Primary contact: Football, M/W Swimming & Diving, Softball
Secondary contact: Wrestling, M/W Tennis, Baseball, M/W Lacrosse, M/W Golf
Sport oversight: M/W Swimming & Diving
Ryan Thorpe enters his 19th year in the UIndy sports information office in 2024-25. Thorpe was hired as UIndy's first full-time Assistant Sports Information Director in July of 2006 before spending four years as the Assistant Athletics Director for Media Relations and then being promoted to Associate Athletics Director for Communications in the summer of 2017.
Thorpe oversees the communications, sports information and media relations duties for all 25 of UIndy's athletic teams, as well as managing the office's budget and coordinating sport assignments and other duties for the office's four-person staff. He has been the sports information contact for football since the fall of 2010 and also handles primary sports info duties for the swimming & diving and softball teams. He also handles administrative sport oversight for the latter.
In addition, Thorpe coordinates gameday statistical crews, while lending his efforts to gameday publications, photography and graphic design for the athletics department's website and social media outlets. He also oversees and staffs the department's video streaming efforts for the GLVC Sports Network.
Previously the men's basketball, volleyball and baseball contact at UIndy, Thorpe served three seasons as the the Midwest Regional Coordinator for the Daktronics, Inc., All-Region volleyball teams. He also spent five years voting on the weekly National Collegiate Baseball Writers’ Association (NCBWA) Division II Midwest Region Baseball Poll.
In 2012, Thorpe handled media coordinator duties for the school’s first-ever home football playoff game, a role he also filled in 2013, 2017 and 2018. He has served in that same capacity for a number of other NCAA events, including the three NCAA Softball Midwest Super Regionals, the 2009 NCAA Division II Volleyball Midwest Regional and the 2007 GLVC Volleyball Championship. Other experiences include handling statistics for the 2014 NCAA DII Women's Volleyball Championships in Louisville, Ky., and volunteering at championship events in Indianapolis such as the 2010 and 2016 NCAA Division I Women's Basketball Final Fours, the 2015 NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Final Four and Super Bowl XLVI.
A member of College Sports Communications (CSC) and the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics (NACDA), Thorpe is a former Grant Burger Media Award winner, an honor bestowed annually by the American Volleyball Coaches Association. Before UIndy ended its publication of media guides, he received citations of excellence from CSC, including "Best Cover" for his 2009 baseball guide and "Fifth in the Nation" for his 2006-07 women's basketball guide.
Thorpe is a proud alumnus of Purdue University. He and his wife, Amanda Wade, reside on the near eastside of Indianapolis.
