October 2009

COVER CORNER

VANDERBILT’S

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table of contents8

12

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2 Connecting With The Web

4 National Commodore Club

6 In My Words Mackenzi Adams

7 Commodores Cubed VU inducts second HOF class

8 Point of View Bram Chisholm

11 Coach, Vaulter Share Record Duo owns local high school record in vault

12 Committed to Community Jimmy Williams grows his foundation

13 It’s My Turn—Rod Williamson Doing What’s Right

14 Vanderbilt’s Cover Corner Myron Lewis

17 Ready to Serve SEC Success Ryan Lipman

18 Teams Find Bond Overseas VU teams traveled abroad this summer

20 Quick Hits A look at Vanderbilt’s sports teams

23 No Sophomore Slump in Sight Marina Alex14

VUCOMMODORES.COMConnect with

Twitter

Skinner in the Hall of FameIt was great to see Roy Skinner selected to the Vanderbilt Hall of Fame this season. He was one of the primary reasons why I became interested in Vanderbilt athletics as a kid growing up in Murfreesboro, Tenn. He continues to be a great representative of the university, and it was nice to see him get the ovation he deserved at halftime of the Western Carolina game. Dan, Nashville

Football Staff has StabilityI believe that having stability on our coach-ing staff is one of, if not the top, reasons our football program finally made a bowl last year. For years, coaches shuffled in and out faster than you could remember their names. Having a consistent voice over a player’s career makes it much easier for a player to fully develop up to his potential. As a Vanderbilt alum, I am proud that the admin-istration has stood by Johnson even when things looked bleak the first few seasons. Jim, Mt. Juliet, Tenn.

Stadium RenovationsI had heard all the discussion about how good Vanderbilt Stadium looked after the renovation, but hearing the description from friends didn’t give justice to how good it actually looked when I saw it in person against Western Carolina. Carol, Memphis

To submit a letter, e-mail CN at: commodorenation@vanderbilt.edu. Letters should include the writer’s name and address and may be edited for clarity and space.

Letters

Blog Gameday Central

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Editorial

Publisher: Vanderbilt University

Editor-in-Chief: Ryan Schulz

Director of External Relations: Rod Williamson

Designers: Jeremy Teaford

Ryan Schulz

Digital Image Specialist: Julie Luckett Turner

Photographers: Daniel Dubois

Steve Green

Jed Jacobsohn

John Russell

Contributors: Andy Boggs

John Erck

David L. Hudson Jr.

Larry Leathers

Thomas Samuel

Chris Weinman

Travis Young

Administrative

Chancellor: Nicholas S. Zeppos

Vice Chancellor for University Affairs: David Williams II

Vice Chancellor for Public Affairs: Beth Fortune

Vanderbilt University’s Mission, Goals and ValuesVanderbilt University is a center for scholarly research, informed and creative teaching, and service to the community and society at large. Vanderbilt will uphold the highest standards and be a leader in the quest for new knowledge through scholarship, dissemination of knowledge through teaching and outreach, and creative experimentation of ideas and concepts. In pursuit of these goals, Vanderbilt values most highly intellectual freedom that supports open inquiry; and equality, compassion and excellence in all endeavors.

Vanderbilt University is an equal opportunity, affirmative action university.

ON THE COVER: Defensive back Myron LewisPHOTO ILLUSTRATION: Jeremy Teaford PHOTOS: John Russell & Steve Green

POSTMASTER: Please send address changes to National Commodore Club, 2601 Jess Neely Drive, Nashville, TN 37212.

SUBSCRIPTION: To subscribe to Commodore Nation, please contact the National Commodore Club at 615/322-4114.

ADVERTISEMENT: To advertise with Commodore Nation, please contact Vanderbilt ISP Sports.Jeff Miller, General Manager 615/322-4468jmiller@ispsports.com

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Compliance questions? Please contact:Candice Lee George Midgett John PeachDirector of Compliance Compliance Coordinator Compliance Coordinator615/322-7992 615/322-2083 615/343-1060candice.lee@vanderbilt.edu george.d.midgett@vanderbilt.edu john.w.peach@vanderbilt.edu

CORNERC O M P L I A N C E

Q:

A:

Johnny Touchdown is a prospective student-athlete who is being recruited by several schools. Some members of the alumni association have gone to his Facebook page to comment to try and persuade him to come to their institution. Is this permissible?

No. This is impermissible as they are considered to be representatives of athletic interests according to NCAA Bylaw 13.02.13.

A representative of the institution’s athletics interests (i.e. booster) is an individual (including alumni), independent agency, corporate entity or other organization who is known by a member of the institution’s executive or athletics administration to have participated in or to be a member of an agency or organization promoting the institu-tion’s intercollegiate athletics program; have made financial contributions to athletics at that institution; be assisting or to have been requested to assist in the recruitment of prospective student-athletes; be assisting or to have assisted in providing benefits to enrolled student-athletes or their families; or have been involved otherwise in pro-moting the institution’s athletics program.

All recruiting contacts with a prospective student-athlete (or the prospective student-athlete’s relatives/legal guardians) shall be made only by authorized institutional staff members. Such contact, as well as correspondence and telephone calls, by repre-sentatives of an institution’s athletics interests is prohibited.

2009 Homecoming/Reunion Weekend ScheduleOct. 16-17Friday, Oct. 16 Class-Sponsored Educational Events

Noon–4 p.m.

Behind the Scenes of VU Athletics 2–3:30 p.m. (Memorial Gym North entrance)

Chancellor’s Address 4–5 p.m.

Undergraduate Class Parties Begin 6 p.m.

Saturday, Oct. 17 Homecoming Parade 10 a.m.

Homecoming Tailgate at Olin Lawn (corner of 25th

and Highland Avenues) Begins 2.5 hours before kickoff

Homecoming Game Vanderbilt vs. Georgia TBA

Registration: You can register for reunion events online. Visit www.vanderbilt.edu/alumni/reunion and follow the link to your class Web site.

VS.

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CORNERCOMMODORE CLUB

PHONE: 615/322-4114 • ONLINE: vanderbilt.edu/ncc

COMMODORE KICKOFF - AUG. 25

The National Commodore Club hosted the Commodore Kickoff on August 25 in the outfield plaza at Hawkins Field. About 300 Vanderbilt fans attended, as well as most of Vanderbilt’s coaches. The crowd was entertained by the band, cheerleaders and Mr. C.

The cheerleaders entertain the crowd at the picnic.

NCC members Sara and C.T. Hassel.

NCC members Brian and Jackson Vingelen with assistant men’s basketball coach Dan Muller.

Bobby Johnson addresses the crowd as senior co-captains Patrick Benoist (left), Ryan Hamilton (center) and Bradley Vierling look on.

NCC members Bob Moore and Sondra Morris.

Mr. C stops to pose with Ken Barker and his family.

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GET TO KNOW CHRISTY PASSMORE

Christy Passmore was named executive director of Vanderbilt Athletics Development and the National Commodore Club on July 27. A 19-year veteran in development at Vanderbilt, Passmore led the athletics development team to their most successful fundraising year of the past five when she served as interim executive director for the fiscal year completed in June. Below, Commodore Nation provides NCC members with a closer look into many topics with a Q&A.

Commodore Nation: You’ve been in the interim role for one year now, how will your role change now that you are no longer interim director?

Christy Passmore: Athletics has my undivided attention. While in the interim role, I had additional responsibilities to the university for the Shape the Future Campaign, as well as several other areas in my portfolio. Now that I’m here full-time, I would say my intensity and focus is now 200% engaged. CN: What are a few of your top priorities in the position?

