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NACDA honors Swofford as Corbett recipient

The National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics has selected Atlantic Coast Conference Commissioner John Swofford as the 45th recipient of the association’s coveted James J. Corbett Memorial Award.

The Corbett Award is presented annually to the collegiate administrator who “through the years has most typified Corbett’s devotion to intercollegiate athletics and worked unceasingly for its betterment.” Corbett, a long-time athletics director at LSU, was NACDA’s first president in 1965.

Swofford, in his 14th year as commissioner of the ACC, served as president of NACDA in 1993-94 while director of athletics at North Carolina. He assumed his role as the fourth full-time commissioner in July 1997.

Swofford will be officially recognized at the NACDA convention in June.

“Receiving the Corbett Award is truly one of the highlights of my career because NACDA has meant a great deal to me since I attended my first convention in 1976,” Swofford said. “When I look at the previous recipients, it is humbling to join them. None of us has success without the help and support of others, and I have been fortunate to have that support from family and colleagues throughout my career. I am sure there are many recipients who were more deserving, but I can assure you that there are none more appreciative.”

During his career, Swofford has been an advocate of academics and student-athlete well-being, and he helped the league form the ACC Student-Athlete Advisory Committee. When he was hired at North Carolina in May 1980 at the age of 31, Swofford was the youngest major college athletics director in the nation at the time. He initiated North Carolina’s trademark licensing program and saw tremendous growth in athletics facilities on campus. His accomplishments were recognized by the university with the establishment of the John D. Swofford women’s athletics scholarship and the naming of an auditorium in the university’s football complex in his honor.