Two of the best boys’ basketball players locally in recent years completed their high school careers this spring. For a while it appeared that neither would continue playing in college.
Now we’ve learned that Logan County point guard Torin Graham will attend Campbellsville University and is expected to be a part of the Tigers’ basketball team.
“He wasn’t sure what he wanted to do, but he has accepted an academic scholarship to Campbellsville. They had already used all their athletic scholarships, but he has been invited to be part of the junior varsity team with a chance to move up to the varsity,” says his coach at LCHS, Lonnie Mason.
As a sophomore, Graham directed Coach Harold Tackett’s Cougars to their first winning season in over a decade. As a junior, he was at the helm when the Cougars first win(s) ever over a Dennis Pardue-coach team, their first wins over Russellville since 2003, and their first berth in the regional tournament since 1998. This year’s team also picked up a win over Coach Phil Todd’s Panthers and forced them into overtime in another Clash.
As a senior, he led Mason’s first team or was tied for leadership in games played, games started, minutes played, field goals, 3-point goals, 3-point percentage, free throws made, free throws attempted, scoring average (16.8), assists (84) and steals (39) while finishing third in rebounding from the point guard position.
At Campbellsville, he will join his girlfriend, former Russellville point guard Amber Sydnor, who signed earlier to play for Coach Ginger High Colvin’s Lady Tigers.
Torin Graham is the middle of three basketball playing brothers from Auburn. Older brother Troy Graham had a good career in Cougarland. Younger brother Tahmir Graham was a part-time starter for Mason’s Cougars last season as a sophomore.
Logan has sent very few male basketball players to the college basketball ranks in recent years. Derrod Blakey, whose Cougar career ended in 2010, plays on Georgetown College’s junior varsity team. The last college varsity player from Logan was Trey Turner, who played for Hanover after graduating in 2007.
A lot of us had hoped that Russellville center Jordan Kennedy would be playing college basketball, too. My evaluation of his playing ability was that he was the best college prospect among Panther roundballers since T.C. Thomason in 2005. Thomason had an excellent four-year career at Centre College.
Jordan, the son of former Auburn High standout Tyrone ‘Ice’ Kennedy and long-time Russellville Lady Panther stalwart Catherine Higgins Kennedy, doesn’t want to play college ball, several people close to the program have told The LoJo. He was coached at RHS by Pardue and Todd.
The LoJo
From the It’s a Small World Department: After eight years as the RHS coach, Pardue coached last year at Garrard County in Lancaster, Ky. His wife, Auburn native Diane Meguiar Pardue, who has a long distinguished teaching career at Russellville Middle School and Auburn Elementary/Middle School, joined him there on the faculty. They will continue in those roles in the new school year which is about to begin. They still own their home in Auburn where their sons Daniel and Davis are living along with a couple of college friends.
A former player and coach at Garrard County is Rusty Clark, president of First Southern National Bank. Before he became head of a company with over $700 million in assets with branches spread throughout central and western Kentucky, he served as an assistant coach under Pardue at RHS. FSNB has a close connection with local sports. Loan officer Nathan Thompson is RHS athletic director and golf coach. WRUS sportscaster John Brett Reynolds works for the bank. Holli Brown, who serves in a leadership role at the bank, heads the FSNB Christmas Basketball Classic and is official scorer for Cougar basketball. Former Cougar and Campbellsville baseball star Bryan Fuller and former RHS golfer and basketball player Daniel Pardue are also current FSNB employees. Thomason worked there while he was in college and while he was a Panther assistant coach.
Clark’s son Trevor, who hit one of the most famous shots in RHS history to beat the Cougars in January 2010, transferred from WKU to Eastern Kentucky University last year to be an assistant coach under Pardue at Garrard. He will continue in that role this year.
Now Rusty and Rayanne Clark are moving back home so that he can run First Southern from corporate headquarters. He probably needed to do that when he became president four years ago, but the Clarks really enjoyed being a part of this community and their daughter Molly was happy at LCHS. She was Logan County Tobacco Festival Queen and Strawberry Festival Queen and really liked being part of Daniel McCarley’s youth group at Crittenden Drive Church of Christ. Then came her year of adjustment in being a freshman at WKU, so the Clarks continued as Logan Countians four extra years, which those of us who know them well have cherished. Rusty will still be around periodically in his role with the FSNB branches here and because Molly plans to continue living in this area.
Now, here’s more of the Small World continuum: The new superintendent of Garrard County schools is former Lewisburg Principal Paul Mullins. After Paul left LMS, he became principal of Caverna High School. Then he moved on to be principal of the much larger Larue County High, where he was very popular and led the school to great heights academically. Now Dr. Paul Mullins, he was already president-elect of the Kentucky Association of School Administrators before being hired at Garrard.
Mullins coached before going into administration. His and Tonda’s oldest son, Christian, had an excellent athletic career at LaRue. Now Christian is an umpire.
There’s another Small World connection: Ben Schell taught and coached on faculties that Mullins led both at Lewisburg and LaRue. At Lewisburg, which was his first teaching job, he started the volleyball program. His teams went undefeated “for almost two years,” Mullins noted and his Lady Rangers won two Logan County Middle School championships. His Lady Hawks volleyball teams won their 100th match last fall in his seventh year on the job at LaRue County. He was honored for that milestone.