CP: Facility renovations for football in McGugin Center are at the top of the “to do” list right now. Coach Bobby Johnson has been a grand member of the Vanderbilt family…he’s been steady and deliberate in building the football program. And he’s been patiently waiting for the facilities he needs to take his program to the next level, especially as it relates to recruitment. How the place looks and how it feels matter to prospective student-athletes evaluating where they will spend their collegiate careers. Another important priority will always be growing athletics’ endow-ment to help ensure scholarships will be there in perpetuity. We began that focus in fiscal year 2006 in consideration of a $25 million goal; we have secured gifts, pledges and documented bequests totaling $19 million, so we still have a ways to go in that area. The third area will be the growth of the National Commodore Club. Why does it matter so much? NCC funds help us meet the annual scholarship commitment, which is one of the largest budget items in the Division of Student-Athletics. A full grant-in-aid for a scholarship athlete at Vanderbilt is slightly more than $50,000 a year. And to give our incoming freshmen a head start on acclimating themselves to Van-derbilt, many of them attend summer school, which is an added finan-cial aid expense. The NCC is a key partner working with Vice Chan-cellor David Williams to help ensure the dollars he needs will be there to pay for the complete student-athlete experience. There are almost 3,000 members of the NCC, and every gift at every level matters.

CN: How do you plan on balancing the major gift/facility campaign effort and the annual fund/NCC effort?

CP: Balance implies something to be equalized; I really prefer to think of it as coordination of the various aspects of fundraising/development. Annual gifts, such as gifts to the NCC, provide the “foundation” necessary on which to build. NCC is the best way to help all our student-athletes, and every gift counts toward building that foundation, large or small. Of the $13 million gifts and pledges this year, a little over $2.8 million was given to the NCC. Similarly, we have allocated resources to grow our major gifts program, for which we have a plan for the current year. We even have plans in the works for FY 2011. Many individuals will make their annual NCC gift, and they will also make a multi-year commitment to facilities or endow-ment with a major gift...or a planned gift. They might document a bequest. The coordination of priorities and the variety of ways to support them is a delicate conversation and requires skillful, knowl-edgeable people...like Lucy Jones, John Erck, Cal Cook and Robin Langlois. Each of us plays a role, and each of us depends on each other to keep things coordinated and moving in the right direction. Ultimately, however, it’s about the donor and his/her choices as it relates to their philanthropic goals.

CN: How is fundraising going for the facility campaign?

CP: You can see the manifestation of much of it—the improvements at Vanderbilt Stadium, the additions to Hawkins Field. The men’s and

women’s basketball locker rooms, which are out of public view, are spectacular and a real plus as Melanie and Kevin plan and re-cruit for the future. Our efforts for McGugin football improvements are going well, but we have been a little slowed by the forces of the economy. Stocks were depreci-ated; retirement portfolios took big hits. My experience is that philanthropists tend to find their way around those obstacles in time when they are committed to something, and we are fortunate to have many fans and supporters saying, “I want to help, give me a little time.” As we go to press, we need about $700,000 to meet the $3 million goal in order for work to begin on the football project at McGugin. CN: As executive director, what would you like to do to help athletics forge an even better relationship with alumni and, in turn, help membership numbers grow?

CP: In my 19 years at Vanderbilt, I’ve watched athletics go from be-ing a curiosity to many of us working or studying in other parts of the campus to becoming a full-fledged integrated operation now in-volving many aspects of the university as a matter of routine. It’s not perfect, but it’s been a good model for Vanderbilt, and it’s working! Our teams are performing better academically, they are competitive across the board, and our coaches seem to really like it here. The story is partially told through victories, but it also goes way beyond that. We’ve got to do a better job of communicating the story to our alumni and friends around the world. One of the most popular ses-sions at reunion over the last several years has been Vice Chancellor David Williams’ seminar on the history of Motown. Here’s a guy who runs athletics and so much more in the life of the university, and alum-ni flock to hear him. He’s spoken at several summer send-offs this summer meeting and greeting incoming freshmen, their parents and local alumni. I’m not sure you would see AD’s at other SEC schools extending themselves in such a way. CN: How do you plan on reaching out to alumni outside of Nashville?

CP: There is so much in this area that thrills me to think about for our future. Vanderbilt teams play in a lot of different states – even internationally. We need to do a better job letting our alumni know when a Vanderbilt team is within driving distance so they can attend if possible. We want alumni to come to homecoming and reunion. We want them to visit us during parent and family weekend or any week-end when they come to visit their children who are students here. We want former student-athletes to come to campus and revisit their former arenas of play and reconnect with their teammates. We want to provide more alumni packages for tournaments and post-season play. We want to partner with our colleagues in alumni relations under the direction of newly appointed Associate Vice Chancellor James Stofan, to evaluate all the ways alumni want to be engaged with Van-derbilt Athletics. Athletics is the “welcome mat” for the University; we’re here as a big front door to come in, enjoy and become reac-quainted with old and new friends, classmates. n

—Visit vucommodores.com to read the rest of the interview.

Christy Passmore

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In My Words

Mackenzi

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On not winning the quarterback job out of preseason camp

Preseason has been pretty frustrating for me because this is the fourth year I’ve had an opportunity to be the starter at the begin-ning of the year, so in that scenario, it is a little disappointing to me. However, it teaches you to stick with it, keep going hard and be prepared because you are always one snap away. You’ve just got to stay ready for whatever happens.

On the quarterback competition

Competition always makes you prepared to come out here and do your best. At the same time it is frustrating. It can get in your head a little bit, and you start to count your reps. It is part of the game and you have to deal with it.

On performing his best in two of Vanderbilt’s most memorable wins

I feel that pressure is kind of a privilege. When you get out there and you are in packed stadiums, that is fun. We practice to be able to play in front of 100,000 people and in front of College Gameday. When you have fun, you play better out there. I just like to compete.

On the no-huddle offense

I think it plays to our strengths and give us some advantages. I think we will wear down opponents a little bit with the fast-paced kind of stuff, and we will spread the field out more. It starts open-ing up a lot of holes and spreads the defense out, and you can get a lot of zone reads where you have the option to hand off, keep it or throw it. It is a fun offense to run.

On his track career

I was always more of a football guy. I got into track and really started to love it. I won state my senior year in (the 110-meter and 300-meter hurdles), but I was always a football guy. I got a lot more flexible and definitely saw a transformation in my speed. n

In the past four years Vanderbilt quarterback Mackenzi

Adams has been in the race for the starting quarter-

back role entering the season, but each year he has

come up just short. Instead of dwelling on not being the

starter the opening week, Adams has continued to work

to get better and prepare himself as though he was the

starter. His positive mentality and work ethic have paid

off on many occasions when he has been asked to start

in the middle of the season or come off the bench. The

most notable of those times came when he made his first

career start at South Carolina in 2007 and when he relieved

Chris Nickson against Auburn in 2008. On both occasions,

Adams was instrumental in leading the Commodores to

two of their biggest wins in school history. Now a fifth-year

senior, the Tulsa, Okla., native hopes to end his career with

a few more memorable performances. Off the field, Adams

has succeeded in the classroom and is on pace to earn his

master’s degree in organizational leadership in May.

Adams

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kyleFISCHER

Football

ryanFOWLER

Football

nicoleLUKENS

Soccer

justinGREENFootball

Favorite Halloween costume as a kid

Michael Myers from the

“Halloween” movies

The red Power Ranger

A red M&M

A vampire

I think I’m addicted to

____________

Text messaging

Sweet tea CarbonationGummy bears

Athlete I’d pay

to watch

Ray Lewis

Kobe Bryant

Cristiano Ronaldo

Kobe Bryant

Text messages

I send in a month

Close to 1,000

1,500 to 2,000

1,2003,000

to 4,000

Commodores Cubed

VU Inducts Second Hall of Fame Class

V anderbilt’s game against Western Carolina on Sept. 5 didn’t just mark the official beginning of the 2009

football season, it also signified the induc-tion of VU’s second Hall of Fame class.

