Stephen F. Austin coach returns to KU Jayhawks’ Allen Fieldhouse: ‘It’s the best’
Kyle Keller worked as a member of coach Bill Self’s Kansas’ men’s basketball support staff for three seasons — from 2008-09 to 2010-11 — long enough to fall in love with Allen Fieldhouse, the storied home of the Jayhawks.
“I appreciate Coach Self allowing us to experience the fieldhouse. It’s the greatest college venue there is. It’s the best,” said Keller, sixth-year head men’s hoops coach at Stephen F. Austin and long-time friend of 19th-year Jayhawks coach Self.
Keller, KU’s video coordinator during a 33-3 season in 2009-10 and 35-3 campaign in 10-11, will be bringing the Lumberjacks (8-3) of the Western Athletic Conference to Lawrence for Saturday’s 7 p.m. game against the No. 7-ranked Jayhawks (8-1).
“I’ve been fortunate enough to take our teams to Kentucky and Duke — some great places,” noted Keller. In fact, his Lumberjacks shocked Duke, 85-83, on Nov. 26, 2019 at Cameron Indoor Stadium in Durham, North Carolina. He’s also coached the Lumberjacks to wins at Baylor (59-58 on Dec. 18, 2018) and at LSU (83-82 on Dec. 16, 2017). SFA lost the above-mentioned game at Kentucky, 87-64, on Nov. 11, 2016, at Rupp Arena in Lexington.
“There’s no place like the fieldhouse. I’ve been gone so long now, I haven’t seen the rules of basketball (display in Booth Family Hall of Athletics). I want to walk around and see that stuff. I’m anxious to see all the improvements myself,” added Keller, who will be joined on the trip to KU by his wife, Chaunsea; daughter, Kenzie; and son, Kemper.
Keller noted that he’s “been in the fieldhouse when there’s been some great games all the way down to the end and also when the students were singing with the game over at halftime. Hopefully we’ll have a chance to compete and make it fun for both teams and coach (Self) will feel like we gave their team some good practice.”
As much as he will love the setting, Keller said: “I am excited to see some great friends. I’d prefer to do it after I retired and came back to watch some games then. I am not excited about playing coach’s team. That’s not a lot of fun for me. I wish our team was healthy. I wish our team was in the right frame of mind coming off a victory instead of a loss.”
The Lumberjacks, who lost accomplished senior guard Roti Ware to a season-ending knee injury in the first half of an 63-51 win over Liberty on Dec. 11, suffered a shocking 82-69 defeat to Louisiana Monroe in their first full game without Ware on Tuesday at SFA’s Johnson Coliseum in Nacogdoches, Texas.
“It’ll be a good challenge. I think we’ll grow because of it (playing KU),” said Keller, who told The Star on Wednesday he might move former KU guard Latrell Jossell into the starting lineup with Ware out for the rest of the season. Jossell, a 5-foot-11 sophomore from Chicago, who played sparingly last season at KU then transferred, hit seven threes — yes seven threes — and scored 28 points in Tuesday’s loss.
“Trust me I was able to be around Conner Teahan (when Teahan, brother of KU senior walk-on Chris Teahan, played at KU). The way some of these (KU) games have gone lately, I’ve got Teahan and Jankovich (Michael, like Teahan a KU walk on) in the scouting report. Unfortunately I expect we’ll have to guard those guys the way the games have gone lately,” Keller said of recent lopsided KU victories.
Keller said he tries to stay in touch with members of the KU coaching staff as much as possible. For instance, he contacted Kurtis Townsend on Monday to wish the KU aide a happy birthday. He’s closest, however, with Self, who like Keller is an Oklahoma State graduate and former member of the Cowboy coaching staff. Keller has also been an assistant at Louisiana Tech, UTSA and Texas A&M.
“A lot of guys are grateful to coach. For me, though, I owe everything to coach,” Keller said. “If you go back to the roots of life, coach is that for me. I wouldn’t be here with a family, wouldn’t be able to provide for my family, have the life I’ve had without coach Self.”
Keller will never forget Bill and Cindy Self insisting Keller move into their house in Stillwater, Oklahoma, after Keller’s apartment was destroyed by a tornado in May 1990. Keller was a graduate student at OSU; Self a member of the coaching staff at the time.
“He had me move what I had left of my clothes into his garage, gave me a spare bedroom,” Keller said. “I had no place to go at that time at 22. I’d finished school and had no place to go. With his help I was lucky enough to get a job at Louisiana Tech (in 1990).”
After Sean Sutton and members of his OSU coaching staff, including Keller, were let go in 2008, Self asked Keller to join the Jayhawks program in Lawrence. After three seasons, Keller joined Billy Kennedy’s coaching staff at Texas A&M.
“Coach Self said, ‘You’ve been doing this a long time. You should come here with us, recharge your batteries,’’’ Keller said. “He said, ‘It’lll be good for you.’ He helped me get on at A&M. Talk about a mentor or role model. Coach is everything to me,” he added.
Keller said it’d be a “compliment” if on Saturday anybody notices that his Lumberjacks team resembles the Jayhawks a bit.
“We run a lot of the same offense Coach did when I was there with him,” Keller said. “I think he does it better than anybody. We’ve led college basketball two of the last three years in steals. We’ve been pretty good at doing that. Our team has not been like that (this year) as it has in the past.
“We run 2-game and some ball screen stuff. It’s a different animal playing against Coach’s teams. I think since they got beat (by Dayton on Nov. 26) they’ve been clicking. The worse thing that could have happened to us is them losing a game.”
Self’s Jayhawks have won four straight games entering Saturday’s contest. The Lumberjacks had won four straight prior to the loss to Louisiana Monroe.
“We laid an egg,” Keller said. “You look around for your senior leader (Ware) and he’s not there. That was a shock to our system. We just got hit in the head. I would categorize that as one of our worst losses for sure in our six years here.”
Just as wins over Duke, Baylor and LSU were some huge wins. KU’s Self expects a tough test from his buddy’s Lumberjacks.
“I have known Kyle since 1987 when he was a student at Oklahoma State,” Self said. “He has done every job imaginable, from being a student assistant to a graduate assistant to a part-time assistant to a head coach, and in charge of every duty you could handle in a basketball program at his various stops.
(At SFA) Kyle has done a fabulous job highlighted by the 2018 NCAA Tournament berth (first-round loss to Texas Tech) and the win at Duke last year. He’s a great coach and a great friend and I look forward to having him back at Allen Fieldhouse,” Self stated.
This story was originally published December 16, 2021 at 12:00 PM.
