Abdur-Rahim’s career comes full circle

    *This is the final part of a four-part series about current Murray State coaches and their athletic careers.
    When you are looking for something special, the last place you often think to check is right underneath your own nose. 
    That was the situation men’s basketball Head Coach Billy Kennedy found himself in last season as his staff lacked a third member just before the start of the year. He did not have to look far, though, as that coveted last spot went to a person who had become rather familiar to him - Amir Abdur-Rahim.
    An assistant coach at California in the mid-90s, Kennedy had a chance to interact with Abdur-Rahim early while recruiting his older brother Shareef. The interactions were friendly, he said, but he did not get to know the coach until later, during Abdur-Rahim’s recruitment.
    “To be honest we really just knew each other from that relationship that he and my brother had,” Abdur-Rahim said, “but I would say our relationship really didn’t grow until maybe about six years later when he signed me out of high school. He had just taken the job at Southeast Louisiana, I believe.”
    During his prep career at Wheeler High School in Marietta, Ga., the high-flying guard was named to the All-Cobb County and Georgia All-State Honorable Mention teams, but without any scholarship offers he decided to play junior college basketball. That is when Kennedy re-entered the picture.
    “I didn’t have any offers at all,” Abdur-Rahim said, “but he knew that I was a good player and heard that I needed somewhere to go. From there on through junior college he always stayed loyal and true to his word and our relationship just grew from there.” 
    He added that his brother called him to help seal the deal.
    “When it came down to it, I had about four schools  really interested in me,” Abdur-Rahim said. “I visited Southeastern Louisiana and Central Florida, (but) growing up our parents taught us loyalty is very big.  People that have showed you their character are a lot of times the people who are going to be true to what they say they’re going to do.
     He took a chance and when it kind of came down to everything I can remember my brother calling me and he said, ‘You don’t need to go visit no other schools, you just need to go to Southeast. You know that Coach Kennedy is going to take care of you. He was there from the jump when nobody wanted you.’” 
    So that is what he did. After one season, Abdur-Rahim joined Kennedy at Southeastern Louisiana, where he went on to earn three-time All-Southland Conference selection honors as a Lion and led the team in scoring for three straight seasons. He also finished as the seventh all-time scorer in school history with 1,282 points.
    Oddly enough, though, he said his favorite college memory came the year after he graduated. 
    “My proudest moment was watching my alma mater in the NCAA tournament (and) seeing where it came from to where it went in four years with the help of a lot of guys,” Abdur-Rahim said. “Four years before (they went) 7-20 and were kind of the doormat of the league, to helping build a program to my senior year where we won a regular season championship and then the next year they won the conference tournament and went to the NCAA tournament.”
    The Racers return to play this week for the continuation of the Coaches vs. Cancer Classic with their game at 3 p.m. today against James Madison.
    Contact Waddell at gregory.waddell@murraystate.edu

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