The night before the Commodores routed the Catamounts 45-0, Vander-bilt athletic officials welcomed the 2009 inductees and their families to campus for the induction banquet, which was at the Marriott at Vanderbilt University.

Enshrined as part of the nine-member 2009 class were Jim Arnold (football), Charles Davis (basketball), Julie Ditty (tennis), Charles Hawkins (baseball and football), Ming Hsu Robinson (swimming), Herb Rich (football), Wendy Scholtens Wood (basketball), Roy Skinner (head bas-ketball coach) and Brandt Snedeker (golf).

The induction of the second class brought the total number of Vanderbilt Hall of Fame inductees to 21, 12 were selected in the inaugural class of 2008.

The group of inductees was also hon-

ored on the field at halftime of Vanderbilt’s game against Western Carolina.

“I’m still getting used to being called a Hall of Famer,” said Arnold, who was a guest in the TV broadcast booth during the third quarter. “It is going to be hard to come off this cloud.”

Continuing what is becoming a tradi-tion, Vanderbilt’s 2010 Hall of Fame Class will be inducted the weekend of the Van-derbilt’s first Saturday home game next season. n

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1st Jay Cutler’s rank among the top NFL jerseys sold since he was traded to the Chicago Bears.

433 Yards gained by the Commodores on the ground against Western Carolina—the most since rushing for 557 yards against Air Force in 1978.

3 Number of former Commodore football coaches who have had longer tenures than Head Coach Bobby Johnson.

11 Former Commodores were on NFL rosters for the 2009 opening weekend.

9 Vanderbilt men’s basket-ball games will air on the ESPN family of networks.

17th Vanderbilt’s ranking in the 2009 U.S. News and World Report listing of the top universities—its highest ranking of all time.

1 The number of times Van-derbilt has had two freshmen top 100 yards rushing in the same game; Zac Stacy (133) and Warren Norman (105) topped the century mark against Western Carolina.

NUMBERSBy The

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Editor’s Note: Each month “Commodore Nation” will ask a varsity athlete to sound off on a point of personal interest. A native of Canton, Ga., Chisholm is a junior on the cross country team.

In embarking on new goals, projects and adventures, sometimes you have to face the fact that you’re not prepared for what is to come and accept that you will learn along the way. Before walking onto the

cross country team last year, I didn’t realize what level of physical con-ditioning that competition in the SEC required. Through slow progress and hard training, Coach Keith eventually brought me up to speed.

Studying abroad in China this summer presented some of these familiar “trial by fire” experiences. There was no way that two years of studying Mandarin in a classroom could have prepared me for life at a college campus in China. Ordering food from street vendors, talking with Chinese students about their country’s reemergence in the inter-national economy, even huddling and speaking with other passers-by under roofs while waiting out sudden rainstorms all became my class-room. It proved a much harder and more unforgiving one than what I

had been accustomed to in the safety of Vanderbilt and the Eng-lish language. However, this kind of environment also taught me Chinese much more quickly than simply memorizing vocabulary lists and performing rehearsed skits in Chinese.

I will never forget the first run I took in China, and how by rely-ing on my “sense” of direction, I got lost in 10 minutes, causing a 60-minute run to balloon into a three-hour run. Weeks later I discovered what I had been tell-

ing people on the sidewalks while trying to find home was not, “I’m lost, please help me,” but “I’ve been abandoned by my parents.” Embar-rassing? Well, yes. Regrettable? No way. Now I’ll never forget how to say, “I’m lost” in Chinese.

Other experiences and encounters also shape my memory of life in China. The trouble-shooting of what food I could stomach that first week seemed like an insurmountable task as I waded through mystery meats in the truest sense of the term and milk with a seven-month shelf-life. After much trial and more error, I slowly began to acclimate to Chinese food.

Then there’s the time when, visiting a Chinese friend’s home, I caught myself staring at a portrait of Mao Zedong hanging over the mantel just like a family member’s picture. My Western upbringing had led me to believe that everyone at least disagreed with his policies, and at most thought him guilty of genocide. As the tour of the house ended, my Chinese host directed the conversation towards China’s recent past and Mao’s shaping of it. I stumbled through a few non-inflammatory sentences, hoping to strike some medium between what I believed and what would not get me kicked out of the house, still wondering how I had not known of Mao’s popularity in China.

Admittedly, the lessons from these experiences vary considerably, but the common thread uniting them all that I can now see is simple—don’t be afraid of the unknown and don’t be afraid of being embar-rassed. So the next time you’re faced with a potentially uncomfortable, awkward, or down right painful situation, consider the upside of how much there is to learn from it and just jump in! n

Point of View

By Bram Chisholm

Learning Beyond the Classroom

Chisholm at the Great Wall of China.

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It isn’t often that a coach gets to coach someone from his or her high school alma mater. It is even less often that a coach gets to coach someone from his or her alma mater who is in the school’s record book for the same reason he is.

Vanderbilt assistant track coach Clark Humphreys will have that unique opportunity this year when he coaches freshman pole vaulter Alyson Hasty. The two not only graduated from Brentwood Academy in Brentwood, Tenn., but they also hold the school records in the boy’s and girl’s pole vault, respectively, and were two-time state champions in the event.

When Humphreys first looked at bringing Hasty to Vanderbilt, the thought that he could potentially coach someone whose high school career was linked so closely to his never crossed his mind.

“When I first started thinking about (Hasty), I truly did not think about the connection,” Humphreys said. “An old teammate of mine (Hunt Atkins) who is an assistant coach at Brentwood Academy was actually the one who brought it to my attention that the boy’s school record holder could coach the girl’s school record holder.”

Beyond their ties to Brentwood Academy, Hasty and Humphreys also shared a connection with the late Bill Etheridge, who coached many area Nashville pole vaulters over the years, including Humphreys and most recently Hasty, until his death in the summer of 2008.

“It was a real friendship that we got out of being coached by him,” Humphreys said. “He was our coach, but there was a different level of friendship that I don’t know if I really ever had with any other coach.”

It was through Etheridge that Hasty first learned of Humphreys.“Bill had introduced me to (Humphreys) so I knew he was the

Vanderbilt coach before all the recruiting,” Hasty said. “Technically Bill was a really great coach, but what stood out most was that he had such a great relationship with his athletes.”

Given Hasty’s success in pole vaulting, it’s hard to believe that she only picked up the sport as a sophomore in high school after giving up gymnastics. Because she is still relatively new to the sport, Humphreys believes Hasty’s inexperience leads to her having a very large upside.

“Alyson could be very good,” Humphreys said. “She’s only been vaulting the last two years, so her growth curve is very high.”

Hasty’s high school resume looked similar to Humphreys’ in many ways. However, after high school, Humphreys went on to Auburn where he won the 1997 NCAA outdoor pole vault title and was a three-time All-American. Hasty’s resume after high school is only in its beginning stages, but she can only hope her career path continues in the same direction.

“Hopefully since I just started, I still have a long ways to grow and I can improve a lot this year with him as my coach,” Hasty said. n

Coach, Vaulter Share Unique Connection

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Clark Humphreys and Alyson Hasty hold the Brentwood Academy records in the boy’s and girl’s pole vault, respectively.

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Williams’ Foundation Reaches Out To Youth

Jimmy Williams made a living intercepting passes, and now he is focusing his attention on intercepting youth before they head down the wrong path with the Jimmy Williams Intercepting Our Youth Foundation.

After graduating from Vanderbilt in 2001, Williams went on to play in the NFL as a cornerback and return specialist before retiring this past June. His stops included three years with the San Francisco 49ers and two with the Seattle Seahawks, whom Williams made a Super Bowl appearance with in 2005.

Williams’ NFL career was longer than most, but during his time under the bright lights, he never lost sight of what he believed was much more important than football.

“I didn’t come from the best background,” said Williams, who was raised in Baton Rouge—the same city he now calls home. “I did have two parents, but the thing that helped me get through was that there were other people who had a hand in my success. I decided that whenever I got to where I wanted to, the main thing I was going to do was at least try to help out. That came from an early age.”

