Temple Athletics Newsletter

Greetings,

I hope you are doing well and enjoying a great summer.

As I reflect on the 2022 – 2023 academic year, I am reminded that Temple Athletics and its teams had some great accomplishments worthy of celebration. Whether in the classroom or the community, Temple student-athletes continued to make us proud, while several programs had individual performances deserving of recognition.

As the nation celebrated the 50th anniversary of Title IX, the year started with the retirement of a Temple Athletics legend, Dr. Nikki Franke, who started our varsity fencing program and coached our student-athletes to unprecedented success over a stellar 50-year career. Coach Franke recommended and endorsed turning the program over to one of the members of her 1992 NCAA Championship team, Jennie Salmon, who had a tremendous first year at the helm, leading us to our 27th consecutive NIWFA Championship and final national ranking of #11.

A few weeks after the team celebrated its championship it was announced that junior saberist Diana Tiburcio was awarded the Barry Goldwater Scholarship for the 2023-24 academic year. This prestigious scholarship is awarded to sophomores and juniors in the fields of natural sciences, engineering, and mathematics and is considered the most competitive undergraduate scholarship for STEM students who intend a career in research. Diana owns a 4.0 grade point average in Mechanical Engineering and was one of two Temple University students chosen (Nala Hamilton, junior Biology major) and one of 413 selected nationally. This is a great honor for Temple.

In addition to our Fencing program there were many other athletics highlights during the year including:

• Women’s Track & Field student-athletes, Laura Nicholson and Allie Riches qualified for the NCAA Track & Field East Regional. After earning a gold in the 1500 at the American Athletic Conference Championships, Nicholson competed in the 1500m, while Riches jumped her way to the regional in pole vault after setting seven school records in her first season as an Owl.
• Women’s Tennis’ double team of Jamie Wei and Maiko Uchijima was ranked among the Top 10 in the nation during the season and qualified for the NCAA Championship. It marked the first time that Temple was represented in the NCAAs in women’s tennis in 20 years.
  
• Men’s Basketball upset #1 Houston on the road, marking just the third time in program history – and the first in 23 years – that our Owls have upset the nation’s top ranked team.
  
• Quarterback E.J. Warner earned the starting job early in his true freshman season and broke multiple school records, including the most passing yards (527), and completions (45) in a game against East Carolina. The American Athletic Conference Rookie of the Year also became the second Temple QB to pass for over 3,000 yards in a season.
  
• After defeating #13 UCONN in their final conference game, Temple Field Hockey clinched their third straight BIG EAST Tournament appearance, ending the regular season ranked #24.

I am thrilled to report that our student-athletes continued to excel in the classroom. Under the leadership of Tara Evans, Director of the Nancy and Donald Resnick Academic Support Center for Student-Athletes, we continued our record streak of 23 consecutive semesters with an overall cumulative GPA above a 3.00 for our over 500 student-athletes. This spring semester Temple Athletics combined grade point average for all 19 teams was a 3.34 with 39 student-athletes earning a perfect 4.0 semester GPA. This year also marked the ten-year anniversary of the Nancy & Donald Resnick Academic Support Center for Student-Athletes, which served as a great reminder of the amazing commitment from the Resnick’s to help us redefine student-athlete success over the course of the last decade. Thank you to the student-athletes for their continued commitment to academic excellence, the Resnicks, as well as to all of the great staff of advisors, learning specialists, and tutors who call the Resnick Center home.

In terms of community engagement, I am proud to report our student-athletes combined for over 2,600 hours of community service this academic year! Our teams participated in a variety of different initiatives, including a department-wide Day of Service on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. Our coaches and staff joined our student-athletes in serving 15 different community organizations, performing various tasks such as cleaning, painting, gardening, food delivery, etc.. A special thanks to Prince Moody, Associate Athletics Director for DEI & Student-Athlete Development, Tia Withers, Temple Athletics Coordinator of Leadership Operations, and Andrea Swann, Director of Community & Neighborhood Affairs for coordinating these efforts. We look forward to establishing new partnerships across the community and continuing to demonstrate our commitment to civic engagement.