“I’m so proud of his work ethic, the way he carries himself and represents our school. He does a great job in the classroom and is a leader in our building,” Mullins said at the time. “He’s got a very quiet demeanor, but he understands that success happens with hard work, organization and high expectations. He’s one of those people who always get the job done and get it done with a high level of success.”
The LoJo
Now back to the aforementioned Daniel McCarley: He gave up coaching—at least for now—while he was at the top of his game. The founding coach of Lady Cougar soccer, he built the program in a short time period to district champion last fall. In fact, the Lady Cougars won a game at region before falling in the semifinals.
McCarley—one of Russellville’s best-ever soccer players who was a key player for Ohio Valley College for four years—coached soccer at Glasgow before coming back home.
His job at Crittenden Drive is quite time-consuming. He heads one of the largest church camps in the area with about 200 people spending a week at Taylor Christian Camp in Allen County. He also takes large groups of young people to two sessions of Impact at Lipscomb University and leads a mission trip to another state each year. Additionally, he and pulpit minister Dale Parsley are in charge of a large vacation Bible school.
“I’m gone a lot of the summer when the team needed my attention, and I also need to spend more time with my family,” he said about his decision to relinquish his coaching duties. He and his wife Jennifer have two young children, Skyler and Trapper.
The new Lady Cougar soccer coach, Dan Duncan, is a versatile member of the athletic department at LCHS. He has been the boys and girls tennis coach for a few years, and his doubles team of Adam Wilkins and Logan Johnson made it to state this spring. He also is an assistant boys basketball coach, and was very valuable to The LoJo this winter by providing statistics after every Cougar varsity game.
Dan also played a positive role for all of Logan county this summer by helping get Reach WorkCamps to come here for young people to do repair work for people in need. His brother Jeremy, a teacher and coach in Ohio, is a Reach regular. Dan told The LoJo:
“When I was younger, I attended camps as a camper. As I got older, I wanted to help start a camp in a new area, and being a teacher at the high school gave me a great opportunity. One the first things Reach needs to get started is a host school. It made too much sense for me to help get this camp started because I already worked here and knew the ins and outs of the school and the camp setting.
“At that point, I met with Mr. (Casey) Jaynes and submitted to the school board the paperwork necessary to host the camp. From there, God did his work as only He can do and oversaw this entire process. To see the kids here this week is a very rewarding experience for me and I hope to be able to do this again in the future.”
So the Lady Cougars are changing soccer coaches but both are men who value Christian service.
The LoJo
Scot MacAllister has a new coaching job. After leaving his position of eight years as coach of Lady Cougar basketball, MacAllister is the new girls basketball coach at Russell County High School, another Fourth Region school.
The Lady Lakers, who were coached last year by Craig Pippen, went 24-5 in 2012-013, won the 16th District championship, and beat Coach Josh Matthews’ 13th District champion Franklin-Simpson at region before losing to eventual regional champion Bowling Green in the semifinals.
Coach Mac reports that he has found a place to live on Lake Cumberland while the MacAllisters try to sell their home in Auburn. His wife Lori had a job interview within 48 hours of their being in the area.
Melinda Hinton, mother of junior center Abbey Hinton, who played for Mac on a summer team and then at LCHS after transferring from a Tennessee school last year, talks about MacAllister’s “dedication, integrity and passion for girls improving their basketball skills.” She says, “I pray that Coach Mac is happy at this new school. … I will always consider him one of the best role models my Abbey could ever have.”
The LoJo
A long-time coach in the Logan County system has a new job in a different school system. He is now an assistant principal in his home school district, Calloway County.
Travis Anderson was an assistant coach for Cougar baseball for 11 seasons, including this year’s regional championship squad.
“Coach Anderson has coached many sports in his time at Lewisburg and LCHS over the past 11 years and will be missed,” says head baseball and golf coach Ethan Meguiar.
The LoJo
One of the new teachers at Lewisburg is Grace Siegert¸ who is a third grade teacher. She is the daughter of new WKU Alumni Director Rick Dubose and his wife Carol. For many years, Rick was public address announcer at Hilltopper ball games.
Kudos to President Gary Ransdell and others responsible for the selection of Dubose to lead the alumni. Before he was picked, I told some of my colleagues on The Hill that I consider Rick to be one of the five people who are most Western through-and-through. Three of them are still living—Coach Jimmy Feix, Lee Robertson and Dr. Carl Kell—along with the late Dee Gibson. That’s pretty select company.
Grace will get to continue wearing red and white in the North Logan Coon Range while supporting the Lewisburg Rangers.
The LoJo
The Kentucky High School Athletic Association Board of Control completed the formal evaluation process for Commissioner Julian Tackett during its July 22 meeting at Northern Kentucky University. The evaluation was an extremely positive review, and the board awarded him a new four-year contract. Tackett became the seventh commissioner of the KHSAA on June 1, 2010, and begins his 30th year serving the Association in 2013-14.
“The Board of Control is extremely satisfied at this time with the leadership being provided by our commissioner and value his leadership and work ethic during this critical time for our schools as we not only expand offerings, but carefully consider the tremendous importance that school-based athletics plays in the development of college and career ready graduates,” said Board of Control President Bill Beasley. “Certainly, a multi-tiered instrument with 666 responses from the 18 board members, in which the Commissioner received 98% of marks being ether good or excellent, is a strong indication of our approval of his outstanding efforts.
I personally am very pleased. Julian was one of the first KHSAA staff members to learn by name when I was a relatively young reporter, and he has always made me feel welcome, despite my being a very small fish in a very large pond.