Gaining experience doesn’t happen overnight. Assistant men’s basketball coach Rennie Bailey has dedicated the last 20 years of his life gaining valuable insight in the collegiate basketball world.
Bailey has added plenty of basketball experience through his own career before he became a coach. As a player, Bailey earned four letters as a standout member of the Louisiana Tech Bulldogs basketball team. During his senior season of 1983-84, Bailey and future NBA Hall of Famer Karl Malone helped the Bulldogs to a Southland Conference Tournament championship and a trip to the NCAA Tournament. He received his bachelor’s degree in health and physical education from Louisiana Tech in 1987. At the age of 22, Bailey was drafted in the 6th round to the Detroit Pistons. After what he refers to as, “the shortest professional career ever: two and a half weeks,” Bailey turned to coaching; something he had wanted to do for a long time.
Bailey has wanted to be a coach since he was in 8th grade. It was through his own childhood experiences in sports that he realized the impact coaches leave on their athletes. Whether it was through little league baseball or basketball, Bailey credits his former coaches for his passion. “Coaches cared about us and they wanted us to be good players and good athletes, but they wanted us to be good young men first,” Bailey said. Bailey has adopted this way of thinking and uses it as a focus for the Colonel basketball team. “I want them to be great young men, productive citizens of the world,” Bailey said.
Throughout his extensive coaching career, Bailey helped rebuild one of the Colonels’ toughest conference opponents, the Stephen F. Austin Lumberjacks of Nacogdoches, Texas. From 2000-2004, Bailey was the assistant coach of the Lumberjacks alongside head coach Danny Kaspar. The Lumberjacks went from a combined 22-32 record during his first two seasons to a combined 42-17 record in their third and fourth years. SFA finished second in the Southland Conference and participated in the conference tournament finals finishing second in 2002-03.SFA claimed a fourth place finish in 2003-04 and advanced to the conference tournament finals, earning a runner up finish. “It’s really gratifying to know the state of the program at SFA once Coach Kaspar was named the head coach, to know where the program was before we got there and the rapid success we had within the 4 years that I was there,” Bailey said.
Bailey has also played a part in helping multiple players move towards their dream of playing in the NBA. As an assistant coach under Gordon Stouffer’s 1988-1990 Nicholls State Colonels, Bailey helped sign Gerard King, who was a future NBA Washington Wizard and San Antonio Spur. As an assistant coach on Jerry Lloyd’s staff at Louisiana Tech in 1992, Bailey helped coach PJ Brown who, later that year, went on to be the 29th overall pick of the NBA draft to the New Jersey Nets. Despite his role in helping players get to the next level athletically, Bailey stresses the importance of guiding young men in the right direction. “Being a coach isn’t just about being a coach. It’s about helping boys become young men and giving them direction and guidance within their lives so that they can be successful once they leave the university,” Bailey said.
According to Bailey, one of his biggest coaching strengths is the immense amount of knowledge he’s attained through his basketball career. “I have a great deal of experience considering that I’ve been doing this over 20 years at the Division I and junior college level,” he said. He also believes that his previous professional experience allows him to help others in trying to get to the next level. “In considering that I coach now, and that every college player that comes through the system that’s something that they aspire to do,” Bailey said. “I have firsthand insight about how they may want to go about getting there.”
Bailey said his experience doesn’t just lie in the game of basketball, but also in the game of life. “I think it takes both in order for you to have success,” he said. Bailey believes another big strength he possesses is his ability to communicate with student athletes. “Whether it’s me getting after them to try and challenge them and be very demanding of them, I think my gift gives me a place where they accept the challenge and they accept the demanding part. I want to make them better,” he said.
Bailey’s oldest son, Sterling, is a freshman forward and guard on the Colonel’s basketball team this season. According to Sterling, his dad’s best coaching quality is his humor. “He gets after us pretty hard, but he’s pretty funny. He doesn’t know he’s funny, but all the guys think he is,” he said.
This isn’t the first time Bailey has had the opportunity to coach his son. After being released from the Louisiana Tech staff in 2008, Bailey acted as a volunteer coach at Cedar Creek High School in Ruston for Sterling’s junior and senior years. Bailey credits this rare opportunity to God. “I’m a man of faith and in saying that, I have a high belief in faith in God. It’s not so much what happens it’s about how you respond to what happens and in me being released from my job at LA Tech, it gave me an opportunity to coach Sterling,” he said. Bailey adds that being able to be on the court for six months was a gratifying and enjoyable experience. “To watch your kid grow at another level, not just in life but now suddenly in the game that he holds dearly to his heart, and to give him knowledge that I have on a daily basis, that’s gratifying,” he said.
Bailey admits that coaching his son at the collegiate level was always something that both he and Sterling internally wanted, but it was never verbally discussed. “We never really talked about it, but I think that it was something both he and I wanted on the inside to happen. I would always tell him that the only was he could play for me was if he was good enough. Things happen for a reason and I’m here at Nicholls State and so is he and I think that’s a great thing,” he said.
At this point in time, Bailey’s short-term focus is to help the Colonels make it to the 2011 NCAA tournament, while his long-term focus is to become a division 1 head basketball coach. Again, Bailey refers back to faith. “I have a great relationship with Jesus Christ, and that’s the most important thing. Through my years of life I’ve learned it’s not where I want to be and what I want to do, I just want to be where God wants me to be and do what God wants me to do,” he said.
Starting Monday, February 7th, Bailey will be leading a service for the Fellowship of Christian Athletes in the Student Union at 7 p.m. every Monday for all athletes that choose to attend.
