WhatsTheGoodWord
Georgia Tech Fan
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| Dear Friends: Last week, I had the pleasure of introducing J Batt, our new director of Athletics, to the Yellow Jacket community. During our joint press conference, J reflected on the fact that three of the most prestigious national awards in intercollegiate athletics — the Bobby Dodd Coach of the Year Award, the Heisman Trophy, and the Homer Rice Award — are named after three of his predecessors at Georgia Tech. That’s an impressive legacy to treasure and build upon, and a reminder of the level of excellence Georgia Tech alumni and fans have come to expect from us. J is no stranger to expectations of excellence. A former ACC student-athlete himself, he was a member of the University of North Carolina’s men’s soccer team that won the 2001 national championship, so he knows firsthand what it is like to compete at the highest level while earning a degree from a top academic institution. As an administrator, he earned an outstanding reputation in fundraising and revenue generation at a variety of institutions. Most recently, as the University of Alabama’s executive deputy director of athletics, chief operating officer, and chief revenue officer, he helped lead a team that has built a perennial athletics powerhouse. Those skills will serve him and Georgia Tech well as intercollegiate athletics enters a new era of growing uncertainty. Every generation of administrators believes athletics cannot possibly become any more challenging. Yet every generation gets proven wrong. Today, we face a new wave of conference realignments, escalating media contracts, growing resource gaps across and within conferences, landmark legal cases making their way through the courts, and major changes to NCAA policies that now allow students to make money from third parties (“name, image, and likeness” or NIL) and transfer to another school without sacrificing eligibility (transfer portal). Our challenge — and opportunity — is to successfully navigate this new landscape while remaining fully committed to the growth and well-being of our student-athletes as well as the integrity and academic rigor of Georgia Tech. And that is the reason why J emerged as our top candidate during the search. J shares our vision for Georgia Tech Athletics. He understands the twists and turns we face, yet he is also enthusiastically devoted to working with our coaches and staff to help our exceptional student-athletes grow and succeed. Indeed, we have an extraordinary team with coaches like Aileen Morales, who turned her record-setting collegiate softball performance at Georgia Tech (all-time No. 1 in stolen bases and No. 2 in runs scored) into a successful coaching career that brought our softball program to new heights while remaining fully dedicated to her players’ athletic and academic excellence, leadership and professional development, and personal well-being. And Bruce Heppler, a 10-time ACC Coach of the Year who was just inducted into the Georgia Golf Hall of Fame and who has led the Yellow Jackets on an unprecedented run over his 28 years as golf head coach. His students have not only made 18 trips to the NCAA Championship finals and taken home 13 ACC championships and 70 tournament titles, but they’ve also turned in a perfect NCAA Academic Progress Rate score of 1,000 for 18 straight years — every year since the metric was established! Our coaches know better than anyone else how exceptional our student-athletes are. Few people can compete at the highest level in their sport while completing a degree at Georgia Tech. Take senior psychology major Júlia Bergmann, a consistent All-ACC Academic Honor Roll awardee and last year’s ACC Player of the Year, who’s become one of the top volleyball players in the nation, has helped lead Tech to a No. 10 ranking, and has won two silver medals with the Brazil national team. Or Carol Lee (All-ACC First Team and Academic Team) and Kate Sharabura (ITA All-American and Scholar-Athlete), who are the top-ranked women’s tennis doubles team in the nation. After climbing to No. 3 last season, Andrés Martín and Marcus McDaniel (both All-ACC First Team and All-ACC Academic Team) are currently No. 17 among men’s tennis doubles and are poised for another stellar year. (Martín also places among the top 20 tennis singles rankings.) Tech’s incredible Spirit Squads — our cheerleaders and our dance team, Goldrush — both won ACC Championships this year as well! (You should see the rings they earned!) Each of these students shows that our athletic legacy is inseparable from our well-deserved reputation for academics, research, and impact — and that we don’t need to choose between academic or athletic greatness but must remain committed to both. As J himself mentioned at our press conference, that combination — a legendary tradition of athletic excellence at one of the world’s finest research universities — is what makes us unique, and a model for higher education worth investing in and leading to success. I am excited about this new chapter in Georgia Tech Athletics, and I know it will be a rewarding journey for our students, alumni, and fans everywhere. Please join me in welcoming J Batt to the Georgia Tech family, and I hope to see you at our many exciting sporting events this fall. Go Jackets! In Progress and Service, |
