{"id":429,"date":"2023-02-20T12:07:00","date_gmt":"2023-02-20T12:07:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/adntesting.online\/chambersledger\/2023\/02\/20\/team-bison-collins-family-shares-mutual-bond-with-southern-union-athletics\/"},"modified":"2024-10-07T20:52:10","modified_gmt":"2024-10-07T20:52:10","slug":"team-bison-collins-family-shares-mutual-bond-with-southern-union-athletics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/adntesting.online\/chambersledger\/2023\/02\/20\/team-bison-collins-family-shares-mutual-bond-with-southern-union-athletics\/","title":{"rendered":"Team Bison: Collins Family Shares Mutual Bond with Southern Union Athletics"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The Collins Family has a deep love for Bison Athletics. The multi-generational SU athletes are shown at a Bison Baseball game. <\/i><\/p>\n

Story by Katie Jackson<\/p>\n

Being part of a sports team is often likened to being part of a family, but for four Southern Union State Community College athletes, being a Bison is truly a family affair. <\/p>\n

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Those four are Ricky, Christy, Thomas, and Savannah Collins, two generations of Collinses from Newnan, Ga., that have found personal and professional success through Southern Union\u2019s athletic program.<\/p>\n

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Their family story began in 1993 when Ricky, an All-American high-school baseball player, arrived at SU\u2019s Wadley campus from his hometown of Stockbridge, Ga. A standout pitcher and hitter, Ricky had already been chosen by the Texas Rangers in the 1993 Amateur Draft, but he and two of his fellow high-school baseball team members wanted a chance to develop further before going pro. So when SU offered them all scholarships, the trio jumped at the chance to play for the Bison\u2019s then-head baseball coach, Joe \u201cJabo\u201d Jordan.<\/p>\n

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During Ricky\u2019s first year at SU, he and his Bison teammates were state junior college league champions, missing a chance to go to the National Junior College Athletic Association (JUCO) World Series by just three outs. In June of 1994, Ricky was again picked in the Amateur Draft, this time by the Oakland A\u2019s, and was named that year\u2019s Alabama Male Junior College Athlete of the Year, the top award given across all sports.<\/p>\n

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That same year, Ricky also met another Bison athlete, Christy Byrd of Newnan, Ga., a former gymnast and by then an All-American cheerleader who had arrived at SU on scholarship to become part of the Bison cheer squad. Christy\u2019s first impression of Ricky, whom she met as he helped her roommate, a friend of his from Stockbridge, move into the dorm, was less than stellar thanks to a goofy wardrobe incident. However, Christy and Ricky soon became a couple and continued dating even after Ricky left SU in 1995 to play for Auburn University\u2019s baseball program and Christy joined the Jacksonville State University cheer squad in 1996.<\/p>\n

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After a year at Auburn, Ricky joined Christy at JSU where he further honed his pitching and hitting skills before going on to play independent ball in Michigan. Unfortunately, a year and a half later Ricky threw out his arm, which ended his plans for a professional baseball career, but not his passion for the sport. <\/p>\n

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The two married in 1998 and settled in Newnan to pursue their careers, she as an educator and he as a builder and now project manager, and soon their family had doubled in size with the birth of Thomas and, 14 months later, Savannah.   <\/p>\n

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Thomas apparently inherited his father\u2019s baseball talents; according to Christy, at the age of six months, he was already flexing his hitting prowess by knocking balloons across a room. \u201cI remember calling Ricky and saying, \u2018He\u2019s hitting lefty!\u2019\u201d (Ricky himself was a lefty.) By the time he was two, Thomas was hitting and fielding balls on a field. <\/p>\n

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Like his father, Thomas was interested in pursuing a professional baseball career but also wanted to take some time after high school to further develop his skills and strength. He had several offers from four-year schools under consideration, but his parents knew Southern Union would be a great place for Thomas to further develop his skills, so they gently nudged him toward their alma mater.  <\/p>\n

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\u201cWe\u2019ve always thought highly of Wadley and Southern Union,\u201d Ricky said. Both he and Christy appreciated that it provided them with a small, tight-knit community where they were able to excel while also being held accountable by their coaches, professors, and even local residents. <\/p>\n

