Adonis "Sporty" Jeralds To Speak at Guilford Awards Ceremony

Greensboro, N.C. (4/7/09) -- Guilford College alumnus Adonis “Sporty” Jeralds ’81 will be the keynote speaker at this year’s annual Athletic Department Awards Ceremony April 26 at 4:00 p.m. in Ragan-Brown Field House. The event is free and open to the public.

A native of Fayetteville, N.C., Jeralds graduated from Guilford with an undergraduate degree in criminal justice and played four years on the Quakers’ basketball team. He graduated with 1,050 career points, which ranks 25th in school history, and averaged 8.9 points for his career. Jeralds stands second among the Quakers’ career leaders in games played (118) and ranks among Guilford’s top-20 in career field-goal percentage (.523) and free-throw percentage (.721). He also contributed 537 rebounds in four seasons. Jeralds won Guilford’s Best Undergraduate Male Athlete Award in 1979.

Following graduation from Guilford, Jeralds attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill where he obtained a master’s degree in public administration. He earned a second master’s degree in sports management from the University of Massachusetts. An internship at the Hampton (Va.) Coliseum turned into a permanent position, giving Jeralds the opportunity to put both master's degrees to use as assistant director. In 1988, he was hired as assistant manager at the Charlotte (N.C.) Coliseum and was promoted to manager two years later. Jeralds recently moved with the NBA’s Charlotte Bobcats to their arena in downtown Charlotte where he works in the Marketing and Events Department.

Jeralds is also an established author and motivational speaker. He published his first book, a motivational vignette entitled The Champion in You, in 2002. A part-time professor at Johnson and Wales University, Jeralds also serves on the Board of Directors for the Better Business Bureau of the Southern Piedmont, Athletes United for Youth, the Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention Coalition of North Carolina and the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Academic Internship Program. In 2006, he received the Harold J. Vanderzwaag Distinguished Alumnus Award from the Sports Management Department at the University of Massachusetts.

Jeralds resides in Charlotte with his wife, Teresa Gambill Jeralds '81, and their two children, Jazmine and Jacob.