Both head coaches insist it really isn’t a big deal to them personally.
Just about everyone else watching will probably see it differently.
When Delaware State University visits North Carolina Central University on Saturday (Jan. 8) at 4 p.m. at McDougald-McLendon Gym the game was going to be historic anyway, since it will mark the first time since the Eagles officially rejoined the MEAC they’ll play a MEAC team in a home basketball game.
But it will also mark the first return of former NCCU coach Greg Jackson for a game in Durham since he left to take the helm with the Hornets in 2000.
Jackson was at NCCU for the most successful run in Eagle basketball history since the days of Naismith Basketball Hall of Famer John McLendon. Jackson was the top assistant for Mike Bernard, who is now Jackson’s trusted assistant at DSU, from 1985-91 as Bernard went 115-56 and won the 1989 NCAA Division II championship.
Jackson took over as head coach in 1991 when Bernard departed for Norfolk State and went 164-78 over a nine-year tenure, including a return trip to the Elite Eight in 1993.
Showing plenty of promise on that 1992-93 team was a freshman named LeVelle Moton, who is now in his second season as NCCU’s head coach. The shooting guard went on to become the undisputed best player of the Jackson era, scoring 1,714 points to become the No. 3 scorer in school history as the Eagles went 80-28 during his career.
“I know he’s an emotional guy,” Moton said of Jackson, who is 162-156 in nine seasons at the DSU helm. “I just don’t want him out here crying and hugging and all that. But he’ll have that team ready to play for him. For me, I know it’s cliché, and I know it’s not the drama people want to hear, but this game is not circled on my calendar. It’s North Carolina Central vs. Delaware State.
“He has to come back and look up and see faces and all that stuff. I don’t know what he’ll be feeling, but there’s no pressure on me. I’m building a program, and he’s the Hall of Fame coach. I’m not supposed to out-coach him. We’re fierce competitors and we’ll try to cut each other’s hearts out for two hours, and then we’ll leave it on the floor.”
At DSU, Jackson has turned around a once sad-sack program to make the Hornets a consistent contender in the MEAC. The big highlight for him there so far was the 2004-05 season. He led DSU to its first MEAC Tournament title, and then took the No. 16 seed into a first-round NCAA Tournament meeting with Duke at the Charlotte Coliseum in which the Blue Devils had to grind out a 57-46 win.
The next season the Hornets earned an automatic bid to the NIT when Jackson got what he said was his biggest career win at DSU, a 58-53 first-round upset at Northern Arizona.
The Hornets almost topped that on Dec. 22 at the RBC Center, when a half-court shot had to rim out at the buzzer for N.C. State to escape with a 72-70 win.
“It’s going to be emotional for me because it’s a special place,” Jackson said of his return to Durham. “I’ve been blessed to work with two great universities, North Carolina Central and Delaware State. I’ve been blessed by the grace of God to be around some great people. I have nothing but love for Central, and I get to coach against one of the best players I’ve ever coached. But I’m not preparing for this game any differently than any other game. We’ll come down with the same mindset as any other game.
“I’m in a no-lose situation. I have so much love for the university, the community and the city. (NCCU athletic director) Ingrid (Wicker-McCree) was the volleyball coach when I was there, and what she’s doing with the program is amazing. (Track coach) Mike Lawson and I used to spend a lot of time in the office just sitting around talking about life. I look at the success he’s had and the success Joli Robinson has had with the women’s program, and I spent a lot of time working with her. (Assistant A.D. for marketing and cheerleader coach) LuAnn Edmonds-Harris, I got so much support from her and from so many people. I developed so many good relationships there.”
Each coach acknowledges he might not be where he is today if it hadn’t been for the other guy. Jackson needed one great go-to player to help him put his own personal stamp on the program after his good friend Bernard departed, and Moton needed a father figure to not only enhance his basketball skills but give him a jump-start on his adult life.
Jackson is still the top career scorer at St. Paul’s College, which hasn’t done a lot of winning in basketball outside the time he was in uniform. He helped get the Tigers to the semifinals of a CIAA Tournament, was named first-team All-Virginia on a squad with Division I players, and got a nice thank you when the school decided to retire his jersey.