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\u201cIt was good for us,\u201d said Christy, \u201cbut we wanted Thomas to make his own decision.\u201d <\/p>\n

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However, when Thomas got an unexpected \u201crandom\u201d text from Southern Union\u2019s then-coach, Aaron Everett, to come for a visit, he and his father drove over. <\/p>\n

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Thomas, who was recovering at the time from injuries, didn\u2019t try out for the team that day but the conversation with Everette was enough to help him make up his mind. \u201cWe got about halfway home when Thomas said, \u2018This (SU) is where I\u2019d like to go,\u2019\u201d Ricky recalled. <\/p>\n

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\u201cI didn\u2019t get any pressure from my parents,\u201d Thomas said. \u201cI just knew it was the best choice for me and it just happened to be the best choice for everyone else in my family.\u201d<\/p>\n

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In 2020, Thomas arrived in Wadley on an academic scholarship ready to begin his college experience. He, too, appreciated Wadley\u2019s small-town atmosphere and home-away-from-home vibe, which allowed him to concentrate on classes and on things there were important for his athletic aspirations\u2014\u201cplaying baseball, lifting weights, and eating food,\u201d he said. \u201cEverything I needed was right there for me.\u201d <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

In 2022, Thomas transferred to Emmanuel College in Franklin Springs, Ga., where he is majoring in sports management with an eye toward a baseball career. Whether that career is as a player or coach in another role, Thomas is sure of one thing: \u201cI want to stay around the game,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Savannah, too, was a natural athlete who started playing softball while very young before switching to volleyball in middle school. \u201cShe told us she was hanging her cleats up because \u2018my dad doesn\u2019t know that much about volleyball so he can\u2019t coach me,\u2019\u201d Ricky said.<\/p>\n

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In 2022, as Savannah began looking for colleges, SU wasn\u2019t on her list nor was she sure she even wanted to play college-level volleyball. But she sent out her volleyball highlight videos to several schools including SU and ended up coming to Wadley for tryouts. When Bison volleyball head coach Ametrice Jackson called to offer her a scholarship Savannah was thrilled.<\/p>\n

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\u201cI always liked Southern Union when I would come to watch my brother play,\u201d she said. \u201cWhen I went to the tryouts, I realized it was a great team and a great environment. I also knew it would let me start small before going onto a bigger school,\u201d Savannah, who is majoring in nursing, said.  <\/p>\n

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And she was right. The experience of playing volleyball and being part of a close community has been wonderful, and one she happily recommends to others.<\/p>\n

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Of course, none of that is a surprise to Ricky and Christy, who truly think of their SU family as \u201cfamily.\u201d <\/p>\n

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\u201cWhen you\u2019re here, your teammates really become your brothers and sisters,\u201d Ricky said. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are proud that our children chose to go to SU,\u201d Christy said, and especially that they chose it for themselves. And they, too, often recommend it to others.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u201cWe tell people all the time that they will not find better facilities anywhere, even at a lot of Division 1 schools,\u201d Ricky said. \u201cWe all should be proud of everything here.\u201d <\/p>\n

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Now is a great time to experience that sense of Bison family firsthand by attending home games at the SU Baseball Complex for their 2023 season, which opened in mid-February. Schedules for all Southern Union athletic events can be found at www.suscc.edu. <\/p>\n

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The Collins Family has a deep love for Bison Athletics. The multi-generational SU athletes are shown at a Bison Baseball game.  Story by Katie Jackson Being part of a sports team is often likened to being part of a family, but for four Southern Union State Community College athletes, being a Bison is truly a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"give_campaign_id":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-429","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-schools"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/adntesting.online\/chambersledger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/429","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/adntesting.online\/chambersledger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/adntesting.online\/chambersledger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adntesting.online\/chambersledger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adntesting.online\/chambersledger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=429"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/adntesting.online\/chambersledger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/429\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":539,"href":"https:\/\/adntesting.online\/chambersledger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/429\/revisions\/539"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/adntesting.online\/chambersledger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=429"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adntesting.online\/chambersledger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=429"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/adntesting.online\/chambersledger\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=429"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}