Peach Bowl Inc. president and CEO Gary Stokan is in a unique position.

In 1998, when the BCS formed, he recalls media referencing the bowl game he oversees as “third-tier.” Well, after the 2016 season, it will host a semifinal in the College Football Playoff. And after the 2017 season, it will host the national championship game.

In addition, his organization has helped develop one of the most successful neutral-site games in college football — the Chick-fil-A Kickoff Game, this year featuring Georgia vs. North Carolina — helps oversee a wildly successful charity golf tournament (the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl Challenge) and played in instrumental role in moving the College Football Hall of Fame to Atlanta.

He understands the relationship between the game of football and business, and has been one of the major players especially in the last decade.

Reached last week to promote the charity golf tournament, which runs Monday to Wednesday and should raise more than $600,000 for charities and scholarships, Stokan opined on the current structure, which is two years old.

“We’ve seen great growth in the game and great growth in our business. I think the commissioners have ultimately — from the alliance to the coalition to the BCS now to the New Year’s Six and College Football Playoff — have done the right thing,” Stokan said.

“I think four teams is the right amount of teams in the playoffs because what college football has over any other sport is undoubtedly the best regular season. The most interesting, the most pressure-packed, the most important regular season in any sport during the year.”

We talked to Stokan about the charity tournament, the rise of the Peach Bowl, the College Football Playoff and more. Here’s what he had to say.

SDS: How did you decide on a golf tournament for the format when you formed this charity event nine years ago?

Stokan: One of the things that was important to us was developing relationships with the coaches, and also with our partner Chick-fil-A, who was our title sponsor of our bowl game. When we conceived this concept of matching a coach with a celebrity alumni, we went to Chick-fil-A. Chick-fil-A liked the idea so much that they got out of the LPGA event they were sponsoring and decided to sponsor the Peach Bowl Challenge golf tournament. It really started not only to develop a relationship with Chick-fil-A and its vendors, its partners, and for us as a bowl to develop relationships with the coaches. But we wanted to give money back to charity.

In our mission, it’s awfully important to us to give back to the community where we live, but also the community where we do business with. We had originally ACC and SEC schools in our bowl game. We’re humbly proud to say that we’ve now over nine years given over $5.3 million in scholarship and charity. This year we’ll go over $600,000. Last year we had $653,000 that we gave to charity and scholarship.

The purse is created so that every coach wins. Certainly there’s a first place, but every coach gets some money that goes 50 percent to their charity and 50 percent in a Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl endowed scholarship to the university. Not only does the coaches’ community win through his charity, but also their school wins as well in getting money for an endowed scholarship.

SDS: You’ve got the bowl game, you’ve got the charity golf tournament, you’ve got the kickoff challenge at the beginning of the regular season. Any one of those events by themselves would be a huge undertaking. Obviously there’s your organization, there’s the Chick-fil-A people, there are the coaches and teams actually playing in the game. What about these partnerships and your common philosophies has allowed you to be able to undertake so many things at the same time?

Stokan: We’ve really challenged ourselves. Personally, I love challenges. We want to give back to our community as I said earlier, but also we want to give back to the game of college football. We’ve done that through not only a charity and scholarships, but in recruiting the College Football Hall of Fame to come to Atlanta and donating $5 million to be the first founding sponsor and partner to move and build the Hall of Fame here. We believe in being the most charitable bowl game in the country with over $19 million that we have given away since 2002.

Our corporation, Peach Bowl Inc., very easily could’ve taken that money in as reserves and profits. But we feel it’s [our responsibility] to give back to our community. Because our community has supported us by buying tickets and sponsoring our bowl game and our kickoff game. So we’ve been able to reach the highest pinnacle of that by joining the New Year’s Six games, when in 1998 we were looked at as a third-tier bowl game.

I think we’ve received recognition from the conference commissioners because of our willingness to give back to the game and give back to our community through the Hall of Fame, through our Challenge golf tournament. We endow scholarships at both our bowl game and our kickoff game with teams that play in those games. I think the creation of the kickoff game — all those elements led to the conference commissioners saying, ‘These guys are doing what’s good for college football.’ They rewarded us by moving us into the New Year’s Six, where this year we’ll reach the pinnacle of hosting the national semifinals with either No. 1 against No. 4 or No. 2 against No. 3.

And then next year, in partnership with the Atlanta Falcons and the ACVB (Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau) and the Georgia World Congress Center and the Atlanta Sports Council, we’ll host the national championship game.

I think back to 2007 when we created the golf tournament to 2008 when we created the kickoff game to 2009 when we signed the 30-year license to move the College Football Hall of Fame here, it’s just been a very rewarding run. We’re humbly proud to be able to give back as well with everything that we’ve created.

SDS: What do you think it is about the culture in Atlanta and all the organizations that have been involved? What factors go into creating the sort of environment where you’re so competitive? Is it more about the environment there or is it about the people at the top?

Stokan: I think it’s a combination. We take great pride in our leadership and our vision, which is where it starts with our board, our staff — which is the best in the bowl business. You can’t run these type of events to the scale that we do and achieve the type of success we’ve had without having people on a staff that are just tremendous teammates that work hard, work smart, work effectively and efficiently.

