WACO, Texas (KXXV) — Baylor's newest development centers opened up earlier this year.
The Fudge Football development center and the Foster Pavilion offer the latest technology and equipment in advancing athletics.
For the Fudge center, it's all off a $15 million donation from Jeremy Fudge and the Fudge family to Baylor's Give Light campaign.
"The biggest thing for me about Baylor and Baylor athletics, both in general right now is how much our president and our athletic director are driving towards this concept, this philosophy of as Christians, we need to be great. Whether it's R1 and academics and things like that or whether it's things in athletics, that vision holds true and is just so personal and deep to me as far as what resonates," Jeremy Fudge said.
Jeremy Fudge graduated from Baylor in 1997 and currently serves as managing partner for Berry Appleman & Leiden LLP.
Talks of developing the center begin in 2020 and while the centers look to take student athletes to the next level, Baylor sees it as raising standards.
"This is a place as a university and as an athletic department both, this is a place that you can truly develop and grow as a person first and foremost and then academic, athletically, whatever else. That's really what it's about," Fudge said. "It's far less about we have the nicest this or the biggest that or whatever, it's not competing for the sake of size or dollars or anything else. It's competing in the sense of how do we raise our own standards of excellence constantly. And I think that's what Baylor is about," he said.
Baylor continues to grow. With these centers now fully operational, a question that now comes up is, what's next?
"I feel like we're in a really good spot right now as far as athletic structure goes. I think you can do some renovation stuff over at Ferrell still, I think there's some other things that need some sprucing up but I think by and large, like this is the big pieces. So I think it'll be a little while but, you know, there's always a need to keep going and doing more," Fudge said.
Seeing these centers firsthand, Baylor continues to find ways to grow to try and expand their reach in an ever-changing college sports landscape.
