BOWLING GREEN, K.Y. — Former Columbus resident Beth Jeffers was inducted into the Western Kentucky University Sports Hall of Fame. Jeffers and her fellow inductees were honored at the Hilltoppers’ homecoming football game against Louisiana Tech last weekend.
“It was quite an honor to receive the induction into the Hall of Fame,” Jeffers said of the recognition of her playing career. “It is nice to represent the beginning of the changes in women’s athletics and be recognized for it.”
Jeffers starred for the Hilltopers’ women’s basketball team in the 1970s, settling into the first program to offer women’s athletic scholarships at the university.
“My class in 1975 was the first to get basketball scholarships at Western,” she said. “Title IX, which was a break-through law for women’s athletics, had gone into effect and universities across the country were beginning their compliance. The long-term goal was to bring women’s programs up to the same level as men’s.”
Jeffers was the 1979 WKU Female Athlete of the Year and team captain for her junior and senior years. She helped the Hilltoppers to a winning record in all four years and finished her career as the program’s all-time leading scorer with 1,446 points. She still ranks 18th in the school’s all-time scorers list.
Jeffers remembers her time fondly, and reflected on the time spent training and traveling with teammates, and how much the experience meant in the early days of collegiate women’s basketball.
“We really never compared ourselves to the men’s program much,” she said. “We traveled in a 15-passenger van, had humble pre-post game meals, and had a very basic locker room, but we did get to practice in the arena on our game floor. We were just glad to have what we had as women’s sports was developing. I never thought that women’s athletics would be at the level it is today.”
Jeffers graduated with a degree in physical education and went on to complete a Masters degree in exercise physiology. She coached basketball at Auburn and the University of Idaho before settling in Columbus to raise a family. She opened Fitness Factor in Columbus in 1994 and ran it for 30 years before retiring and selling the business in 2023.
Jeffers’ achievements at WKU and her career in coaching and training speaks to her passion for athletics and fitness.
“I am a firm believer that playing athletics is beneficial in life,” she said. “Personally, I felt I learned how to work hard, how to be disciplined, how to get along with others as well as mental toughness. I feel that these attributes helped me in running my former business as well as my day-to-day interactions with people. One of the most important things that one can learn from being on a team is that it’s not about you. It’s about working with people and respecting people and this is a great life lesson.”
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