{"id":654137,"date":"2026-05-20T09:37:19","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T09:37:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/654137\/"},"modified":"2026-05-20T09:37:19","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T09:37:19","slug":"billie-jean-king-graduates-from-college-at-82-tennis-icon-first-enrolled-at-cal-state-la-in-1961","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/654137\/","title":{"rendered":"Billie Jean King Graduates from College at 82, Tennis Icon First Enrolled at Cal State LA In 1961"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">Tennis legend Billie Jean King officially graduated from Cal State Los Angeles on Monday at the age of 82.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">King received a bachelor&#8217;s degree in history from the college she first attended back in 1961. After walking across the stage in triumph, King said, &#8220;It&#8217;s never too late, whatever age you are, whatever your abilities are, go for it if you want it,&#8221; per <a class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-inherit MuiLink-root MuiLink-underlineAlways MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__ui__link__medium_strong css-lu48cp\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/billie-jean-king-graduates-f45e32d3f48820924e85d64d2a64412e\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\">Beth Harris<\/a> of the Associated Press.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">According to <a class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-inherit MuiLink-root MuiLink-underlineAlways MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__ui__link__medium_strong css-lu48cp\" href=\"https:\/\/news.calstatela.edu\/2026\/05\/18\/at-82-billie-jean-king-earns-cal-state-la-history-degree-and-inspires-class-of-2026\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\">Cicero A. Estrella<\/a> of Cal State LA&#8217;s official website, King addressed her fellow graduates as well, adding, &#8220;More than 60 years have passed before I returned to the classroom to complete my degree in history. Talk about delayed gratification, and I came back with a purpose. I had\u00a0unfinished\u00a0business, and it is important to me to finish what I started. I like completing things.\u00a0It&#8217;s\u00a0like shaking hands at the net after a match.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">As a 12-time Grand Slam singles champion (including six Wimbledons and five U.S. Opens) and 16-time Grand Slam doubles champ, King is widely regarded as one of the greatest tennis players of all time.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">She famously beat Bobby Riggs in the &#8220;Battle of the Sexes&#8221; in 1973, paving the way for greater equality among men and women in tennis and the sports world in general.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tennis legend Billie Jean King officially graduated from Cal State Los Angeles on Monday at the age of&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":654138,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[72],"tags":[99,428],"class_list":["post-654137","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/654137","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=654137"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/654137\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/654138"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=654137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=654137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=654137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}