Former ASU President J. Russell Nelson dies at 86

• Nelson was president of ASU from 1981 to 1989
• Started effort to bring Super Bowl to Sun Devil Stadium

Former Arizona State University President J. Russell Nelson, whose tenure included the opening of the ASU West campus and the launching of the first major fundraising campaign, has died.

The 86-year-old died Wednesday at his Tempe home from complications of Alzheimer's disease, according to a statement by ASU.

Nelson was ASU president from 1981 to 1989, a time that included the construction of the Karsten Golf Course and the opening of a fine-arts center named in his honor. In fall of 1983, he started an effort to bring a Super Bowl to Sun Devil Stadium, an achievement finally realized in 1996 several years after his departure.

ASU President Michael Crow said the university's mission was honed and energized under Nelson's leadership.

"Through his expertise and passionate advocacy, Russell made significant strides forward in scholarship funding, campus facilities and student services," Crow said in a statement.

Nelson, who had degrees in business and finance, was chancellor at the University of Colorado at Boulder for three years before coming to ASU.

At ASU, Nelson steered the university away from athletics and toward academics, and the school's standing as a research university was enhanced.

He left ASU in 1989 to go back to the University of Colorado-Boulder, this time as dean of the business college and was succeeded at ASU by Lattie Coor.

Nelson said he wanted to live ''a simpler, more private life," at the time.

At the time of his departure, ASU had a student body of 43,000, ranking fifth in the country.