Williams and his wife, Chandra, started the foundation in 2004 with the primary focus of awarding five scholarships to high school seniors in the Baton Rouge area.

“We don’t look for the top-tier kids, we look for the kids that aren’t at the top of their class, but they are trying and doing the right thing,” Williams said.

The scholarship was originally named the Jimmy Williams Scholarship, but in 2007, it was renamed the Cora Lee Jones Scholarship Fund in honor of Williams’ late aunt, who died in a car accident the same year.

“She was a real close aunt who used to sup-port me and was real giving,” Williams said. “She died in a car accident while she was on her way to deliver food to somebody less fortunate, which was her whole life. I renamed the scholarship after my aunt, and I think it gave all the recipients a little more meaning to what we are all about.”

Awarding scholarships is what the foundation is most known for, but it is just a small part of the work the foundation does in the community.

Among the other outreach activities the founda-tion is a part of is an annual back-to-school send-off where school supplies are donated to kids. During the holidays, the foundation adopts a family and fills out their Christmas wish list. When Williams was playing, he would fly two or three families out to watch one of his games.

Over the holidays, the foundation also takes foster children to a Build-A-Bear store where they make stuffed bears for kids at the local children’s hospital. In the summer, the foundation, along with the scholarship recipients, hosts a youth camp that focuses on health and wellness, team building, conflict resolution and football.

While football is a part of the camp, it is a very small piece. Williams had a successful NFL career, but even so, he is still in his early 30s, a fact that helps him emphasize that football isn’t everything.

“I try to tell them as a player that football is a game and it isn’t going to be here forever,” Williams said. “I ask the kids what they want to be when they grow up and if they tell me a football player, I correct them and tell them football is not a career because it isn’t something that can last you for a lifetime. With that, I just try to get them to focus on different things they can aspire to be other than a football player. Football is an extra bonus, but when it is over, you have to go back to getting a career.”

Williams began his foundation in 2004, but his first foray into com-munity service came while at Vanderbilt. It was in Nashville that Wil-liams first became involved with the Backfield in Motion program with fellow former Commodore Jamie Winborn. Even after leaving Vander-bilt, Williams continued his work with Backfield in Motion.

“We were wondering how we could help some kids and we wanted to partner up with somebody, so the first two years Jamie and I partnered together and brought some of the Backfield in Motion kids out to California and we took them on a college tour,” Williams said. “The kids also got to come to practice and go to a game. The thing that I took from the Backfield in Motion program was that whenever I was going to start my own program, I wanted to run it like they had theirs.”

From what he learned with Backfield in Motion, Williams went to work on developing the Jimmy Williams Foundation.

“My wife and I sat down at dinner one night and on a napkin, began drawing up how we wanted to start our own and that is pretty much how it came about.”

Having an idea is one thing, but actually putting the plan together is an entirely different challenge. To get the foundation off the ground, Williams relied heavily on what he learned from his time at Vanderbilt.

“What I learned at Vanderbilt was really key in the development stages,” Williams said. “Over at Peabody, we had this segment in a course where we had to go and reach out to a nonprofit in Nashville, and my task was to go work with the Charles Davis Foundation. I pretty much had to rewrite their operating handbook. Through that and watching how they ran their business, I got an idea of how I wanted to structure mine. It just gave me so much more insight on a nonprofit organization from a business standpoint.”

Former Commodore Jimmy Williams is making a difference in the community with the Jimmy Williams Foundation.

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It’s My Turn

By Rod Williamson

Doing What’s Right

This past summer Kevin Stallings received volumes of favorable public-ity after word leaked out that he had

spent his scheduled raise to fund his bas-ketball team’s trip to Australia.

Fans and media gushed over the Commodore coach’s unselfish-ness and integrity, contrasting him with some of sport’s infamous counterparts who have strayed off the path of acceptable behavior.

Some loyalists even worried we weren’t treating Coach Stallings right, that the department budget should have picked up the tab for the trip Down Under. Once they understood the rationale behind the decision (tightened budgets, a hiring freeze and no university raises except those contracted to receive them) those concerns were abated. Vanderbilt takes very good care of its coaching staff.

Many of us are drawn to Vanderbilt athletics because of its bed-rock commitment to academic excellence and integrity and its quaint insistence on following the spirit and letter of the rules.

When Bobby Johnson’s name was announced as our “Coach of the Year” for 2008-09 during the first football game, the biggest applause line was not the Music City Bowl championship, but the program’s first-place finish in the American Football Coaches Asso-ciation graduation percentage.

We admire people who do the right thing. After all, it is usually easier and much faster to cut corners. We see this in all walks of life, the overnight success who blazes into the headlines and spotlights only to crash and burn, unable to build on the shaky foundation.

In the case of Coach Stallings, after completing nine full years at Vanderbilt in a tenure that has earned him Southeastern Confer-ence Coach of the Year honors, trips to the NCAA Sweet 16 and has allowed him to develop three SEC Players of the Year, it appears the outside sports world has finally realized his value.

Earlier in the summer he earned praise for his professionally brave public stand against the often-murky underground of AAU coaches and youth player representatives. Other coaches privately applauded his stance but were afraid making a similar stand could hurt their recruiting.

Nearly all Commodore Nation readers understand that Bobby’s record the first few years was unavoidable, not an indication of any inability as a head coach. After several years of orchestrating big upsets and getting a bowl victory, outsiders now see our staff deserves mention with the very best.

If Tim Corbin and Melanie Balcomb are not the best in their business, it would not take long to call the roll of their equals. Our baseball and women’s basketball teams can accurately be called national powers. Both coaches fit the Vanderbilt mold. Not only do they produce big winners on the scoreboard, they mold life-long winners from their rosters.

We receive numerous complimentary letters every year about our baseball program. Flight attendants compare our team’s man-ners with others; parents are amazed their son learned how to stand during the national anthem at Corbin’s summer camp, and even faculty seem impressed that a Commodore didn’t use a road trip as an excuse in the classroom. These are the hallmarks of a first-class program.

Coach Balcomb has a similar track record. Her program has attracted and then developed its share of life long winners, young women who have gone out into the world and made a difference. She, too, has turned down many job offers to stay on West End.

It’s this way throughout the hallways of McGugin Center…ten-nis alumni in law schools, lacrosse vets becoming physicians, ex-golfers turning into business tycoons, two recent bowling graduates donating a year of their life to public service with Americorps.

It’s Good to be Gold is more than an expression; it’s a way of life when you are a Commodore. n

The close attention he paid to what he was taught at Vanderbilt has paid off for Williams, who continues to look at ways to grow the foundation.

“The night we sat down and put ideas on a napkin, we kind of envisioned starting a charter school,” Williams said. “With the state of the schools in New Orleans and Baton Rouge, we would like to go that route, but we are still in the beginning stages.”

No matter how successful the organization becomes, Williams is not interested in the recognition that comes his way, he’s more interested in continuing to do his little bit to make the world a better place.

“We don’t really do a lot to get noticed,” Williams said. “We just do what we can because it is the right thing.”

Williams also understands he has a greater chance to make a dif-ference in the community because of who he is. As a former football player, he has a voice in the community that others may not have and he doesn’t plan on letting that voice go to waste.

“That is definitely the case, and it is something that I thought of,” Williams said. “With the platform that I have, I feel there is a responsi-bility that comes with it. If you are going to call yourself a contributor to society, then in my mind, you have to accept the responsibility with the platform you have. You can help change the world, you can inspire kids to dream and you can help plant seeds in them that they are so much more than they have an idea of what they can be.” n

“I ask the kids what they want to be when they grow up and if they tell me a football

player, I correct them and tell them football is not a career because it isn’t something

that can last you for a lifetime. ”

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Inscribed on the eye black he wears for games and etched on the inside of his right bicep are the words “4 Broth-ers.” To Vanderbilt senior cornerback

Myron Lewis, the words are more than just a reminder of his family, but a way of life.