Additionally, this year marked the beginning of a new program designed to expose Temple’s greatness to area youth. The “Temple Experience” was formulated from conversations and meetings with surrounding municipalities in Philadelphia and New Jersey with the aim to introduce the community, specifically young students, to all that Temple University and Temple Athletics has to offer. Through a partnership with Dr. DaVonti Hayes and Dr. Raven Lynch from the School of Social Work, Temple Undergraduate Admissions, and Temple’s Black Student Union, Temple Athletics hosted three different Temple Experience events that welcomed under 450 area middle school students to our facilities, including Lincoln Financial Field. We look forward to continuing to grow the Temple Experience and see more and more young people on our campus in the future.

As we welcomed more students to campus, many of our student-athletes had a completely different Temple experience by traveling abroad through our partnership with the School of Sport, Tourism & Hospitality Management (STHM). This spring 46 different student-athletes from ten different sports participated in three unique short duration study abroad experiences – Barbados, Rome, Italy and Madrid, Spain. With Dr. Debra Blair leading the trips to Barbados and Madrid and Dr. Jeremy Jordan leading the visit to Temple’s Rome campus, our student-athletes were submersed in foreign cultures, where they learned the history and sampled cuisine, while building relationships with fellow student-athletes from different teams. These transformative experiences have become a great source of pride of our department and we look forward to providing opportunities to more student-athletes in the future.

Earlier this spring, our student-athletes also had an opportunity to travel to New York City for a day of professional networking with our Temple Owls Take Manhattan program. We are very grateful for Temple alum, Doug Maine, for his leadership in organizing an exceptional multi-disciplinary panel and hosting 48 student-athletes from ten sports at Brown Brothers & Harriman Co. on Wall Street. Following the panel and networking session, our student-athletes visited the World Trade Center site before a session at the Adobe Systems Office. Thank you to Alyssa Drachslin, Coordinator of Leadership & Professional Development in the Resnick Center, as well as the staff from Temple’s Career Center in facilitating this outstanding experience and their commitment to the career readiness of our student-athletes.

As we look ahead to the coming weeks, the weekend of August 4th one of our own, Joe Klecko, will be enshrined into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio. A two-time honorable mention All-America selection during his outstanding Temple career (1974-76), Klecko had an incredible 12-year NFL career with the Colts and Jets and set the then-NFL record with 20.5 sacks during the 1981 season. I look forward to celebrating this momentous occasion in Canton with the Kleckos and many of our alums at the enshrinement ceremony on Saturday, August 5. If your schedule allows, please join us in Canton to celebrate with the Klecko family.

From the University front, Joanne Epps was introduced as Temple’s Acting President in April 2023. President Epps, who served as our Athletics Faculty Representative in the 2000s, spoke with our entire athletics staff this spring about the importance athletics has within the University community. President Epps is an amazing woman who has served Temple and the community for over 40 years. We look forward to working with her during her tenure leading our university.

In closing, we have been immersed in the creation of a vision statement and core value exercises over the last six months. It has been an extremely enlightening process led by expert facilitator, consultant and Temple alum, Michael Gaines. We were able to identify areas of improvement in addition to highlighting what we do best. Thank you to all the staff, student-athletes, coaches, and alumni who participated in this process. I look forward to sharing the results of this work soon. Having student-athletes represent our great university in NCAA and conference championships, coupled with a holistic student-athlete experience, remains our top priority. In the meantime, we recognize that without success in competition we will fall short of an important goal.

The support from committed fans, alumni, faculty and staff has a direct impact on the student-athlete experience. All of your support – attendance, donations, community engagement, mentorship – makes a significant difference. We are grateful for your passion and energy and we look forward to seeing you at our athletics events and/or back on campus during the 2023-24 academic year.

Missed an edition? See all past newsletters HERE.