So that’s the start. To have leadership and a staff that are on the same page in creating a vision to make Atlanta the college football capital of the world. That’s where it starts and that’s where it ends, because you have to execute all these things. You have to have the vision. But then you have to execute them and you have to support them, and that’s where the board comes in with Chick-fil-A and Coca-Cola and Delta, Georgia Power, AT&T. We have some tremendous corporations here in Atlanta that have worked together with us to support us financially, to allow us to create these events or create these opportunities, and then execute them with operational excellence.

It takes a team. We have a great team with a great vision and people that have bought into the vision and the leadership to execute it both from the board side, the corporate side. The fan side. We don’t sell out 16 straight years I think it was unless you have fans in this community that are willing to buy the tickets and support your game.

We’re very blessed in this city. We’ve got a great infrastructure of interstates so people can drive here easily. The number one airport in the world so people can fly here easily. Great hotels. And partnerships with the city, the state, the airport, the hotels. And great venues that partner with us as well so that we can host these types of events.

SDS: You mentioned the rise of your bowl game. Your words, I believe, were “third-tier perception.” To now being involved in the College Football Playoff. We’re two years in, now, to this system. With what you’ve been able to witness with the rise of your bowl game and also being part of this new system for the first two years, what have you learned about its effectiveness? And also about the future of the sport — what works? You obviously have a handle on how to do these things in an effective manner to make the rise that you have.

Stokan: Mark Bradley of the AJC said back — I believe it was in 1998, that the Chick-fil-A Peach Bowl was a third-tier bowl game. And I remember in my first board meeting talking to the board. The BCS was just getting started in 1998. And I said, ‘Our goal is to take this bowl and make it a BCS bowl game.’

It took us until 2012, I guess, to get that opportunity to play in what is now the New Year’s Six/College Football Playoff system. Going back, a) we had the vision and b) we had the leadership and the teamwork and the staff to do it. As the BCS grew, it made college football a national sport. Where prior to the BCS it was a regional sport. Becoming a national sport, we wanted to play at the national level. And so our opportunity to become part of the New Year’s Six games took all that work from 1998 and as I said through 2007, 2008 and 2009.

I think those types of things plus our operational excellence, our sellouts, the ACC and SEC who are great partners, really permitted us the opportunity to play in the College Football Playoff. Now the College Football Playoff, now that college football is a national sport, is now number two in fan amenity only behind the NFL. You have an opportunity with the semifinal games and the national championship now to be second to the Super Bowl in putting a sporting event on in this country. And we’re a part of that. We’ll be a part of that this year.

We’ve seen great growth in the game and great growth in our business. I think the commissioners have ultimately — from the alliance to the coalition to the BCS now to the New Year’s Six and College Football Playoff — have done the right thing. I think four teams is the right amount of teams in the playoffs because what college football has over any other sport is undoubtedly the best regular season. The most interesting, the most pressure-packed, the most important regular season in any sport during the year. So that foundation, to be able to move to a playoff off of that regular season in December just captivates the country now, and that’s why college football is the No. 2 sport to the NFL in fan support.

SDS: Circling back to the golf event — you’ve mentioned community a lot. And obviously it’s a community-minded event. Being around NFL and college football, it just seems like college football is a very community-oriented sport. All these coaches are super competitive, but early in May, if there is an offseason any more, this would probably be it. I would imagine they’re a little bit more relaxed than they are in September. What are you able to see from these coaches when they’re at this event, and are you able to pick up on their caring for the community and their willingness to participate and give to their charities as well?

Stokan: They’re coming out of spring ball. This gives them a chance to No. 1 relax with their wife to come over to a great area at The Ritz on Lake Oconee. And to really not only relax themselves, but also to enjoy in some fellowship and camaraderie and some time with friends and coaches that they don’t normally see or that they can’t play golf with or be at a dinner or a lunch or a breakfast with because during the season, they’re encapsulated 24/7 with running their own programs.

So what we see is coaches who people on the outside may think don’t like each other because their schools are rivals are sharing some fellowship and some stories and great times and doing it all to give back to their own charities and their own schools. It makes for a great scene. They’re able to come with their wives in a relaxed atmosphere, play some golf, have some fun, do what’s right, give some things back to charity and people less fortunate than them. It’s just a wonderful weekend to be with everybody.

We’ve got great relationships with the coaches. They appreciate what we’ve done as an organization giving back to college football, and they want to help us do that as well with the charity donations.

We’ve hit on something that’s been successful for nine years. It’s hard to believe it’s been nine years, but it’s one of those things that you think will just continue to thrive. We can see this thing growing. We’ve started to develop it beyond the ACC and SEC coaches now, because we’re in the New Year’s Six and not just ACC and SEC schools come to our games. Whether it’s a Tom Herman and Andre Ware, former Heisman Trophy winner that will represent Houston this year — Urban Meyer has played in this event. Can’t make it this year. But he said, ‘Hold a spot for me for next year.’ Those are the types of things that we want to continue to build off of and continue to give money back to the communities.