Student-Athlete
Tennis players went to college in the 1960’s to receive an education because there was not anything after college sports but the workforce. Mr. Butch Newman was a student-athlete at the time most universities treated athletics first and academics second (Newman, 2017). Newman understood that academics needed to take top priority. Coach Mabry emphasized the priority of academics first. He created an acronymn using the knowledge of the athletes needing a good SAT score to be admitted to Trinity. The S stood for spiritual, A for academics, and T for tennis. He believed this acronymn was the correct order to live life by (Newman, 2017).
In his time at Trinity University Mr. Newman was a disciplined student-athlete according to his roommate and doubles partner, Mr. Cliff Buchholz (Buchholz, 2017). Buchholz credited Newman for helping him gain study habits that allowed him to finish at Trinity and go on to receive a law degree (Buchholz, 2017). Newman understood he would need his degree after his tennis days were over at Trinity so he propelled himself in the classroom.