50 Years of Women's Varsity Athletics: Volleyball

50 Years of Women's Varsity Athletics: Leslie Lewis

Photo by: Duke Athletics

50 Years of Women's Varsity Athletics: Volleyball

11/15/2021 5:29:00 PM | Volleyball, Athletics

Legacy Talk with First Scholarship Player Leslie C. Lewis

By: GoDuke the Magazine

Duke is celebrating 50 years of varsity women’s athletics in 2021-22. This is the second installment of a year-long GoDuke The Magazine series reflecting on the Blue Devils’ 14 women’s sports programs. For more from the university, see dukengwsd.com or #DukeWomens50 on social media.

Leslie C. Lewis was Duke’s first scholarship volleyball player and one of the first five female student-athletes to receive an athletic scholarship. She served as a team captain and was a key figure for the 1976 squad that reached the AIAW Nationals. She was also a violinist in the Duke Symphony Orchestra. She is now a consultant (in conflict resolution and mediation), facilitator, strategic planner, professional playwright and author living in Colorado.

Back in the fall of 1977, what did it mean to you to be in the first group of female student-athletes at Duke to be awarded athletic scholarships?

That was at the time universities had to become compliant with Title IX. I was not very aware of what was going on in the background. When I received the scholarship I was a junior and had already been attending the university for two years. My sophomore year our team went to the AIAW national tournament, the first time the volleyball program had ever made it to the national tournament. I had not been recruited to Duke for volleyball, I was a walkon my freshman year. Because our team did really well and I was a good performer on the team and was going to be there a couple more years, that’s the reason. And it helped Duke become compliant. They needed to start having equity in the sports. So it was a way for Duke to recognize my accomplishments for what I had done in volleyball and also a way for Duke to start to become in compliance (with Title IX).

VOLLEYBALL FILE

• Volleyball was one of eight varsity women’s sports during the 1970s, playing its first official season in 1971.
• Before the NCAA took over women’s sports, Duke competed in the AIAW.
The 1976 Blue Devils were Duke’s first great team, posting a 36-6 record and reaching the AIAW national tournament in Austin, Tex.
• Duke has made 20 trips to the NCAA Tournament, beginning with the 1984 team that finished with a 31-9 record. The 2010 Duke team had one of the school’s best postseason runs, reaching the NCAA quarterfinals and finishing 27-7.
• Duke has been crowned the ACC volleyball champion 11 times, including seven under former coach Jon Wilson (3 in a row 1984-86, and 4 in a row 1991-94). Duke had 3 straight undefeated ACC seasons 1991-93, with a 37-0 record vs. the league during that stretch.
• Duke had 10 players named to the ACC’s 50th Anniversary volleyball team, which was selected in August 2002.

What are some of the things you fondly remember about that 1976 season when you went to the national tournament and created quite a buzz on campus?

There was a lot of attention and it was great. Ed Turlington from (The Chronicle) covered us and wrote a lot of lovely articles. What was really fun was moving out of the gym on East Campus and moving over to Cameron to get to play our games in Cameron Indoor Stadium. That was wonderful and exciting to play on that great floor. What was really wonderful was actually having people come in to spectate. This had not really happened before. We had a few friends (in attendance), but people started to come in and that just raised the level of excitement. Also, I have to say, our team is still in touch with each other. We are planning a huge reunion for next fall. We’ve had reunions before. We became very close, it was a unique bond, and it was at a time when we weren’t showered with money. We came together in the back of vans driving to Tennessee, mushed in there all over each other playing word games and getting to know each other. I have to say those are some of my most precious memories…and it’s wonderful that we are still in touch.

With Title IX having come into play a few years earlier, did you get a sense that women’s sports was on the verge of something big or was it still too early to tell what might happen?

Swimming was really coming into its own at that time, tennis as well, golf… Those sports all had a presence and their presence was becoming larger and larger. And it happened pretty quickly right at that time at the beginning of the 80s. Nancy Hogshead and various other athletes at that time, basketball started to come into play… I think when we went to the national tournament and saw what was going on out there, we were playing against the major players in the sport and it was opening your eyes — look at what’s happening, look at the level of athletics at all these places around the country, that can happen here, too. So there was a sense that something was going to be shifting. How and when and how fast was unclear because that was just the beginning.

Tell us about how Duke has impacted your life.

Duke is a huge part of my life right now. I’m the ideal prodigal. I literally had nothing to do with the university for 20 or 30 years. Then I came back for a women’s weekend and became aware of the extraordinary resources at Duke in terms of the people. So I took that experience back here to Colorado with me, started the women’s forum here, chaired it, and eventually became a member of the Duke Alumni board through the experience of volunteering for Duke intensely these past 10 years. I’ve come to admire the university at a level I had no appreciation for when I was in school. I tell people I’m a slow developer, slow maturation rate. It took me a long time to understand the power of the network, the power that is behind the resources of the people at Duke, the alums. I’m constantly amazed when I’m in a room of Duke alumni. So now my involvement with Duke is quite deep, quite wide and incredibly important to my well-being.

What’s it mean to you to be a part of 50 years of women’s athletics at Duke?

Incredibly grateful. I was the lucky recipient of that honor to be the first woman in volleyball to get a scholarship at Duke and a part of that first cohort of five women to receive scholarships. That’s remarkable. I’m so lucky that I got to be that person and that that is in my history, because now I get to come back and share the meaning of being involved at that deep of a level in volleyball at Duke. And there is nothing like the bond of being on an athletic team. It’s different than every other relationship or association that you could ever have because of that level of intensity and the competition, so I am ever so grateful to be part of Duke. I am also grateful to have been able to pass on the value of athletics to my daughter, Augusta Rose, and maximally support her in that regard. She is an internationally competitive equestrian vaulter, and her squad was chosen to compete for Team USA at the Junior World Championships. I am so grateful to have been able to give her this gift, of having international experience living with families from other countries, experiencing their customs, food, friendships. She has been vaulting with the same squad members since she was 9, and they are all like sisters/cousins, even closer — that bond between teammates being one of the most unique relationships there is. To know she has that already, that her life will forever have been positively shaped by these times, makes my heart swell.

50 YEARS OF WOMEN'S ATHLETICS

“I’m delighted to know that Duke is celebrating 50 years of women’s athletics! The opportunities that Title IX provided were necessary and have resulted positively on a variety of levels. I have seen Title IX’s positive influence over the years, beginning with my older sisters who began playing interscholastically late in high school wearing gym uniforms and pinnies; to myself being able to receive some scholarship money and one pair of volleyball shoes which I treated like gold; to our student-athletes today. It’s incredible to see the growth and development. “I have seen our student-athletes over the years develop teamwork, cooperation, leadership, self confidence, independence, strength and character to name just a few qualities as a result. The incredible opportunities that have resulted from Title IX have greatly enhanced numerous lives and families including the men and boys in our lives. To witness the increased support, growth, opportunities and funding for women in athletics over the years and see the increased level at which we compete is exciting, motivating and evidence that this was the right thing to do.”