Sometimes it isn’t easy being a smart person named Smart.
“Yeah, they still get on me a little bit,” Pete Smart said Monday night after being named Kansas University’s male senior scholar-athlete of the year. “But it kind of runs in the family.”
Smart’s mother is dean of the business school at Southwest Texas State, and his dad teaches business strategies at Texas A&M.
Not surprisingly, Smart is working on a masters degree in business. A fifth-year senior, he earned a bachelor’s degree last May.
A left-handed pitcher on KU’s baseball team, Smart has maintained a 3.62 grade point average.
Volleyball player Amy Myatt was named the female scholar-athlete of the year during ceremonies at the Lied Center. She has a 3.82 GPA in pre-physical therapy.
Myatt, who hails from Iowa City, Iowa, still has a semester of classwork and a semester of on-the-job training with a physical therapy firm remaining before she graduates.
“Hopefully, I’ll get into medical school after that,” Myatt said. “I’d like to go in-state, but I’ll go back to Iowa if I have to.”
Myatt’s volleyball days are over, but Smart’s days as a pitcher are not. Smart will definitely give pro baseball a try.
“I’m going to give it a shot, but I know I’ll have other options,” he said. “I’m looking forward to the challenge. I’m realistic. I think I can make it to the big leagues, but I don’t believe I’ll ever be a superstar.”
Smart has never been drafted and won’t be in June because he is a fifth-year player, but he has talked to a few teams about signing as a free agent and, he said, “I probably will.”
Smart, who stands 6-foot-7, is the Jayhawks’ leading pitcher this season with an 8-4 record.
Myatt, a six-footer, was the first player in KU history to record more than 400 kills in back-to-back seasons. She set a school record last fall with an average of 4.57 kills per game.
Also on Monday night, the KU Student-Athlete Advisory Committee presented a large plaque to outgoing athletics director Bob Frederick, who received a standing ovation.
It was announced that the senior scholar-athlete award would be named in Frederick’s honor starting in 2002.
Here are the other award winners:
Commitment to Excellence Roger Ross, football.
Del Shankel Teaching Excellence Peter Mancall, history.
Service awards Bob Lockwood, Phil Huntsinger, Carole Zebas, Wayne Osness, Bob Brown, Bob Senecal and Sally Frost-Mason.
Hale Academic Awards Jennifer Bawanan, golf; Colin Dutton, track; Rodrigo Echagaray, tennis; Jaclyn Johnson, basketball; Stacy Keller, track; Clarence Laws, football; Leila Mengsketball; Bryant Nash, basketball; Arrah Nielsen, track; Jawad Pearson, football; Crysta Redwine, track; Roger Ross, football; Amber Snyder, track; Patricia Stringham, swimming; Greg Tyree, football; Megan Urquhart, softball; Nikki Wahle, soccer; Mike Walker, track; Meka White, track; Megan Wray, track.