The youngest of five boys, Lewis has spent his entire life looking up to his older siblings, who are all at least five years older than he, with the oldest being 36. Together, they form an unquestioned bond.

“The use of ‘4 Brothers’ is just for them because they supported me throughout my whole life, and I always looked up to them,” said the soft-spoken Lewis. “I always think about all the things that they taught me and carry it on and off the field.”

The closeness he shares with his brothers is some-thing that was instilled in him and his brothers by their mother, Gloria Milligan.

“Growing up, if she wasn’t talking about school, she was talking about sticking together,” said Hamin Milligan, Lewis’ second-oldest sibling. “Because when everything is said and done, the only thing you really have is family. If your own family can’t look out for you, who are you going to turn to?”

The emphasis placed on family is some-thing Lewis took to heart as a kid growing up in Ft. Lauderdale. Although he was much

younger than his brothers, it didn’t keep him from trying to keep up with them in sports.

“We never excluded him from anything,” said Milligan. “It didn’t matter that he was younger because if you can play, you can play, and he could.

“He was the brother who made it the most difficult to see what sport he was going to play because every sport that we played, whether it was basketball, base-ball, football or whatever, he was always the person who could pick up anything in a second. He was amazing.”

The close relationship Lewis shares with his brothers is something Vanderbilt senior linebacker Brent Trice has witnessed the

past three years as Lewis’ roomnate.“He tells me his brothers are his role mod-

els and he wants to be like them, but he also wants to be better than them,” Trice said.

Like Myron, his brothers also succeeded at many sports growing up, but when it came time to focus on one, they all chose the same route—football. Not only did his brothers all play football, but also they were all defensive backs.

“Myron was always asking questions and wanted to be around us all the time, so we knew he really looked up to us and what we did,” Hamin said. “His brothers all playing football and specifically the defensive back position also had an impact on him wanting to be a defensive back.”

So instead of looking up to famous college or NFL cornerbacks as a youth, Lewis didn’t have to look outside his family to find role models in the game he loved. All of his broth-ers played defensive back and two—Hanik and Hamin Milligan—played professionally. Hanik played four seasons in the NFL and Hamin played six seasons in the Arena Foot-ball League.

“Having those other brothers play foot-ball, it gave me the mentality of going out there and working hard all the time because they were always pushing me,” Lewis said.

Just as his brothers wanted to see Myron succeed on the football field, they wanted to see him have even more success off the field. But they knew the success on the field wouldn’t come if he followed the wrong path off it.

“With him being the youngest one, we were a lot more protective of some of the things that he did and the places he went,” Hamin said. “We were pretty overprotective and made sure to call him, not every minute, but just to make sure everything was going well and everything like that.”

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Brothers Inspire Lewis’ Play on the Field

“...they supported me throughout my whole life, and I always looked up to them...”

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Like Myron deciding to play football, when his brothers did something or told him to do something that would be in his best interest, he listened because he knew they were look-ing out for him.

The way his brothers looked out for him is something that wasn’t lost on Lewis. Since he didn’t have the same opportunity to mentor a younger sibling, he reached out into the community to work with underprivi-

leged youth. The last two summers, he has spent time in East Nashville at the Martha O’Bryan Center.

“I just like helping young kids,” Lewis said. “A lot of these young kids don’t really have a father figure in their life. Me growing up with four older brothers and having people to look up to is something a lot of these kids don’t have. I just like working with the kids and seeing their eyes light up.”

Lewis has felt such a connection working with children that he hopes to someday make a career out of working with youth once his playing days are complete.

“I had my big brothers, and I want to be a big brother to these kids,” Lewis said. “Just hanging out with them, they have the oppor-tunity to hang out with somebody that they look up to.”

The kids at the Martha O’Bryan Center are far from the only ones looking up to Lewis. Vanderbilt fans and teammates are also looking up to Lewis as he takes over for D.J. Moore as Vanderbilt’s shut-down corner. A preseason All-SEC selection, Lewis is con-sidered one of the nation’s top NFL pros-pects at the cornerback position.

What makes Lewis unique at his position is his height. At 6-foot-2, Lewis is one of the taller cornerbacks in the country. While some may scoff at his height, Lewis makes up for it with his quickness and reach.

“Being so tall and lanky with my arms, I have a better opportunity to get my hands on the receivers than shorter defensive backs who have to use their feet more at the line of scrimmage,” Lewis said. “I’m also able to go up and attack the ball more being 6-foot-2 and having such long arms.”

His height may not be typical of a lot of cornerbacks, but it isn’t something that Head Coach Bobby Johnson is concerned with.

“I think he one of the best cornerbacks in the country,” Johnson said. “He can run, he’s got great ball skills. I think he’s really relishing the role of being the returning big-play-maker.”

In 2008, Lewis ranked second on the team with five interceptions and tied for the team lead with five sacks. It is that fifth intercep-tion that Vanderbilt fans will remember most. Playing Boston College in the Music City

Bowl, Lewis stepped in front of a Boston College pass with 1:36 to play to seal Van-derbilt’s first bowl win in 53 years. The inter-ception was sweet revenge for Lewis, who had given up a touchdown that put Boston College up 14-13.

“The interception brought a lot of excite-ment to the fans,” Lewis said. “I always get fans thanking me for making the intercep-tion. It was just good to have the opportunity

to make a play after giving up a big play.”

Lewis has suc-ceeded on the field, and he has done the same in the class-room. He needs just 14 more hours to

graduate, which he will do this December when he completes his degree in human and organizational development in just 3 ½ years.

“To have the opportunity to graduate early is a big accomplishment,” Lewis said. “I never thought I’d be able to do it, but I was able to take the right classes and still bal-ance football out with it.”

Seeing Lewis perform in the classroom as well as on the field is something his family is proud of.

“The whole family is very proud of him that he can sustain a strong GPA in the classroom and play football, and do excep-tionally well at both,” Hamin said.

Lewis has followed the path on and off the field his brothers have wanted him to take. Now, he has his eyes on leaving his own mark.

“I’m trying to follow in their footsteps, but do a little bit more,” Lewis said. “They are good and I’m trying to be great.”

With his smarts, size, speed and athleti-cism, Lewis has an opportunity to have a long career at the next level. That oppor-tunity could take him anywhere across the country. But no matter where he ends up, his “4 Brothers” won’t be far from his mind. n

Lewis sealed the Music City Bowl with his interception.

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Most college freshmen do not spend the week before their first day of classes participating in a national ath-letic competition with other teenage prodigies. They also don’t spend the day before classes competing in New

York in arguably the most prestigious, international athletic competi-tion of their favorite sport. But, Middle Tennessee native Ryan Lipman is not your ordinary freshman.

In mid-August he competed in the United States Tennis Asso-ciation National Boys Juniors Championship in Kalamazoo, Mich., reaching the finals before falling to Chase Buchanan. That landed him a spot in qualifying for the main draw of the U.S. Open. On August 25th, Lipman squared off against Ukranian Illya Marchenko, a player with international experience in the Davis Cup. Lipman dropped a close match 6-4, 7-6 but came away knowing he could compete.

“I had five break points in the first set but couldn’t convert and served for the second set at 5-3 but couldn’t close it out,” he says of his qualifying match. “But it was an amazing experience—not only the competing on the court, but also hanging out with the pros in the players’ lounge.”

Lipman quickly traveled from the bright lights of New York to Nash-ville where he began practicing with the Vanderbilt men’s tennis team whose season started September 17. He comes with high expecta-tions as perhaps the most prized recruit in the history of the program. Tennisrecruiting.net had him rated as the No. 3-ranked prospect in the entire country. “He is definitely the highest-ranked player we’ve ever had since I’ve been at Vanderbilt,” said fifth-year Vanderbilt men’s ten-nis coach Ian Duvenhage. “People had been sending e-mails about him for more than three years.

