Bio

Lisa Murphy is in a “league of her own”. She was a four-sport athlete, the first player in Wellesley basketball history to score 1,000 points, a Wellesley Outstanding Athlete winner, the first recipient of the Barbara Barnes Hauptfuhrer Scholar-Athlete award, a winner of the Katherine Malone Scholar prize, an NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship recipient and lastly, a Rhodes Scholar. Among many, her highest accomplishment was winning the New England Division III Tennis #2 Doubles championship and being named an NCAA Division III Tennis Championships qualifier with her doubles partner Ann Smith.  In basketball, Lisa was captain, team MVP, Seven Sisters Tournament Champion and a New England Women’s Basketball Association Senior All-Star.  Lisa continues to serve Wellesley as a member of the Malone Scholars Committee. 

So these things are always so hard to write. Sometimes because one doesn’t want to sound corny or formulaic. Sometimes because it’s just hard to talk about oneself. And sometimes because, despite being a science major, I feel like I spend my whole life writing, so the thought of writing even more seems like a chore (did I mention I was a math science type?). But for this, I think it’s hard because Wellesley and Wellesley Athletics were so important in my life—in both opening up a whole new world to me and in shaping the person that I am today, that trying to describe the enormity of it all in 500 words or less is daunting. But here goes. I grew up in Indiana and went to a public high school, graduating with a class of 400.

Only a handful of us left Indiana for college and I was the only one to make it east of Ohio. And that wasn’t because we had any East Coast ties. My family were all “I” state Midwesterners (born in Iowa, Illinois, and Indiana). But for some reason my mother, the driving force in our family, thought I should go East and introduced me to Smith, Mount Holyoke, and of course Wellesley (I had never heard of any of them—nor had my friends). I still remember clearly the day my parents dropped me off and drove away. I felt alone and just cried in my dorm room. But two things quickly overcame the homesickness—the intellectual world Wellesley opened up for me and the excitement of being a part of Wellesley Athletics. The academics were amazing and with each course in a new department (14 different departments for me) I discovered an entirely new world of intellectual thought.

This wasn’t without its growing pains (like the time my French teacher asked who hadn’t heard of Proust and I looked around with horror to find I was the only one raising my hand) but it was so exciting it was easy to ignore those moments. (As a member of the Katherine Malone selection committee I’m sad to say it seems few current Wellesley students go outside their comfort area and explore the wonders of a true liberal arts education.) On the athletics side, I still remember with clarity going to the sign board between the chapel parking lot and the rhododendron dell and finding my name on the list of those who made the tennis team. I can even still conjure up that feeling in my stomach—the excitement and nerves mixed with exhilaration. That was just the start of my life with Wellesley athletics, which included playing a sport in every season except my final spring season where I thought finishing my thesis was a good idea.

I remember my first trip ever to New Hampshire (tennis match at Dartmouth). I remember driving in a blizzard in the van with the basketball team to New York to play Columbia (and by driving I mean I was the one driving the team van—times have changed as have liability rules no doubt). I remember the time as a first-year when I had a wide open layup to win the game as time ran out but was so excited it hit the backboard so hard that it bounced to the free throw line. On a more positive note, I remember the final game in Hemenway Hall against Smith and blocking a full speed layup by their All-American (whose name I’m sort of glad I don’t remember). But what I remember most is the wonderful friends I made, the camaraderie of being on a team, the colorful coaches (meant in the best way possible), the wonderful support we had from faculty (whether athletically inclined or not), the exhilaration of exercise every day, and (here’s the corny part) the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat. I’ve been able to continue my intellectual journey since Wellesley, but nothing has ever, ever compared to Wellesley Athletics.