upgrading Arizona’s football facilities.

“I think the president understands what we need to be successful at this level in this conference,” Stoops said.

“Obviously, facilities is something that we are dearly need in this program, and being able to raise money and give us the facilities we need to compete on a national level is imperative. I certainly believe the president fully supports that.”

The athletic department is in the beginning stages of a $378 million master plan to improve facilities across many sports, including an $85 million football project that is underway, focusing on improvements to the north end zone of Arizona Stadium, including locker rooms and offices.

The football practice field is also being extended and improved with the addition of some artificial turf.

In November, Jeff and Sharon Stevens of El Paso gave $10 million toward the north end zone project at Arizona Stadium.

You can find more of my UA football notes, including video of Stoops after practice Monday, at FoxSportsArizona.com

Arizona senior associate athletic director Kathleen “Rocky” LaRose has been selected as the interim athletic director after Jim Livengood was introduced today as the new athletic director at UNLV.

“There is no one more highly regarded at this university,” university president Robert Shelton said of LaRose in a press release, “and the department will be in good hands under Rocky’s leadership while we search for a permanent replacement for Jim.”

Livengood, 64, had been Arizona’s athletic director for nearly 16 years, but his contract was not going to be renewed after its expired June 30, 2010.

LaRose is in her 31st year at Arizona, joining the staff as the softball coach in 1979. She has been the senior associate athletic director for the past 16 years.

Livengood in a UA release said: “My experience in 16 years at the University of Arizona has been nothing short of phenomenal, both professionally and personally. To complete a period like this, with so many high points and other dramatically difficult moments, is truly satisfying.

“I’m proud to have been a Wildcat. The hard part will be the separation between me and the hundreds of people with whom I have worked so closely at the University of Arizona.”

Jim Livengood's tenure at Arizona is coming to an end/Tucson Citizen photo

UPDATE: The Arizona Daily Star is reporting that Livengood has accepted the UNLV job. The Las Vegas Review Journal is reporting that a press conference at UNLV has been scheduled for 2:30 p.m. today to announce the school’s new AD.

One way or another Jim Livengood won’t be here much longer. He might be UNLV’s athletic director as early as Thursday. If not, he’ll ride out his Arizona contract and be done at the end of June.

He began his job right after Arizona’s Fiesta Bowl victory over Miami on Jan. 1, 1994. That’s a long time ago. Long enough that Livengood suffers locally from Dick Tomey Syndrome — anybody at one spot that long has highs and lows, creating firmly entrenched supporters and detractors.

Most importantly, Livengood has lost his support from the board of regents and university president Robert Shelton, who, at least publicly, has been unwilling to fight the fight to extend Livengood’s contract.

It was Shelton — as much if not more so than Livengood — who failed to step up during Lute Olson‘s leave of absence for health-related reasons. Neither could wield the clout to do what needed to be done — convince Olson to retire, which would have been a good move for all the parties.

Olson, however, proved more powerful than either. Besides, who wanted to be the bad guy who told Lute he couldn’t coach here anymore?

Anyway, when the powers that be declined to consider another Livengood contract, he went looking for another job. He is 64 and not ready to golf full time. He is one of three finalists for the UNLV athletic director position, along with former Oregon athletic director Bill Moos and Washington State senior associate athletic director John Johnson.

In Las Vegas on Tuesday, at a public forum during his interview, Livengood acknowledged his contract at Arizona wouldn’t be renewed.

Whether he gets the UNLV job or not, Arizona will have a big decision to make soon.

It shouldn’t be too hard.

(Of course, that’s what we said about the men’s basketball job, and that nearly turned into a fiasco. Shelton, in an interview in Dec. 2008 with the Tucson Citizen, said he was going to be very involved in that hiring … so he has to share in all the false steps along the way before UA landed Sean Miller.)

The Arizona athletic department has its challenges, notably getting a $378 million facilities plan off the ground.

But coach Mike Stoops and the football program is hitting its stride, and the long-term future of the basketball program is in good shape with Miller. Arizona has national championship coaches in softball (Mike Candrea), swimming (Frank Busch) and men’s golf (Rick LaRose) — all holdovers from previous administrations.

Baseball coach Andy Lopez, a Livengood hire, won a national title at Pepperdine. Second-year women’s basketball coach Niya Butts might prove to a young star in the business.

At the beginning of Livengood’s tenure, Arizona began a nine-year streak of top 10 finishes in the Directors’ Cup Standings, which rates an athletic department on how all sports fare in the postseason. For the past few years, the Wildcats have been mostly just inside the Top 25.

Not what it once was, but still the envy of many programs.

I’m reminded of what Livengood said about the UA men’s basketball vacancy last year. “This is a great job,” he said.

The AD’s job is, too. Arizona will have no shortage of good candidates.

Someday soon, Shelton is going to be on the spot. If he doesn’t want Livengood around, then he can’t afford to mess up the hire.

He’ll have to make sure that the introductory press conference for the new athletic director is, as Livengood would say, a great Wildcat day.