“I am very excited about having Ryan here,” said Duvenhage. “I think he brings a long tradition of success and an expectation to be successful. …You want a team where all your guys in a tournament think there is a possibility that they will be the last person left stand-ing. Every time he is in a tournament, he honestly believes and has that level of confidence where he feels he can win.”

Lipman brings more than talent, a solid all-around game and a diz-zying variety of shots and styles. He also brings an advanced under-standing of the game and an incredible attitude. He learned early on from his coach Bill Tym the importance of the mental aspects of ten-nis. He also learned the value of good sportsmanship and a positive attitude, culminating in his winning the USTA’s prestigious Bill Talbert Sportsmanship Award in 2009, given annually to one boy and girl at the International Tennis Hall of Fame in Newport, R.I.

Duvenhage says Ryan’s attitude and sportsmanship were a main reason he coveted him for his squad. “I’ve been at this long enough to know that it may be possible to have a great team without great people, but it makes it that much harder,” he said. “We at Vanderbilt work very hard to recruit not only very good tennis players but also very good people—and Ryan is certainly that. The Talbert award is

the pinnacle or epitome of sportsmanship in our sport.” Tym, who has worked with Ryan since he was six years old, also

emphasizes Ryan’s positive attitude. “I think he will make an immedi-ate impact for the Vanderbilt squad in several ways. His attitude is the dominant thing about Ryan; he has an attitude that is second to none. …He’ll make a real important impact on the team.”

Given his phenomenal success in the juniors, Lipman had his choice of colleges. But, he grew up in the area as a lifelong VU fan. His personal coach Tym (who was best man at Ryan’s parents’ wed-

ding) has longstanding ties to Van-derbilt, serving as the men’s tennis coach for a decade (1986-1996) and taking the team to its first NCAA tournament. Furthermore, Ryan’s mother, Lisa (the former Lisa Tamborello), played four years for the Vanderbilt women’s team.

Lipman’s final four were Geor-gia, Georgia Tech, Virginia and Vanderbilt. Fortunately, he chose Vanderbilt and chose it early in June 2008. “I made four visits, and Vanderbilt just felt right. I really connected with the coaches, Coach Duvenhage and Coach Boysen (assistant coach Tom Boysen) and knew the guys on the team from the juniors,” said Lipman, who was home-schooled. They’re all great guys.”

Lipman is excited about com-peting in the SEC. “I’m so excited. I’ve wanted to do this for my whole life, and I can’t wait to get started.” The SEC represents competition of the highest order. Consider that Vanderbilt finished No. 61 in the nation, but only 1-10 in SEC play. Lipman, fellow fresh-man Sam Wells and a solid return-ing group of players should bol-ster the Commodores chances.

Confident without the slight-est trace of cockiness, Lipman believes the team can improve its

position dramatically. “I think we can finish top three.” He identifies winning the SEC as his main goal but also has his sights set on cap-turing the NCAA tennis singles championship— if not this year, then next year.

Given Lipman’s success and rapid rise up the juniors rank, he may compete one day full time on the ATP men’s tour. Tym, who coached Bryan Shelton and Kenny Thorne on the ATP Tour, believes Ryan has the potential to compete on the tour in the future.

Duvenhage agrees, “I definitely think he has the potential, desire and work ethic to be on the ATP Tour, and we take it as part of our job to help make that a reality for him two or three years down the road.”

For his part, Lipman is focused only on Vanderbilt and the SEC and enjoying his time as a Commodore freshman. “The Commons is phenomenal—the food is so good and the people are so friendly.” He acclimated himself academically this summer by taking two classes in English and political science.

It seems as if his coach Tym said it best: “Ryan is definitely in the right spot at the right time.” n

— David L. Hudson Jr. teaches as an adjunct at Vanderbilt Law School and is the author or co-author of five sports books.

Prized Recruit Ready to Serve Up SEC Success By David L. Hudson Jr.

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Where did you spend part of your summer? Did you visit a castle or cathedral in St. Andrews, take a bicycle tour of Munich or

cruise the harbor in Sydney? Probably not, but members of Vanderbilt’s women’s lacrosse, men’s basketball and men’s golf teams spent part of their summers doing just that.

To further integrate Vanderbilt’s student-athletes into the general student body, Van-derbilt has long encouraged its student-ath-letes to travel abroad during the summer just as the rest of the student body has the oppor-tunity to do. Many have taken advantage of the opportunity to do so over the years and have returned with memories to last a lifetime, but with few friends or anyone to share the experience with.

Such was not the case this summer when three of Vanderbilt’s teams made trips abroad to experience another part of the world together. Instead of being with a small group of students, many of whom had never met before the trip, the teams were able to share cultural experiences that they can reminisce about with each other throughout this season and the seasons to come.

The NCAA allows teams to travel abroad once every four years and it just so happened that Vanderbilt’s three squads decided to take their trips during the same summer. The lacrosse team spent a little over a week in Europe from May 29 to June 7 visiting Ger-many, Austria and the Czech Republic. The basketball team was in Australia August 7-17 and the golf team was in Scotland July 25 through August 3.

While the idea of student-athletes and teams traveling abroad may be frowned upon at some institutions, the idea of giving teams a unique cultural experience is encouraged by administrators at Vanderbilt.

“I think the neat thing is that you get the sense from the higher levels here that it is not just about going over there and winning,” lacrosse Coach Cathy Swezey said. “They

expect us to do that during the season, but they really want our girls to get the cultural experience.”

A cultural experience is exactly what the teams got. They toured the countries they visited, took lots of photos and left with many memories. The lacrosse team took guided tours in every city they vis-ited, but according to Swezey nothing topped the bike tour in Munich, Germany. The men’s basketball team visited four cit-ies, including Townsville, where the team visited the Billabong Wildlife Sanctuary and were able to feed kangaroos and other native species. The golf team stayed in Prestwick and St. Andrews, Scotland, visiting historic locations such as the St. Andrews Castle and St. Andrews Cathedral.

Many of the student-athletes who traveled abroad had never been outside the U.S. Providing them with an opportunity to visit another country is an educational oppor-tunity that was not overlooked—even for the men’s basketball team, which is one of the most diverse squads in the NCAA with four players who grew up outside of the U.S.

“I always enjoy and appreciate the cul-tural opportunity that our players have to see what other people live like, and what it is like in other parts of the world,” men’s basketball Coach Kevin Stallings. “I think that is very important for them as far as their education at Vanderbilt is concerned. It’s not the education you will get in the classroom, but it is still a very big part of their education in my opinion.”

Like Stallings, men’s golf coach Tom Shaw shares a belief that the trip was much more than just about athletics.

“It was a great learning experience,” Shaw said. “It was more than about play-ing golf, it was about having the experience, seeing the history, doing some bonding and just having the life experiences of being in a different culture and country.”

Teams Find Common Bond Overseas

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In addition to being immersed into a differ-ent culture, the teams had an opportunity to test themselves against international compe-tition. The basketball team finished 3-2, while the lacrosse team went 2-0 and the golfers honed their skills on historic courses in St. Andrews, which is known worldwide as the “home of golf.” The teams all had success facing the unique challenges they are not accustomed to in the U.S. By adapting to the different styles found in international compe-tition, the teams hope it will yield dividends for its upcoming seasons.

“Sometimes, in American golf, you get pretty good at being a one-trick pony and you just have one shot for one situation,” Shaw said. “In Europe, on any given shot, you can have multiple options. Being the kind of golfer you need to be to be a world champion, you have to have an entire arsenal of shots, so I think it showed them that, number one, I have to work on more shots to complete my game and number two, once I do that, I’m going to be even more capable of pulling out some shots that maybe my competitors can’t.”

