The University of Georgia Lady Bulldogs aim to make their mark in the NCAA Tournament. For graduate student Haley Clark, who is the 2018 Arthur Ashe Jr. Female Sports Scholar, these are the final basketball games of her outstanding collegiate career. Throughout four years at Georgia, Clark has been a teammate, friend, scholar, motivator and
leader.
Women’s basketball head coach Joni Taylor says coaching Clark — team captain and a starter the last two years — has been a blessing. “She’s someone who from day one has always been very mature and had an understanding of what she wants to
accomplish and will do anything that she needs to do to help this team win,” says Taylor. “She shows the team what focus and determination look like. Everyone sees
her studying on the bus or on the plane and it shows what’s possible.”
Clark acknowledges that she has always been highly driven, with a strong work ethic, and thanks her parents for nurturing that. As a teenager, she completed all of her
high school’s advanced placement courses, so, during her junior and senior years, she attended morning classes at a local community college.
She admits that, during her years at Georgia, she sometimes sacrificed sleep to ensure that sufficient time was spent at practice, in the gym on individual
workouts and studying. Honors have included SEC Academic Honor Roll, Caterpillar Student Athlete of the Month and J. Reid Parker Director of Athletics
Honor Roll. Teammates come to her for study tips.
“People say time management, but I say time prioritizing,” says Clark, 22, who completed her undergraduate degree in finance in three years and is currently
studying for her master’s in financial planning. “When [my teammates] see how well I do — I give a lot of thanks to Georgia for recognizing me for the academics — they
see it is noticed. Leading by example is a big thing. When they see me being noticed, they try to do the same.”
Sitting on two prominent studentathlete groups, LEAD (UGA Athletic Association Student-Athlete Leadership Academy) and SAC (Student-Athlete Advisory Committee), community
service has also figured prominently in Clark’s life. In 2017, she was one of 19 Georgia student-athletes who went to Costa Rica as part of Soles for Souls, a
nonprofit organization that collects new and used shoes and redistributes them to people in need. Heather LaBarbera, director of student services, says there
was never a doubt that Clark would participate in this first service-learning trip for Georgia student-athletes.
“We push them to get outside their comfort zones, to network, to be our frontline for anything that we do in the community,” says LaBarbera. “I put a lot of
opportunities out there for our leadership academy, and Haley’s always jumping on board. If she can do it with her schedule, she does it because she always wants to
better herself.”
