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LOCATION: Hammond, LA
CONFERENCE: Southland
LAST SEASON: 6-20 (.231)
CONFERENCE RECORD: 3-15 (10th)
STARTERS LOST/RETURNING: 2/3
NICKNAME: Lions
COLORS: Green & Gold
HOMECOURT: University Center (7,500)
COACH: Billy Kennedy (Southeastern La. '86)
record at school First year
career record 24-34 (2 years)
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ASSISTANTS: Julius Smith (Morehouse '78)
Preston Ivory (Henderson State '80)
Steve Prohm (Alabama '97)
TEAM WINS: (last 5 years) 12-15-10-6-6
RPI (last 5 years) 227-195-298-302-294
1998-99 FINISH: Didn't qualify for postseason.
ESPN.com Clubhouse
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Billy Kennedy has earned the reputation as one of the best recruiters in college basketball. As the lead assistant to Todd Bozeman at California, Kennedy helped lure Shareef Abdur-Rahim from Atlanta to Berkeley. As head coach at Centenary, he plucked high-scoring All-Trans America Athletic Conference guard Ronnie McCollum out of Fayette, Ala. Kennedy will need similar recruiting success to turn around the program at his alma mater, Southeastern Louisiana. The Lions have had just one winning season in the '90s. In two seasons, Kennedy guided the Gents to their first winning record in the TAAC since 1990-91. Centenary's 14-victory season last year was the most at the school in five years. "Billy has established himself as one of the top young coaching talents in the nation," SLU athletic director Tom Douple said after choosing Kennedy over 65 other candidates in late March. Kennedy replaces John Lyles, who resigned March 5 after going 49-86 in five seasons.
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Blue Ribbon Analysis |
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BACKCOURT D BENCH/DEPTH D
FRONTCOURT D INTANGIBLES B
Energetic coach Billy Kennedy is facing a long season at his alma mater. With a roster thin on numbers and experience, he will do well to top last year's six-victory record, especially against a nonconference schedule featuring road games at LSU, Mississippi State, Mississippi and SMU. The key could be 6-10 Kelland Payton, who has failed to live up to his potential as a top recruit out of Biloxi, Miss. At 6-10, 235, Payton gives the Lions an interior presence that most league teams can not match. He could thrive in Kennedy's new halfcourt offense. "We'll play like a Tim Floyd team," Kennedy said. "We'll run when we can and try to score in the first 10 seconds of the shot clock or the end of the shot clock." Kennedy's patient halfcourt attack could be effective in the run-and-shoot Southland, where shot-clock violations are as rare as 7-footers. If the new recruits grow up fast and the Lions avoid injury, they could play the spoiler on certain nights in Hammond. Otherwise, a last-place finish looms. |
Kennedy is no stranger to South Louisiana. The 35-year-old New Orleans native played high school basketball at Holy Cross High School and collegiately at Delgado Community College in New Orleans and later at SLU. He also served as an assistant to Benny Dees at New Orleans and also coached at Tulane and Northwestern State. He later coached at Wyoming, Texas A&M, Creighton and Cal-Berkeley. Kennedy brought with him some trusted help when he hired longtime Tulane assistant Julius Smith. Kennedy and Smith coached together at Tulane, where Smith helped land former Green Wave standouts Jerald Honeycutt and Rayshard Allen. Kennedy also hired former Cal State Sacramento assistant Preston Ivory, who has Texas and California junior-college contacts. "South Louisiana is a talent-rich area," Kennedy said. "It's a great location and a definite positive for us. We've got the Gulf Coast, Baton Rouge, New Orleans and Jackson, Miss., all within a two-hour radius of us." As he did at Centenary, Kennedy plans to build the program with high school recruits, a departure from the two-year, "get-rich-quick" strategy of his league peers. "People told me this is a JUCO league, but we don't have to approach it that way," Kennedy said. "We don't want to have to rebuild every third year. We want players who will be in our system for four years." While it took Kennedy only two years to turn around Centenary, he will have even more work to do at SLU. Only nine scholarship players are on the roster after offseason attrition. One of his first orders of business was cleaning house. When junior holdovers Jeremy Hall, Tawaski Lawton and Marcus Mackey did not satisfy Kennedy's demands in off-season conditioning drills, he cut them