July officially started the 2011-12 academic year at colleges and universities around the country. As we start a new year here at Temple University, I would be remiss if I did not point out all that we have accomplished in the last 12 months.

First, we had our second straight bowl-eligible football season, with our Owls knocking off Big East champion Connecticut along the way. After the season ended, we wished head coach Al Golden well, as he left to take the head coaching position at the University of Miami. We then welcomed Steve Addazio, from the University of Florida, who is poised to take the program to even greater heights.

Next, we watched as Fran Dunphy and Tonya Cardoza completed the "Temple Trifecta" by combining for 50 wins while leading the men's and women's basketball programs to the NCAA Tournament. It marked a fourth straight trip for the men's program, which posted its first NCAA win in a decade with a thrilling defeat of Penn State, while the women, making their eighth straight appearance, also won a game in the tournament against Arizona State.

Some other key notes on our "Big Three":

Temple is one of only five schools (including Texas, Tennessee, Duke and Texas A&M) to have competed in the last four men's and women's basketball NCAA Tournaments.

When combining wins over the last two years from the men's and women's basketball programs and the football program, Temple ranks fifth with 121 wins, behind only Connecticut (141), Duke (137), Notre Dame (125) and West Virginia (123), and ahead of Ohio State (120), Florida State (115) and North Carolina (109).

Temple is one of only three schools (including Texas A&M and Tennessee) to have its men's and women's basketball teams compete in the last two NCAA Tournaments and its football team be bowl-eligible each season.

Top draft picks: Temple had two football players, Muhammad Wilkerson (first round) and Jaiquawn Jarrett (second round), and one men's basketball player, Lavoy Allen (second round), taken in the first two rounds of their sport's professional draft.

Let us also not forget our four All-Americans -- Patrick McLaughlin (men's gymnastics), Alyssa Lomuscio (women's fencing), Bob Keogh (men's outdoor track) and Travis Mahoney (men's outdoor track) -- who shined brightly on the national stage. Lomuscio helped lift the women's fencing team to ninth place at the NCAA Championships. Academically, it was another stellar year as numerous academic all-conference and area honorees, as well as more than 300 student-athletes, were recognized for academic success at our annual Breakfast of Champions in April.

Lastly, I want to thank you, our loyal alumni and supporters. Without your help in the stands cheering on our teams, and your vital financial support, Temple Athletics and its student-athletes would not be able to achieve these successes, on the playing field as well as in the classroom.

We need your generosity now, more than ever, to continue to succeed, and we appreciate your outpouring of support that reached record numbers in 2010-11. Now the challenge is to continue to raise the bar -- as our student-athletes and coaches have done each season -- to support our programs this coming year and beyond.

Thanks again and Go Owls!!