SMU Stories - Lisa Rawlins

This week on SMU Stories, we sit down with Lisa Rawlins. Lisa Rawlins is Associate A.D. for Student-Athlete Success at Southern Methodist University. Prior to this role, Lisa served in various positions within academic support and football, including Director of Player Development and founder of SMU Athletics' Life After Ball (LAB) program.

She joined the Hilltop in 2010 following positions at UCF and Oklahoma. Over the past 13 years, Rawlins has made a lasting impact at SMU, serving as Director for the Center for the Academic Development of Student-Athletes (ADSA) and Football Academic Advisor for more than a decade. She built the academic support units for football and both men’s and women’s basketball, helping all three programs reach record GPAs year after year.

In 2020, she launched Life After Ball, a professional development initiative that began in football and now serves all SMU sports.

Lisa holds a B.A. in Psychology from Fresno State and an M.Ed. in Higher Education from the University of Oklahoma. A former collegiate basketball and equestrian athlete, she’s also an avid runner and marathoner—including the Boston Marathon. Lisa lives in Dallas with her husband, Reggie, and their daughter, Teal.