LAKELAND, Fla. — Over the past 10 years, Florida POLY Director of Recreation and Athletics Derek Lower built an impressive Rec and Club Sport Program at the University.
Last year, Lower and the school administration decided to take it one step further. And it was a big one.
“We’re looking to join the NAIA and the Sun Conference in the near future with men’s and women’s soccer, men’s and women’s basketball, men’s and women’s cross country, baseball and softball,” Lower said.
Eight sports needed eight head coaches and the start date: this fall. Lower has spent many days sending emails and making phone calls to assemble a coaching staff.
Most of the coaches were hired from schools already in the Sun Conference. The first sport to compete this year will be men’s soccer in August, coached by Clay Roberts.
The school is getting help from the city of Auburndale until facilities are built on campus. The Lake Myrtle Sports Complex is just 10 minutes from campus. It will be home to the men’s and women’s soccer and baseball programs. Basketball and softball will be played at Polk State College.
Lower is hopeful all sports will be on campus within five years.
“I hope that’s a realistic timeline and basketball, a basketball arena is the first thing to come online,” he said. “Just being in the Florida sunshine, I think that’s what the sport needs.”
It’s an aggressive timeline for a school that has just over 2,000 students. It is building a varsity athletics program from scratch, but Lower says the Phoenix are rising to the occasion.
“It’s pure excitement, it’s having that ultimate goal of bringing sports, one to campus, and then have them actually played on campus,” he said. “That’s one of our ultimate goals, along with winning a championship on these fields here as well.”
Build it and they will come. Florida Poly is counting on it.