In the early 2000s, every night before the Stan Wright Panther Invitational meet, former track coach Lisa Bauduin would hike the steps to the top of Hughes Stadium to take it all in. And every morning, even before sunrise, Bauduin would make her way up those same steps to listen to the quiet of a new day.
“Every year my favorite memory was the night before the meet,” said Bauduin. “When all the flags are out, and it’s still and it’s calm and it’s beautiful, and I would just sit there. It was the same thing morning— first thing in the morning I’d be the very first one there. It was just that tranquility and that safe haven to me of our stadium, and that really is the essence of what I love about Hughes Stadium and Sacramento City College. There’s just so much beauty and history there.”
Bauduin, a former City College women’s track and field coach and a current kinesiology professor, is set to retire later this month after a 28-year career in athletics. In Bauduin’s 23 years of coaching women’s track and field the team won three state championships in a row in 2003, 2004, 2005 and many more. Bauduin also coached cross country for five or six years for City College, and coached the USA track and field team. But, Bauduin said, she never thought she would be at City College for so long when she got hired.
“I had the opportunity to travel across the world representing the USA track and field but also representing Sacramento City College,” said Bauduin. “The very first year working at Sacramento City College I came in thinking I’d be there three to five years. Little did I know that Sacramento City College started getting in my blood, and once it’s in your blood, you can’t really extract it. The relationships I established with athletes and friends and family members through my coaching just embedded me to the community.”
Bauduin moved to North Dakota when she was a freshman in high school and was recruited to go to North Dakota State University where she played basketball for three years and ran track for four years. She came from a divorced family and lived in three different states before moving to California on her own. Bauduin had no family in California when she did her internship at Cal Berkeley. She then was hired at San Francisco State for five years as a Mens and Womens assistant Jumps, Hurdles and Sprint coach before coming to City College.
“When I came to City and had the opportunity to run my own program. I was still really naive. I was still fairly young at 32,” Bauduin said. “I remember still kind of bumping along, but I needed a home—that’s what I think City brought to me. There was no way anyone could’ve told me I’ll be in Sacramento 28 years later this would be my home. Little by little I established roots. Little by little those roots grew, and it became having a community base and friends that you call family. It was just creating that consistency within our program and getting to know my athletes and their families.”
Bauduin was hired in 1992 and describes herself as an intense person who pours her heart into everything she does. After years of coaching, in 2007-2008 when she started to feel a little burned out, she took a partial sabbatical to acquire a coaching certificate. Bauduin said she hoped to get an opportunity to step away from coaching and be able to coach young coaches.
“I know this sounds cocky, but 50% of me is probably close to 100% for some people,” said Bauduin. “Things were just changing—athletes changing, administration changing, me changing. All those things created that perfect storm. It was good timing for me; it worked out the right way. Instead of being out on the track every day, I’d be in the classroom really trying to help develop young minds and getting others prepared for what coaching can be. That’s really where I wanted my direction to go.”
For the last four years, Bauduin has been strictly teaching Introduction to Kinesiology along with Principles and the Theory of Athletic Coaching. Bauduin also started the Sociology of Sport class in fall 2019, which she said she wished she’d had more time to develop.
“There has been a lot of growth for me on the academic side, [which] really challenged me as well to step up and present a good method to the students, whether it was online or hybrid or face to face. And I had to teach some yoga classes recently and strength training.”
Bauduin said she prefers to stay in the background when it comes to celebrating, but she has always loved to celebrate her “kids”—her student-athletes.
“There [are] so many [memories]. It’s so easy to draw into the successes we had on the track,” said Bauduin. “Having the opportunity to see young people come in that are first-generation college students that really have no understanding of what they’re going to do, whether it’s academically or athletically—to watch them grow and develop as a student and also as an athlete and being able to transfer out with athletic scholarships to be able to get a four-year degree.”
Bauduin added that she still keeps in touch with many of the young women she’s coached over the years.