loose. The three formed Lyles' junior-college signing class of the previous season. Hall, a 6-0 junior-to-be, was the Lions' leading scorer(11.4 ppg) and leading three-point shooter at (.397). Mackey, a 6-6, 210-pound forward, led SLU and was fifth in the league in rebounding (7.8 rpg). Because of the departures, Kennedy has only four players with Division I experience returning. SLU lost its top three scorers and six of its top seven. The Lions failed to win in 13 road games and lost their four non-conference road games by an average margin of 40 points. Kelland Payton gives Kennedy a rare league commodity a true center. The 6-10, 235-pound senior was inconsistent in his first season in the program after transferring from Seton Hall. He should be more at home in the Oklahoma State-like halfcourt offense that Kennedy plans to run. The Biloxi, Miss., native (7.4 ppg, 6.1 rpg, 41 blocked shots) needs to become more aggressive inside and play with more intensity. Payton showed potential early in the season. He dominated the lane in a 90-84 overtime victory against McNeese State, scoring 19 points on 7-of-9 shooting and adding 11 rebounds and five blocked shots. But Payton seemed to lose interest as the long season droned on, and he fell out of the starting lineup down the stretch. "He's 23-years old, so he is mature," Kennedy said. "He put up some pretty good numbers, so we're expecting him to contribute." James Randolph, a 6-8, 210-pound senior power forward, and Jason Elloie, a 6-7 sophomore forward from New Orleans, also return in the frontcourt and will compete for time at the power-forward spot. Elloie (5.0 ppg, 1.8 rpg) is a tremendous athlete with a decent outside touch. He could blossom with more playing time. Randolph (2.3 ppg, 2.0 rpg) also will back up Payton in the middle. Senior Marcus Kemp, an athletic 6-4 swingman, will compete for a starting spot at small forward after sitting out last season as a redshirt. Kemp, a good outside shooter, played at Glen Oaks High School in Baton Rouge with Lester Earl and Leroy Womack before attending Lon Morris (Texas) Junior College (12.0 ppg, 5.0 rpg, 4.0 apg and 1.5 spg as a sophomore). Reginald Patterson, a 6-7 forward from powerful Copiah-Lincoln (Miss.) Community College by way of Franklin, La., and Alfredo Jackson of Fort Scott (Kan.) are the lone frontcourt signees. Patterson will compete with Randolph and Elloie for the starting spot at power forward and could spell Payton and Randolph in the post. "Patterson has the ability to rebound and defend in the post, and he played for a team that won the Mississippi state JUCO title," Kennedy said. Jackson can play either forward position and has the toughness and maturity that Kennedy is looking for out of the junior college ranks. If possible, the backcourt is even more unsettled. Point guard Lee Carney (3.2 ppg, 85 assists, 73 turnovers) is the only returning player with collegiate experience. The 5-11 junior from Baton Rouge is smart and a steady ball-handler but not much of an offensive threat. Kennedy signed three backcourt players in May to bolster the unit, but the best of the bunch, former LSU starter Jamaal Wolfe, is not eligible to play until next season. The 6-0 Wolfe, a former standout at Baton Rouge Redemptorist High School and Lon Morris (Texas) Junior College, started nine games and led the Tigers in assists with 60 in 1998-99. Wolfe has one season of eligibility remaining. Kennedy thinks Jaron Singletary (15.8 ppg, 5.2 rpg, 3.5 apg, .330 3 PT), a 6-3 junior guard from Cuesta Junior College in San Luis Obispo, Calif., will earn the starting spot at shooting guard. He had a 33-point game as a sophomore and a 36-point game as a freshman, when he averaged 21.1 points. "He is a scorer who will definitely help us offensively this year," Kennedy said. "We were very fortunate that Jaron was still available." Josh McCasland, a 6-foot, 180-pound junior point guard from Kilgore (Texas) Junior College, will back up Carney. A former high school quarterback from Irving (Texas) High School, McCasland is the kind of smart, floor leader Kennedy needs off the bench. "His leadership and toughness from the point-guard position fills an immediate need for our program," Kennedy said. Kennedy thought he had landed another future cornerstone when he signed 6-5 swingman Greg Lewis, an All-Western Junior College Athletic Conference at Howard (Texas) Junior College in July. But Lewis also signed national letters of intent with South Alabama and Winthrop, where he eventually landed.
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