Jen Cohen will lead USC into the Big Ten as she was named as its athletic director on Monday, after seven years in the same role at Washington.

Washington, along with Oregon, on Aug. 4 announced a move from the Pac-12 to the B1G beginning with the 2024-25 academic season. In many ways, though, that decision was precipitated by USC and UCLA declaring in June 2022 that they were both bound for the B1G.

Cohen, of course, did a great deal of studying up on the B1G while in Seattle. After helping oversee UW’s decision to make its move, she had an edge that perhaps other candidates didn’t have.

“I have spent a lot of time studying the Big Ten in my previous role and understanding the dynamics of the Big Ten benchmarking, the Big Ten from a salary standpoint, from a performance standpoint, from a facility standpoint,” she said on Monday, according to ESPN. “So I have a lot of that understanding already in preparation for where I was before. And so I’ll bring that knowledge and experience here.”