Being able to experience international competition is beneficial, but it is far from being the most important aspect of the overall experience.

“I think that we get to spend a lot of our time together being intense and competing, and to be able to go over and take in a different experience with your team where it is not just about winning is important,” Swezey said.

The amount of time devoted to actual

competition often pales in comparison to the amount of time that is spent experiencing the culture of another country.

“Fully embracing the experience is one of the reasons why we only played two games,” Swezey said. “I wanted the girls to have the time to take in Europe and not worry about getting ready for a game.”

Sports may not be the primary focus of the trip, but often times, teams find success in the season that follows the trip. In recent years, many Vanderbilt teams have taken trips and for the most part, those teams have gone on to have strong seasons. Vanderbilt’s women’s basketball team traveled to Spain in 2007 and

advanced to the Sweet 16. The lacrosse team traveled abroad in 2003 and won a school-record 12 matches the next year.

The men’s basketball team’s trip to Austra-lia was its third international trip under Kevin Stallings. The 2000 team went to France and Italy and narrowly missed the NCAA Tourna-ment. The 2004 team traveled to Spain and was one of the most successful teams in school history, advancing to the Sweet 16.

Traveling abroad is certainly not a magic formula for achieving success, but a lot of

teams point to the chemistry a team develops during trips overseas as a primary reason for having a successful season.

“First of all just the amount of team bond-ing was very beneficial,” Swezey said. “To be able to experience such things as visit-ing cities and just taking in different cultures and be doing it with your teammates and best friends, there is something to be said for that.”

The teams inevitably become closer than they were before the trip because of the amount of time they spend together and the experiences they share. Sure players from the same team spend a lot of time together during the season, but it is unusual that they spend an entire day together as a team. Between classes, homework, etc., it doesn’t happen often that they are all together outside of practice, games or meetings.

For years, Major League Baseball players have left home to spend weeks together at spring training, and NFL teams spend time dur-ing training camp living away from their homes in college dormitories or in the same hotel.

In college, finding that time together can be a little more complicated, which is why many teams find international trips so valuable.

“Just playing that much golf together and being with each other 24/7—these guys were good friends already—but now they have shared experiences that they are always going to talk about,” Shaw said. “That is always going to be something they will remember.” n

Traveling abroad is certainly not a magic formula for achieving success, but a lot of teams point to the chemistry a team develops during trips overseas...

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Quick Hits

• Vanderbilt will play its annual Black and Gold Series Oct. 15, 16 and 18.

• Pitcher Drew Hayes returned for his senior season after being drafted in the 22nd round by Seattle. Also, Van-derbilt retained all of its signees who were drafted.

• Vanderbilt will host an exhibition game against Alabama-Huntsville on Nov. 10 before opening its regular season against Lipscomb on Nov. 16.

• The Commodores will have nine games air on the ESPN family of networks, including their SEC opener at home against Florida on Jan. 9.

• Vanderbilt completed its 10-day trip to Australia with a 3-2 record.

• The men’s cross country team began the 2009 season by tying for fourth at the Belmont-Vanderbilt Opener on Sept. 4.

• The men were paced by Jenner Kizer and Kyle Rewick, who finished 14th and 16th, respectively.

• Defensive end Broderick Stewart was selected by his teammates as the third Vanderbilt player to wear the “KD1” jer-sey patch in honor of former Commo-dore Kwane Doster.

• Vanderbilt’s 45-0 victory over Western Carolina was the team’s first shutout since posting a 58-0 victory over The Citadel on Oct. 9, 1999.

• Against Western Carolina, freshmen

tailbacks Zac Stacy and Warren Nor-man became the first Commodore duo to rush for 100 yards in the same game since Kwane Doster and Norval McKenzie did so against Ole Miss on Sept. 21, 2002.

• Head Coach Bobby Johnson was named Vanderbilt’s Coach of the Year for the 2008-09 academic year.

• Vanderbilt had 11 former players on NFL rosters when the league opened its first weekend of play.

• The men’s golf team opened the 2009 season with a seventh-place finish at the 2009 Golfweek Collegiate Confer-ence Challenge on Sept. 1.

• Senior Hudson Johnson placed third individually with a three-day total of 209 (-7).

• The Commodores will conclude their fall season Oct. 30 through Nov. 1 at the Al-abama Invitational. The Alabama Invita-tional is the fourth tournament Vanderbilt will participate in this October.

• Freshman Ryan Lipman lost in the first round of the U.S. Open qualifying singles draw on Aug. 25. In order to make the main draw, he would have had to have won three matches in the qualifying draw.

• Vanderbilt’s schedule includes 19 games against teams that reached the postseason last year.

• Vanderbilt will host its first exhibition game on Oct. 30 against Union. The regular season will begin Nov. 15 when Lehigh visits Nashville.

• The women’s cross country team opened the 2009 season by defend-ing its title at the Belmont-Vanderbilt Opener on Sept. 4. The women’s team finished first out of nine teams, scor-ing 42 points, which was 15 points more than the second-place team.

• Kristabel Doebel-Hickok led the wom-en with a fourth-place finish. Also in the top 10 were Allie Scalf and Rita Jorgensen.

• The team was ranked No. 6 in the NCAA Division I South Region Pre-season Poll.

• Vanderbilt will close its fall season Oct. 16-18 at the Stanford Fall Intercolle-giate. It will be the second tournament

of the month for the Commodores who will play at the Tar Heel Invitational Oct. 9-11.

• VU opened its season by finishing sev-enth at the Cougar Classic on Sept. 14.

• Sophomore goalkeeper Natalie Wills made the 24-player roster of the 2009-10 U.S. Developmental Team after two days of tryouts in August.

• Wills is one of three student-athletes nationally from the class of 2012 to be fea-tured on the U.S. Developmental Team.

• Seniors Megan Gibson and Laura Keenan were selected to the 2009 Inter-collegiate Women’s Lacrosse Coaches Association All-Academic Team.

• Molly Kinsella was named SEC Player of the Week for the week on Sept. 8, 2009 after helping the Commodores get off to a 5-0 start for the second consecutive season.

• Vanderbilt entered the top-25 rankings on Sept. 8, checking in at No. 25 in the Soccer America poll.

• Freshman Chelsea Stewart was named to the Top Drawer Soccer Women’s Team of the Week for Sept. 1-7.

• Head Coach Geoff Macdonald announc-ed that Rachael Dillon, a two-year mem-ber of the University of California’s tennis team, has transferred to Vanderbilt for the 2009-10 season.

• VU finished the Fall SEC Coaches Clas-sic with a 13-8 record in singles play and a 7-2 mark in doubles.

• Chelsea Preeg was the only VU player to finish the weekend undefeated in singles.Men’s Sports

Women’s Sports

Freshmen Warren Norman (above) and Zac Stacy each topped 100 yards rushing in their debuts against Western Carolina.

Freshman Chelsea Stewart helped the Commodores get off to a 5-0 start for a second straight year.

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Competing in the NCAA Champion-ships as an individual, making a U.S. Open appearance and having

a strong showing at the U.S. Amateur. All of the accomplishments would be enough for a solid career for a lot of golfers, but for Marina Alex, it was just a summer’s worth of work as an 18-year old.

Marina, a sophomore at Vanderbilt, is not your typical teenager.

Vanderbilt women’s golf coach Greg Allen has coached many good players, but there are a select few that have stood out beyond the others, and Marina, along with current LPGA players Lorena Ochoa and Natalie Gulbis, is one of them.

“There are about four people that I’ve coached that I’ve had a feeling about when they hit a shot that something special could happen, and she is one of them,” Allen said.

For Marina, getting her game to this level did not come without a lot of work. That work began as a child when her father, Steve, an accomplished amateur golfer in New Jersey, would take her and her younger brother to the driving range.

