When she first heard the news that UL would need a new softball coach after Gerry Glasco left for Texas Tech, no one had to tell Jessica Leger how important the job search would be.
And when Alyson Habetz was announced as Glasco’s replacement on June 28, no one had a bigger smile than Leger, UL's deputy director of athletics and senior women administrator.
“I think Alyson is going to be a perfect leader to really reunite the team and also recruit others who will share her vision,” Leger said. “I think she’s going to do amazing things for the Ragin’ Cajuns.”
Leger has been a part of UL’s athletic department since 2007, but her connection goes back much further.
She has spent the past 25 years juggling athletics and education.
After graduating from Lafayette High School in 1999, the former Jessica Clarke committed to coach Yvette Girouard’s UL softball program.
At the time, she was playing for Stefni Lotief’s Louisiana Image travel squad. On the way back from a tournament, though, she had a pivotal conversation with her mother.
“She helped me do some soul searching and I came to the realization that I just wasn’t in love with the sport any more,” Leger said. “I never realized I had the option to not play because it was all that I had done for so long.”
Leger mustered up enough poise to tell Girouard she had decided not to play softball, but instead divert her attention to academics with thoughts of eventually going to law school.
“Yvette was the most gracious person at that moment in my life,” Leger said. “She told me she respected my decision and that her door was always open if I changed my mind.”
After watching some of her Lafayette High teammates play for a season at UL after reaching the state championship game together, Leger returned to softball under new coach Stefni Lotief after Girouard left to coach LSU.
“For me personally taking a year off was probably the worst thing I could have done for my softball career,” Leger said. “After going from practicing every single day of my life to taking a year off was difficult to overcome athletically.”
So a year and a half later, Leger again chose school over softball, asking Lotief if she could stay involved in the program.
For that 2002 season, Leger orchestrated the program’s marketing efforts as part of an internship program.
By this time, Leger shifted her career goals from law school to education.
For two years after graduating she taught third grade at Sugarland Elementary in New Iberia.
“Two years in the classroom and I realized elementary (school teaching) wasn’t my calling, but I still felt called to education,” Leger said.
So it was back to school to work on her master’s degree in supervision, but she also worked as a graduate assistant in the compliance office.
“That was my foot in the door, but at the time, I didn’t realize what doors would open later for me,” she said.
While taking a class in higher education law, Leger “fell in love with higher education,” a love that hasn't faded.
Shortly, athletic director David Walker offered her the full-time compliance position.
“At the time, he said he recognized that athletics may not be what you aspire to do, but it will get you into higher education,” Leger recollected.
Actually, athletics had been a driving force throughout Leger’s journey.
In addition to playing softball and volleyball growing up, her mother, Sandra, was a physical education teacher and father, Jimmy, “started off in recreational sports management in college and always had a passion for advocating for sports opportunities for women.”
In her family, academics and sports went hand in hand.
“It was always taught to us that athletics was an opportunity to become the best versions of ourselves,” Leger said. “I saw the passion my father had and how important it was to provide young women with opportunities to grow and to develop.
“I’ve always been grateful that my parents taught me the value of athletics.”
Working in compliance also gave Leger a taste of what she missed in law school.
“Do I have a passion for it? No, but do I understand the importance of it,” Leger explained. “And am I grateful that I have that foundation? Absolutely.
“It gave me the foundation that I needed to understand the why behind the what in everything we do in college athletics. It helps me in every decision that I make, because ultimately we have to comply with NCAA rules and they’re ever-changing.”
These days, Leger oversees the athletic department’s internal operations — everything from sports medicine to nutrition, academics, compliance, human relations, strategic planning and now even NIL.
"Jessica is the consummate professional," athletic director Bryan Maggard said. "She has tremendous industry acumen and institutional knowledge. She is extremely student-athlete centric, approaching everything she does with their best interests in mind.
"Jessica is a task master. I know whatever I ask of her, it will be done thoroughly and at a high level."
“I’ve learned so much from each of the three athletic directors I’ve worked under (Walker, Scott Farmer and Maggard),” Leger said. “Each of them has challenged me with new leadership opportunities that they felt I could help develop to bring our department to new heights.
“Any time I face a challenge, it’s not easy. It can be scary or overwhelming, but I’ve just had such amazing support from them and the two presidents I’ve worked under.”
The Habetz hiring highlights the department’s most recent challenge — how to stay competitive in the era of paying students without the financial resources of Power Five programs.
“I think we’ll definitely face some rocky roads initially in terms of establishing ourselves in this new work with NIL,” Leger said. “Just like every other challenge I’ve faced, this is just another opportunity for us to make things better.”
But with decades around the softball program, Leger doesn’t plan on abandoning the traditional routes.
“The thing that makes Ragin’ Cajun softball unique is the people,” she said. “As long as we continue to have great leaders such as Alyson and (assistant coach) Shellie Landry, who played for the program and have a passion for what it means to be a Ragin’ Cajun — we all share the same vision.
“We’ve all lived it and know what this program is capable of. We’re not going to let that fall.”
Even though most of her work is behind the scenes, it does not go unnoticed.
During her introductory news conference last week, Habetz shared a direct message to Leger.
“When I talk to your (Image travel) team when you were playing ball, she was like this (tall) and now she’s my boss,” Habetz laughed. “I mean that is so cool, though. I love everything about that.
“I am so proud of you. To have you as a female role model in our department. For our athletes to see you as a wife, a mother, a leader … all the work you do. I’m just so proud of you. ”