UTA athletes’ performances are often judged by their statistics on the court.
However, there’s a process behind that. There are families left behind. There are sacrifices made. There are moments of self-doubt that can only be figured out within themselves.
“Unsaddled,” a docuseries deep diving into the personal lives of student-athletes and coaches produced by the Athletics department, aims to highlight those stories. The biweekly series began streaming on YouTube in September, with 20 episodes planned for the 2024-25 athletic year, said Duane Lewis, senior associate athletic director for external relations.
UTA Athletics shuffled through different ideas for an engaging docuseries. After exploring concepts from coaches’ shows and other UTA properties, the team landed on “Unsaddled,” Lewis said.
The creative team took elements from “Wright Your Story,” a series only focused on UTA women’s basketball, and expanded the concept across every sport for “Unsaddled.”
“We wanted to tell the story of the season through the eyes and ears of our student-athletes and coaches, and here we are,” Lewis said.
Luis Diaz, digital strategies and branding assistant athletic director, worked with Lewis to envision how to create the show with less narration to rely more on coaches and athletes for the storytelling.
“Unsaddled” focuses on breaking down who the teams and players are as people, Diaz said, giving fans the chance to hear their personal stories during the season.
As one of the series’ subjects, Brody Robinson, men’s basketball junior guard, said it’s cool to see into players’ lives, the sacrifices they’ve made and how they ended up at UTA.
Before joining UTA, Robinson played Division One basketball with the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga before transferring to Garden City Community College, where he continued playing at the junior collegiate level.
“It was a culture shock, out in the middle of nowhere,” Robinson said in an episode. “I’ve always been in Houston my whole life. It was the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”
Returning to Division One competition at UTA gave him a deeper understanding of the level of effort it required, what was at stake and what he needed to strive for to be the best version of himself.
“Everybody sees the outcome, but you never see the work that’s put in,” Robinson said. “I think it’s really cool that people can experience the day-to-day, the hour-to-hour work that we do put in and how much treatment and workouts and extra workouts that we do.”
Once the idea was formed, Lewis said he and Diaz presented it to the creative team to see if it could be consistently presented throughout the year. Blueprints from past coaches’ talk shows were reimagined to create the series.
Around 12 to 15 directors, creative services and marketing members have a hand in it, Lewis said. The series relies on team contacts who know storylines down to details like who’s playing well and who’s emerging.
“Everyone has a voice. Everyone’s opinion is heard, and we talk through and figure out what’s the best way to execute every segment of every episode,” Lewis said.
Diaz’s favorite part of the series is having a creative vibe where everyone wants to differentiate the product from a typical docuseries, he said. The team is constantly capturing footage, questioning what shots tell the story or what captures the best emotion, also focusing on post-production aspects — something Diaz said he’s found beauty in.
While the team has improved its production on a show-by-show basis, it’s ready to take it to the next step by moving the series to a larger platform, Lewis said.
“That’s our driving mantra, if you will. To do what we can to showcase our student-athletes and our coaches for the betterment of our department, and ultimately, UTA as a university,” Lewis said.
Each episode is reviewed by the creative team and he enjoys the conversations that strike up, Lewis said. Everybody is critical, wanting to put out the best product.
“Everybody brings their perspective. I enjoy the different levels of thought in terms of trying to get to that core goal of the best presentation that we can every time,” Lewis said.
Not only has the series strengthened the creative team’s relationship, but it has also brought the team closer to the athletes and coaches, Diaz said.
“We’re storytellers, right?,” said Jordan Stepp, associate athletic director of strategic communications. “When it comes down to it, I enjoy that part of it more than probably any part of my job — to be able to tell stories.”
Stepp said the show gives fans and viewers the ability to pull up the series and look back on the effort that was put in to highlight UTA’s program, student-athletes and coaches.
“We get to showcase UTA Athletics and what we’re trying to be, which is winning program upon winning program,” he said.
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