“(LeVelle and I) did the same thing — we shot the ball every time we got it, and never saw a shot we didn’t like,” Jackson said with a laugh. “I had the green light to shoot when I got ready and he had the green light to shoot when he got ready. But one of the things we both learned from that was that we became students of the game. He had a great attitude off the court. He was well-liked and he got along with people.”
NCCU has not retired any jerseys, but Moton’s No. 15 is one of 16 that are honored on the wall at McDougald-McLendon Gym. He’s the youngest of the male alumni whose jersey hangs on the wall.
“I’m just thankful Coach Jackson gave me the opportunity to come here and have a full scholarship and some wonderful memories,” Moton said. “It’s served me well.
“I remember the energy and excitement that were in this gym when I played. It’s surreal to believe that people had to sit on the steps to witness our games. It was almost like we were rock stars. We generated and created an electric atmosphere. Those were the glory days.”
But Moton said Jackson wasn’t just all about the basketball.
“He was always truthful, and when you come from a background where you don’t have a father, you’re not used to hearing the truth from a male figure, so you might take it the wrong way,” Moton said. “He instilled in me his values and his belief in God. He always took us to church and taught us how to be gentlemen and how to take off our hats and say ‘Yes sir’ and ‘No sir.’
“There was one thing that he always said that kind of affected everyone on the team. He always said ‘The ball is going to stop bouncing one day, and when it does what are you going to do?’ When you’re 17 or 18 you think you’re going to be the first 45-year-old guy in the NBA. You have all these dreams and aspirations, but he made us prepare for that moment. He said ‘Your chances of going to the NBA are the same as nailing Jell-O to this tree.’ And some people took it like he was saying he didn’t believe in us. But he believed in us enough to tell us that whether or not you went to the NBA that ball was going to stop bouncing for you one day and you had to have a secondary plan.”
Moton graduated in four years, saying he was inspired not only by his mother staying on him about it constantly, but also in watching Jackson successfully pursuing an advanced degree as he coached.
“The women who raised me could not teach me how to be a man, so I patterned myself after him,” Moton said. “He was getting his master’s degree, and I never really understood the tears of his career. We had a lot of similarities that we were both scoring guards and had a decent amount of success on the floor, and his upbringing was similar to mine.”
Both men had short stints in NBA training camps after their college careers ended. Jackson had gone back to be an assistant at St. Paul’s after that, while Moton had seven seasons making a living playing basketball outside the USA with stints in Indonesia, Cyprus, Israel and Germany.
“I’ve seen it all,” Moton said. “I was blessed to go over there and earn a living playing professional basketball.”
But like his old coach, Moton had his degree when he got his first coaching job at Raleigh’s West Millbrook Middle School.
“I told him he had a chance to be an outstanding college coach,” Jackson said of Moton. “He’s doing an outstanding job, and I’ve told most of the coaches in the conference that in a year or two Central is going to be at the top of this conference.
“A lot of times these kids focus on playing in the NBA and that’s extremely hard. Going to school and getting your education is first and foremost. If you’re willing to pay the price to be a good student, you have control of your life as far as your goals and objectives go. And I thought LeVelle really paid attention to that.”
The mutual respect between the men is obvious. But Moton said he doesn’t think he’s quite the coach Jackson is — at least not yet.
“I know Todd Bozeman and with all due respect, he does a wonderful job with his team at Morgan State, and there are other tremendous coaches in the league,” Moton said. “But I think Coach Jackson is the best coach in the MEAC. I’ve seen his preparation. He does the most with the least amount of talent, but this year they have some talent. I’ve seen it for years, and I know what he brings to the table.
“But it’s MEAC basketball, and there’s a lot of parity. The team that’s executing the best is usually the team that’s fortunate enough to win. We just have to remain humble and hungry.”
NCCU Eagles Insider Mike Potter is an award-winning journalist with more than two decades of experience covering North Carolina Central University.