“My dad got my brother and I started when we were four, and we would play and hit balls in the summer. He’d take us to the driving range all the time. I think I was seven at my first tournament.”

Marina learned the game from her dad, but she also learned much more than just how to hit a 5-iron or pitching wedge.

“Marina has watched me play golf my whole life, and watched me compete,” Steve Alex said. “I’ve found a way to lose a golf tournament every way there is to lose, and that really makes me qualified to be a ter-rific instructor for her because you learn a lot from losing. Marina has seen all that, and I’ve taught her from my failures.”

She found a love of golf early, but it wasn’t until high school that Marina began to realize she was becoming pretty good at it. Her rise in golf prompted her to give up her other favorite hobby at the time: com-petitive dancing.

“It was a lot of fun, but I was better at golf then I was a dancer, so I decided I would do what I was good at,” Marina said. “I really liked to go to the range, but I didn’t take it seriously until I realized I was decent at it.”

Marina was more than just decent at Wayne Hills High School in Wayne, N.J. She was the top high school player in the county, including boys. Like a lot of high schools in New Jersey, Wayne Hills did not sponsor a girl’s golf team, so in order to play, Marina had to make the boy’s team, which she did.

She was the only girl on the team and usually the only girl in the field at tourna-ments, but it didn’t matter to Marina, who won the county championship as a junior and senior. The only state-sponsored girl’s event was an individual girl’s state

championship, which Marina won twice.

“I was never really expected to do anything, so I just went out there and played,” Marina said. “There was no pressure on me to win these tournaments so it was nice to beat the boys up a little bit.”

A lot of golfers can have a good round or two, but it takes a special talent to win—a talent that can’t be taught.

“She is able to remain in the moment, and she is able to not really get that excited when things speed up on her when she is in contention,” Steve said. “Having that quality is just some-thing you can’t teach.”

Marina carried her high school success over to college, where she began her Vanderbilt career by finishing sixth at the 2008 Mason Rudolph Championship.

However, from there her play began to slip below her standards and she didn’t record another top-20 finish until April.

“She got off to a good start in our tournament and didn’t have a great start to the spring season, but I think that a change came for her sometime in late March or early April,” Allen said. “We set her down and talked to her about having a better attitude on the golf course. Early in the spring, she would let a bad shot get her down.”

By the time the SEC Championships began, Marina’s game was beginning to take flight. Through two rounds, she was in fourth place, and if not for carding a final-round 79 to finish 17th, she may have won medalist honors.

She didn’t finish the SEC Championship as strongly as she would have liked, but the transformation of her game had already begun, and it wasn’t just because of an improvement to her swing.

“I’m not going to lie, school ended and so did the stress that came with it,” Marina said. “The last couple of tournaments of the spring season, I know all of us were just swamped with school work getting ready for finals. The fact that we could go to SECs and not have to pick up a book and not have to worry about taking an exam was beautiful.”

Marina went on to tie for fifth at the NCAA East Regional, which earned her a spot as an individual in the NCAA Championships, where she tied for 37th. In June, she quali-fied for the U.S. Open by finishing fourth in her sectional. She concluded her summer at the U.S. Amateur, where she was second through stroke play before being eliminated in the first round of match play.

“It was more than I hoped it would have been,” said Marina of her summer. “The U.S. Open was my main goal, and if I got there I would have been really satisfied with my summer, and I was.“

She has experienced a lot on the golf course, but even she got caught up in the experience at the U.S. Open.

“Everything was going fine and practice rounds weren’t that big of deal and then the first day came,” Marina said. “I had an after-noon tee time, and I got there at 11 and it was crazy because there were so many peo-ple there. I got to the first hole, and it began to sink in that it was actually happening. The emotions all built up.

“I usually focus on keeping calm and keeping my emotions together, but nothing can really prepare you for playing in the U.S. Open except by playing in it.”

Beyond experience, what Marina got from playing in the U.S. Open was a boost in con-fidence that has made every other tourna-ment seem … not so U.S. Open-like.

“It is good that I got there when I did just to get a tournament like that under my belt so when I get back there, which I have full inten-tions of doing, it won’t be as intimidating,” Marina said. “It helped me a lot. Every tour-nament since then has seemed a lot easier and less stressful. It is a different feeling.”

And that feeling is a good one for Vander-bilt’s golf team this season. n

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No Sophomore Slump in Sight for Marina Alex

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The Month Ahead

Men’s SportsCross Country10/3 at Louisville Invitational TBA10/17 at NCAA Pre-Nationals TBA10/31 at SEC Championships TBA

Football10/3 Mississippi TBA10/10 at Army 11 a.m.10/17 Georgia TBA10/24 at South Carolina TBA10/31 Georgia Tech TBA

Golf10/11-13 The Prestige All Day

Tennis10/3-5 at Georgia Tech Invitational All Day10/5-11 at D’Novo/ITA All-American All Day10/22-26 at ITA Regional Championships All Day10/30-11/1 at Alabama Invitational All Day

Women’s SportsBasketball10/30 Union (exhibition) 7 p.m.

Bowling10/23-25 at Greater Ozark Invitational TBA

Cross Country10/3 at Louisville Invitational TBA10/17 at NCAA Pre-Nationals TBA10/31 at SEC Championships TBA

Golf10/9-11 at Tar Heel Invitational All Day10/16-18 at Stanford Fall Intercollegiate All Day

Soccer10/2 Tennessee 7 p.m.10/4 Georgia 2 p.m.10/9 Arkansas 7 p.m.10/11 LSU 1 p.m.10/16 at Auburn 7:30 p.m.10/18 at Alabama 1 p.m.10/22 Mississippi State 7 p.m.10/25 at Mississippi 2 p.m.10/30 Kentucky 7 p.m.

Swimming10/10 vs. Alabama/Centenary (Tuscaloosa, Ala.) TBA10/17 Southern Illinois TBA

Tennis10/6-11 at Riviera/ITA All-American All Day10/9-11 at Kentucky Invitational All Day10/22-26 at Ohio Valley Regional All Day

October 2-4 • Family Weekend

Vanderbilt’s annual Family Weekend will take place around the Commodores’ game against Ole Miss on Oct. 3. In addition to the football game, there will also be various open houses, lectures, tours around campus, etc.

October 15-16, 18 • Black & Gold Series

Get an early look at Vanderbilt’s 2010 baseball team by watching the Commodores wrap up fall practice with the annual Black and Gold Series at Hawkins Field.

October 16 • Basketball Practice Begins

Vanderbilt’s basketball teams will begin prac-ticing for the 2009-10 season on Oct. 16—the first practice day permitted by the NCAA. The women’s team will host its first exhibition game on Oct. 30, while the men will host their only exhibition game Nov. 10.

October 16-17 • Homecoming

Homecoming festivities will take place through-out the week leading up to Vanderbilt’s game against Georgia, but the majority of the activities will take place Oct. 16-17.

October 18 • Bears at Falcons

The Chicago Bears and Commodore quintet currently on the roster will get as close to Music City as they will be all year when the team plays at Atlanta.

What to Watch For

• Vanderbilt, in conjunction with Asgard Press, has created a vin-tage Vanderbilt football program calendar for 2010. Each month of the calendar features a different game program cover from de-cades ago. Fans can purchase the Vanderbilt calendar online for $18.95 by visiting www.asgardpress.com.

• Vanderbilt had 11 players on NFL rosters during the opening weekend of the NFL season. Included in the 11 are Sean Walker (St. Louis) and Reshard Langford (Philadelphia), who were both added to practice squads.

• Vanderbilt officials, in conjunction with Nashville’s Metropolitan government agencies and its own Vanderbilt Police Department, began enforcement to eliminate street vendors and ticket scalpers around the footprint of Vanderbilt’s athletic buildings.

• Fans can receive live score updates from all of VU’s football games this season by following VandyFootball at Twitter.com. The service is free to sign up for, and standard text message rates apply.

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