President A. D. Smith left Howard College on a more solid financial foundation than it had enjoyed in decades. His successor, Kentucky-born educator Frank M. Roof, magnified that success many times over and served longer than any president since Howard relocated to Birmingham.
The relatively young new president (only 40 years old when he accepted the presidency in 1897) apparently took a special interest in physical education. He created new student bathing rooms with running hot water and created a gymnasium that the Birmingham News reckoned was "the best organized gymnasium of any college in Alabama." This attention to nurturing the bodies as well as the minds of students quickly became a point of pride at the college.
The tradition of Samford basketball began on Roof's watch, although there was some initial confusion about the rules of the game.
