June 29 – July 12, 2025
Welcome to issue four hundred and sixty-nine of the Sports Doing Good newsletter. This week’s 10 stories include:

1. Malala turns her fight for equality to women in sports (CNN)
2. USC Paralympian Ezra Frech is a pioneer under pressure (ESPN)
3. Arthur Ashe won Wimbledon 50 years ago. His influence continues to inspire a new generation of athletes (CNN)
4. ‘More than a mascot’: How Ellie the Elephant became New York Liberty’s prime marketing asset (SportsPro)
5. Khaman Maluach a ‘testament’ to African basketball as top-10 NBA draft pick (Andscape)
6. How Gotham FC Is Building A New Playbook For Women’s Soccer (Forbes)
7. Ex-USWNT star Ali Krieger on women’s sports: ‘I want to be an owner and invest fully in an organization’ (The Athletic)
8. Sport and tourism need to team up – to understand and support the ecosystems they rely on (Sustainability Huddle)
9. Wales Women played in front of five fans in 2021. Saturday at the Euros showed how far they have come (The Athletic)
10. The MH 25: Meet the Gen Z Athletes Redefining Sports Excellence (Men’s Health)


10+
Blind skateboarder Dan Mancina builds world’s first adaptive skatepark: “Everyone should have the opportunity to try skating” (IOC)
https://www.olympics.com/en/news/usa-blind-skateboarder-dan-mancina-world-first-adaptive-skatepark-interview
How Ultimate Frisbee Helps Reclaim the Joy of Youth Sports (Psychology Today)
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/lets-talk/202506/how-ultimate-frisbee-helps-reclaim-the-joy-of-youth-sports
Corporate social responsibility in Indian sport: Moving from margins to mainstream (Sport and Dev)
https://www.sportanddev.org/latest/news/corporate-social-responsibility-indian-sport-moving-margins-mainstream
Turning Trash into Opportunity: How Arena Recycling Is Building a Cleaner, Greener Tanzania (Beyond Sport)
https://beyondsport.org/2025/07/08/turning-trash-into-opportunity-how-arena-recycling-is-building-a-cleaner-greener-tanzania/
Celebrating an Icon with Laureus Spirit of Sport (Laureus)
https://www.laureus.com/news/celebrating-an-icon-with-laureus-spirit-of-sport


We present again our “Featured Video” offering(s). With the explosion of video content out there highlighting the good in sport, we want to showcase such content for your enjoyment and learning. This will be an ongoing effort. And now we add podcasts!

Learnings from the Boat Race to the UN: How sport can grasp the climate transition opportunity (Sustainability Huddle)
https://open.spotify.com/episode/0zPLDKFe5NIhwGJcJmTW8u?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
Keep Boys Playing (The Aspen Institute)
https://youtu.be/J-ywYf7TqZM?si=1aY8hGKMIdc2qddk
440: Samuel Hymes on sports diplomacy (CUSP)
https://thecuspshow.substack.com/p/440-samuel-hymes-on-sports-diplomacy
NBA and ‘Learn Fresh’ team up at the NBA Draft (Good Morning America)
https://www.goodmorningamerica.com/video/123301779


Introduction
There has been some recent discussion about the Nobel Prize, specifically, the one for Peace, in the news, as a certain someone is actively campaigning for it. (That’s not how it works.) At a basic level, the Nobel Prize is awarded across multiple fields to “difference makers,” those whose efforts make for a better world. Certainly sounds like something a sports person would qualify for. Dikembe Mutombo, Johann Olav Koss, Muhammad Ali, and Billie Jean King, are some names that come to my mind. Alas, there is no Nobel Prize for Sports.

That does not mean there is no connection between the two worlds. One of the most prominent champions for the power of sport was Nelson Mandela, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1993. In this week’s newsletter, the first story presented involves another Nobel Prize for Peace winner, Malala Yousafzai, who won in 2014 at the age of 17. I was excited to read the story as I am admittedly a big fan of hers and the idea of sport being part of the conversation for making the world a better place is well, something that I kind of believe in. ?

Malala, along with her husband, Asser Malik, have launched Recess Capital, which is focused on finding scalable efforts to increase sports opportunities for girls and women on and off the field. According to Malala, ““We are capable of dialogue, we are capable of coming together, and sports, in history, in the current times, have proven to be that powerful way of bringing communities together. … We could be competitive, but at the same time, when the game is over, we can hug each other, shake hands, and recognize that we’re all one humanity.” Her words and sentiments are ones that have been regularly featured at Sports Doing Good. We wish her and her husband the best of luck in their efforts and encourage you to learn more about Recess Capital.

Please continue to send along your stories. You are both our audience and the best source of stories. Our Twitter handle is @sportsdoinggood, and you can find us at www.facebook.com/sportsdoinggood and on Instagram.

If you think others would like to receive the newsletter, please feel free to forward it on or have them contact us directly at sab@sportsdoinggood.com. (If you do not want to receive the newsletter anymore you can use the Unsubscribe button at the end of the email).

So, enjoy. And have a good week.

Malala turns her fight for equality to women in sports (CNN)
https://edition.cnn.com/2025/06/24/sport/malala-yousafzai-recess-sports-spt-intl

USC Paralympian Ezra Frech is a pioneer under pressure (ESPN)
https://www.espn.com/college-sports/story/_/id/45647323/paralympian-ezra-frech-track-field-first-season-usc

Arthur Ashe won Wimbledon 50 years ago. His influence continues to inspire a new generation of athletes (CNN)
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‘More than a mascot’: How Ellie the Elephant became New York Liberty’s prime marketing asset (SportsPro)
https://www.sportspro.com/insights/ellie-the-elephant-new-york-liberty-mascot-marketing-impact-x/

Khaman Maluach a ‘testament’ to African basketball as top-10 NBA draft pick (Andscape)
https://andscape.com/features/khaman-maluach-a-testament-to-african-basketball-as-top-10-nba-draft-pick/

How Gotham FC Is Building A New Playbook For Women’s Soccer (Forbes)
https://www.forbes.com/sites/leeigel/2025/06/24/how-gotham-fc-is-building-a-new-playbook-for-womens-soccer/

Ex-USWNT star Ali Krieger on women’s sports: ‘I want to be an owner and invest fully in an organization’ (The Athletic)
https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6458510/2025/06/29/ali-krieger-uswnt-nwsl-investment/

Sport and tourism need to team up – to understand and support the ecosystems they rely on (Sustainability Huddle)
https://sustainabilityhuddle.substack.com/p/sport-and-tourism-need-to-team-up

Wales Women played in front of five fans in 2021. Saturday at the Euros showed how far they have come (The Athletic)
https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6475814/2025/07/06/wales-euros-anthem-bucket-netherlands/

The MH 25: Meet the Gen Z Athletes Redefining Sports Excellence (Men’s Health)
https://www.menshealth.com/fitness/a64992950/mh25-sports-superstars-of-tomorrow/

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Our goal is to have Sports Doing Good be a portal housing original content and excerpts from and links to the increasing number of articles, websites, video, and other media that showcase the good in sports and society. We aim to celebrate those concepts, activities, events, and individuals by highlighting them for a wider audience. Much of the news today, whether sports- related or not, is incredibly negative and increasingly polarizing, biased, and quite annoying. We are trying to refocus some of the discussion on the good, with a focus on sports.

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Contact Information
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Sarbjit “Sab” Singh
sab@sportsdoinggood.com
516-287-7141
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