Spalding President To Be Keynote Speaker at NCAA Convention
A former Division III student-athlete who became the first woman to row solo across the Atlantic Ocean and one of the first two women to ski cross country to the South Pole will be the keynote speaker for the Division III business session at the 2014 NCAA Convention.
Tori Murden McClure, president of Spalding University (one of Division III’s newest members, joining in 2012) and a graduate of Smith College (the first women’s college to join Division III, in 1981), will speak January 18 during the Division III business session in the Hilton San Diego Bayfront hotel.
McClure’s address will be the centerpiece of a celebration of Division III’s 40th anniversary year. She will be introduced by former NCAA President Ced Dempsey, who was a three-sport student-athlete at Division III member Albion College.
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Tori Murden McClure |
She is among former Division III student-athletes who are being honored during 2013-14 in a series of weekly online profiles at NCAA.org titled “40-in-40.” The series, which today features McClure, is focusing on student-athletes who graduated in 1973 or later and exemplify the division’s attributes: Proportion, Comprehensive Learning, Passion, Responsibility, Sportsmanship and Citizenship.
McClure competed in rowing and squash and served as co-captain of the basketball team at Smith, and also served as a student athletic trainer before graduating in 1985. Nearly four years later, while pursuing a master of divinity degree at Harvard University, she and Shirley Metz became the first women to ski overland to the South Pole, as part of a Canadian-led expedition that also included eight men.
She twice set out to row solo across the Atlantic, the first effort an eastbound attempt in 1998 that ended after she was injured and her boat The American Pearl was severely damaged by winds and waves generated by three hurricanes. The boat was abandoned but floated ashore several weeks later, and ultimately was repaired and improved for a successful 3,333-mile westbound attempt one year later.
McClure wrote a book in 2009 (A Pearl in the Storm: How I Found My Heart in the Middle of the Atlantic) about her experiences. In the book, she also wrote about her time at Smith, where she initially considered pursuing a career in medicine but changed her major to psychology and also developed an interest in world religions.
She writes that at the end of her senior year, she was surprised to be honored as the student who best represented the ideals of a Smith scholar-athlete, and told Linda Moulton, associate athletics director at the college, that she didn’t feel she deserved the recognition.
“Linda didn’t attempt to argue with me,” she writes about Moulton, who later would serve as director of athletics at Clark University and serve on several NCAA committees, including the Division III Management Council. “She thought for a moment and said, ‘Most Valuable Players come and go. Being the best only lasts for a few seasons.’ She reminded me how offended I’d been to see female athletes at other schools treated like second-class citizens. She called me an ‘idealist,’ but the softness in her voice made it clear that she meant it as a compliment. ‘You believe in the ideals of the scholar-athlete. No one can live up to that in four years. That may take a lifetime.’”
She continued to pursue those ideals over three decades, also climbing mountains on several continents and becoming involved in the National Outdoor Leadership School. McClure also earned a law degree at the University of Louisville and a master of fine arts degree at Spalding. She became president at Spalding in 2010 and among other initiatives, helped lead the institution through a provisional-membership period that culminated with the school achieving active membership in Division III. She currently serves as vice chair of the St. Louis Intercollegiate Athletic Conference’s presidents council.
In 2012, McClure was inducted into Smith’s athletics hall of fame as part of its inaugural class of honorees.
The 40th anniversary observance seeks to celebrate Division III’s history and philosophy, in addition to calling attention to the unique intercollegiate athletics experience shared by student-athletes at institutions like Spalding and Smith. After 40 years, Division III institutions sponsor high-quality athletics competition, and in accordance with the division’s philosophy also seek to ensure opportunities for academic success and for participation in campus life beyond athletics.
Division III was established as the result of an NCAA reorganization into three membership divisions in August 1973. The division established its governance structure and sponsored its first men’s championships during 1973-74 (women’s programs were incorporated into the NCAA beginning in 1981).
COURTESY OF JACK COPELAND AT NCAA.ORG