Encouragement was a term Tracy Lowery often heard during his sports career. Starting in the Athens youth football league and ending as a baseball player at Athens State College (now Athens State University), Lowery had many people along the way that encouraged him to be the best athlete he could be. The encouragement paid off as Lowery will be inducted into the 2023 Limestone County Sports Hall of Fame for his outstanding playing career. 

Lowery says he is honored to be part of this year’s LCSHOF class. “I am humbled to be selected to the Limestone County Sports Hall of Fame. It is a great honor to be in the hall of fame with some of the guys I was teammates with like Keith Schrimsher, Cody Sweetland and Gary Redus.”

Athens Bible School was the first school that Lowery made his mark as an athlete. He played on the Trojans baseball team for six years and was starting guard in basketball for three years. In baseball, he led ABS in stolen bases for three years and recorded the highest batting average for two seasons. He hit .468 during his senior season with ABS. In basketball, he was part of teams that scored points at a rate not seen much at that time since the three-point line was not in existence when Lowery played. ABS would regularly score more than 100 points in games during his junior and senior seasons. For his part, Lowery scored over 900 points in his career at Athens Bible School. Lowery’s senior season saw ABS win the county basketball championship for the first time in school history. The Trojans would fall one game short of qualifying for the basketball state tournament that year. 

Sweetland says that is was Lowery’s senior season that provided the blueprint for the Trojans to win the state championship in basketball the following year. “I have always said it was Tracy and rest of the seniors on that 1975 team that showed the way on how to win a state championship. Had they not provided the work ethic and leadership, we probably would have not won the state championship in 1976,” said Sweetland, a 2013 LCSHOF inductee. 

“We had a lot of success at Athens Bible School,” said Lowery. “We were able to win many games thanks to a group of very talented players and coaches. I wasn’t the tallest guy around but I made up for it with speed and quickness.”

Lowery’s athletic talents would next lead him to Florida College in Tampa, Florida as a baseball player. He would bat over .300 during his two years at the junior college. His plans then were to continue his education. He learned Athens State offered specific summer courses he needed for his major in Biology. Coach (Harold) Murrell and Coach (Larry) McCoy then offered him a baseball scholarship. 

While Lowery was accustomed to playing shortstop, there was a roadblock at that position when he joined the Bears baseball team. “There was a guy who went on to play many seasons in major league baseball by the name of Gary Redus playing that spot,” laughed Lowery. Lowery adjusted to playing other spots on the diamond and played well as he hit over .300 for the Bears during his two-year career. 

Lowery would graduate from college and go on to become a successful medical physician specializing in vascular surgery. Sweetland says that he is not surprised that his former high school teammate has had a successful career in medicine. “Tracy was driven not only as an athlete but a student as well. He had a great work ethic and nobody was ever going to out work him. He had a great competitive spirit about him. He would chew nails to win. He is one of the best competitors I have ever seen,” said Sweetland.