Coach Dave Snyder’s resume as both a player and a coach runs deep. What the highlights don’t tell you is what an amazing man he was. He was much beloved by his teammates and his players, as evidenced by how many of these men traveled far and wide to get to his side when the end was drawing near last month. He was listening and telling stories right up to the end with his boys and they were all able to say good-bye to one another and express the love and admiration they held for each other for decades. Coach...

It’s a redundant anecdote, but I’ll tell it again. One of the most common phrases spoken by visitors as they step off the elevators and into The Stark Center is, “Wow! I never knew this place existed.” The utterance distinguishes between two types of Stark Center visitors: 1. The already indoctrinated, or folks who are avid strength/sport fans that already know of our work at the Stark and have ventured here like pilgrims to Mecca, and 2. The unfamiliar, or folks who are visiting based on the recommendation of a friend or colleague, including visitors who truly had no idea...

Well, folks, it’s that time of the year again. It’s time to raise a stein and proclaim, “Gut Heil!”  Yes, it’s OKTOBERFEST, people, and this time of the year EVERYONE gets to don lederhosen, wear felt hats and master the art of holding a brimming stein of delectable German beer perfectly parallel to the ground, in a true test of strength, all the while belting out “Ein Prosit der Gemütlichkeit” (beer hall drinking song). Anyone who loves to drink beer gets to be German during Oktoberfest.  In my previous life, September signified the end of the Grand Slam tennis season with the conclusion of...

Yessir, it’s football season again and I have the pleasure of living in FOOTBALL COUNTRY, a.k.a. TEXAS. Friday night lights are in full swing in the high schools—you can’t drive down any highway or back road in the state of Texas on a Friday night and not see the stadium lights somewhere ahead of you on the road. The NFL season got underway last Sunday with a bang. But, more importantly, the college season has begun, and our beloved UT Longhorns are 2-0 with a win over ‘Bama in Tuscaloosa last Saturday. Nobody on campus has come down off of...

Let me start by saying, I have never met the man, or if I have, it was only briefly and only incidentally. Last month was the five-year anniversary of the passing of Dr. Terry Todd. While I never had the privilege or the honor of sitting down and spending time with the man, I did attend the opening of the H.J. Lutcher Stark Center several years ago when it opened in the DKR Memorial Football Stadium North End Zone. Back then, it was only a casual stroll from my coach’s office on the opposite side of the NEZ and now,...

I’ve walked past her a hundred times since I started working at the Stark Center a few months ago. She’s at the end of a row on the top shelf, housed amongst the trophies, plaques, and awards of iconic U.T. Coaches, seemingly a bit out of place. She’s one of thousands of artifacts hidden behind the archive doors of the Stark. She’s frozen in time, forever suspended in her leap wearing her Texas cheerleading outfit, complete with pompoms and ponytails. Boxed. Untouched. Unplayed with. Perfect. Our U.T. Cheerleader Barbie. The Barbie movie is all the rage right now. You have...

I’ve spent a lifetime around people who passionately pursue the perfect body. In my younger days, I was a dedicated gym rat and trained shoulder to shoulder with Olympians, top college athletes, and professional athletes, all who looked like they were carved out of stone like statues of Greek gods and goddesses. My motivation in those days was to build a machine capable of performing at top gear as a professional tennis player. Later, as a Head Women’s Tennis Coach, it was to teach and supervise my college athletes how to train specifically for tennis. Nowadays, my goals are much...

I am delighted to introduce a new member of The Stark Center staff—Patty Fendick-McCain, who will need no introduction to fans of UT tennis. Patty was head coach of the UT women’s tennis team from 2005 to 2014, and before that was ranked as one of the top players on the WTA women’s pro tour in both singles and doubles, where she was ranked as high as top 20 in singles and #4 in the world in doubles and won the Australian Open in 1991 with her partner, Mary Joe Fernandez. Born in Sacramento, California, Patty was a scholarship athlete...

The Nike story actually begins well before Jordan, however. It began when legendary Oregon track and field coach, and co-founder of Nike, Bill Bowerman began trying to make a better track shoe. In 1948, Bill Bowerman moved his family to Eugene where he took the head coaching job for the track and field team at his alma mater, The University of Oregon. Bowerman led the team to 24 NCAA individual titles and four NCAA team titles over the course of his career, not to mention his contributions to the US Olympic Track program. But Bowerman’s greatest achievement, the one that...