“Many of my kids have master’s degrees; a few of them have gone on to doctorate degrees,” said Bauduin. “Those are amazing celebrations, getting invited to weddings and the baby showers, and unfortunately, I’ve lost a few of my athletes where I’ve had to speak at funerals. The highs and lows, and it’s a rollercoaster—you celebrate and those highs are so high, but the lows are what really develops us. The lows and those challenges and the failures and setbacks are really what makes us great.”
One of Bauduin’s “kids,” former track and field student-athlete Jaclyn Dalton (now Correia), described Bauduin as a second mom. Corriea ran track for City College from fall 1997 to spring 1999. According to Correia, Bauduin has made a huge impact on everybody’s life that she touches.
“She was able to find the hidden talent in some of us that we didn’t find in ourselves, because she took the time to see me as a person and figure out who I was, and find that hidden talent,” Correia said. “I highly admire her to this day, as a matter of fact, I want to be like her. She’s all about creating greatness in an athlete, but in order to create greatness in that athlete, you have to create the foundation of a good team. A good camaraderie, a sisterhood that [is] motivating and inspiring each other. Because you cannot be great unless you have other people to help you.”
Another former track and field student-athlete Lakischa Walker reminisced about the structure Bauduin created for her team. Walker is a licensed clinical social worker with three degrees, finishing her associate degree at City College, her bachelor’s at St. Augustine (where, with Bauduin’s help Walker got a full ride scholarship), and earning her master’s at the University of Oklahoma.
Baudin and then assistant track and field coach Julie Ferrara-Jones were like aunts to her, Walker said.
“One thing that definitely stood out about her was her passion and her dedication towards us,” said Walker. “I would say every college needs to have someone similar to coach Lisa and coach Julie because not many colleges for athletes actually go the extra mile to try their best to make sure their college athletes actually graduate. Her and coach Julie went way and beyond more than the colleges I went to after that when it came to helping us get our education. Track was a priority, but her making sure we graduated was the ultimate priority. All of us are really grateful for her for that.”
According to Bauduin, she was lucky to have good support over the years, particularly in Ferrara-Jones for 20 years.
“You can’t do it on your own,” Bauduin said, echoing the philosophy she passed on to her athletes, “and it takes teamwork to make the dream work.”
Ferrara-Jones said Bauduin recruited her to join the coaching staff as if she were an athlete. Ferrara-Jones didn’t plan on becoming a coach because in 1995 she wanted to be a second-grade teacher. According to Ferrara-Jones, it was important to Bauduin to have strong women in leadership roles for her athletes, and she made that a priority.
“She taught me a lot as far as coaching,” said Ferrara-Jones, “but I think more importantly the importance of establishing relationships with your athletes. She showed me to fight for what you believe in, regardless of how hard the fight is going to be. I view her very much as being a mentor, somebody who taught me how to be a coach because it wasn’t something I went to school for or planned on doing. A lot of what our athletes got from her as their coach I also got from her, even though I was her assistant.”
Her student-athletes and colleagues weren’t the only ones who got a lot from their City College experience. Bauduin said City College was a really good place for her to grow. What she’ll miss the most is the energy on campus the first few weeks of school every year.
“You see the deer in the headlight [look] with some of the students that are new on campus. Everybody is energized and excited. It’s like the first day of school when you’re a little kid, and that for sure is what I’ll miss. You can’t create that anywhere else,” said Bauduin.
That’s one reason that Bauduin said she’s devastated by the college closure due to COVID-19. Online classes don’t work for everybody, she pointed out, and not having the opportunity to be in her office for students means she won’t see many of them again.
“It’s kind of anti-climatic in the sense of, ‘Wow, next time I step on campus I’m just boxing up my stuff.’ It’s totally different than being on campus and kind of going through those 28 years of memories and having the opportunity to say goodbye on like terms. It’s not the same online. It’s not the same when you can’t give a hug or high five or see the pride in somebody’s eyes. Being able to celebrate those graduations or having young kids move onto the next level and just being a part of that. It’s just so hard.”
