When Nora Deleske walked into class on a Tuesday morning, Aaron Hernandez, the Director of the Allan “Bud” Selig Sports Law and Business program at ASU Law, pulled Deleske aside. He needed to speak with her after the three hour class, and warned that it wasn’t good news.
He planned to mess with Deleske a bit.
After three hours of her brain reeling, processing through every move she had made the last nine months of her graduate program, Deleske nervously waltzed into Hernandez’s office to see the school’s top professors, graduate assistants and founders.
Bracing for the worst, Deleske hears, “We are so proud of you. We want to recognize you with the Sports Law and Business Rodney K. Smith Founders Award.”
The award is given to, as Henerandez describes, “Our MVP.” It is named after the founder of the Sports Law and Business program, Rodney K. Smith who passed away due to cancer a few years ago.
Deleske broke down in tears of happiness.
“I always just went through the motions (in school) and I just was stuck in this mindset that I am only defined as a swimmer,” Deleske said. “I found this program, and I found my passions and what I loved to do and it worked really well.”
‘It worked really well’ would be a bit of an understatement for the newly minted two-time Sun Devil graduate. Deleske served as the Sun Devil Swim team captain, competed in the 2016 and 2021 USA Olympic Trials and led her team in and outside of the pool in ways that had many, especially her coaches, taking notice.
“I am extremely proud of Nora for her exceptional work in the pool, in the classroom, and as a person to transform herself into a valuable member of the Sun Devil community,” said assistant coach Derek Schmitt. “Through her constant hard work, dedication, and resilience, she has contributed to the transformation of the culture and vision of the Sun Devil Swimming program.”
According to the Huffington Post, only 6.7% of the world’s population has a college degree. According to the NCAA, just 16% of eight million high school athletes will compete at the Division I, II or III levels. For an athlete to earn an advanced degree while competing at Division I, the odds are even lower.
But Deleske has always beaten the odds.
According to Hernandez, no one has graduated from the Sports Law and Business program, nor won the award, while also still competing as a student athlete – at least, until 2022.
Deleske embraced the toughest parts of being a swimmer. The 6 a.m. swims, the winter training that included multiple pool workouts and dryland smashed into one day, and most of all, a head coach intent on ushering the program back to national prominence.
“But I have learned now,” Deleske said. “I thank Bob [Bowman] a million times for [pushing] me, because he was constantly raising my level of what I could handle.”
She selflessly handled it all, the workouts, the responsibilities that come with being a team captain, and much more with grace under pressure.
Some of that pressure came when the COVID-19 pandemic struck in spring 2020. One of Deleske’s teammates was back home in Florida with family, with no way of getting back to Arizona to move out of their dormitory.
Deleske was still living in Arizona at the time. When she heard about the situation, she stepped up and moved all of his stuff out for him.
On Hernandez’s birthday, a day he normally keeps a stiff upper lip about, Deleske found out and surprised him with homemade cinnamon rolls in class.
“I was thinking to myself, when was the last time that I had baked goods brought to class on my birthday? I was probably in elementary school,” Hernandez said. “I'm sure there was significant effort, because it was February and she's still in season, and she made the time to do that.”
Deleske has always placed others above herself, even when she was named the ‘MVP’ of her program.
“I'm only the ‘MVP’ because of everyone that's surrounding me,” Deleske said.
As Title IX reaches its 50th anniversary in 2022, Deleske recognizes how the law that guarantees equality across gender lines can impact her.
Born and raised in Southern California, Deleske grew up competing at Golden West Swim Club and Edison High School. As she swam the days away, her mother worked as a nurse, and regularly taught her daughter about how tough it was for women in the pre-Title IX era.
“When my mom was growing up, women didn't play sports, you weren't supposed to be strong, Deleske described. “Title IX changed that. My mom said ‘No, my daughter is going to be an athlete.’ I’m here because my mom always told me to ‘beat the boys.”
The law is also a cornerstone of her masters program. Deleske would sit in class, her eyes darting across the pages of her textbook, the wheels in her head turning as she contemplated one of the most impactful laws of the 20th century.
Diversity, equity and inclusion are all pillars of her Sports, Law and Business degree. At its core, Title IX not only guarantees people the right to education and sport, but also protects victims in cases of sexual assualt and impacts women’s rights in a multitude of ways.
Before coming to Arizona State, Hernandez served as an investigator and the Associate Director of Football at the NCAA. He broke the Baylor University football team scandal in 2016 and wrote on how Title IX impacts it.
Now, he teaches it to people like Deleske.
“Nora has been keenly aware that a lot of her opportunity, and her success, is based on a foundation of a lot of women who had to endure some s— times,” Hernandez said. “They did endure, and luckily, the legislation did endure. Now, Nora is going to be the beneficiary of it.”
She’s a beneficiary with her sights set impacting the next generation through swimming and the Title IX teachings. Now, Deleske is working as a Sport Envoy in swimming for the U.S. Department of the State alongside Olympic Gold Medalists such Katie Ledecky.
“Sports Envoys use sport to advance and complement foreign policy objectives such as empowering women and girls,” according to the U.S. Department of the State.
The newly minted Double-Devil, a term Deleske uses to describe the two degrees she’s received while at ASU, felt like a weight was lifted off her shoulders at the 2022 Pac-12 Championships, where she put the finishing touches on a magnificent career.
The chapter that next awaits Deleske will foster a different weight, one she hopes can provide the next generation of female swimmers the kind of experience and care that she received as a Sun Devil.