Edgar Dyer has been named interim director of athletics at Coastal Carolina University, effective Aug. 1, according to an announcement today by Coastal President Ronald R. Ingle.

Dyer, a professor of politics at Coastal, will replace Dave Blank, who resigned recently as Coastal's director of athletics after accepting a similar position with Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa. A national search for a permanent director of athletics is under way.< p> A member of the Coastal faculty since 1976, Dyer has served as university counsel since Coastal's independence in 1993 and was interim dean of the College of Humanities and Fine Arts during the 1999-2000 academic year. He has been recognized for distinguished teaching and service to students and was the first recipient of the Horry Telephone Cooperative Distinguished Teacher-Scholar Lecturer Award.

Dyer played basketball at Guilford College on an NAIA Final Four team that included M.L. Carr, former player and coach for the Boston Celtics, and he received Guilford's athletic leadership award in his senior year. An active golfer, he won the 1993 Myrtle Beach Amateur and was Coastal's first women's golf coach.