John Pelphrey looks to rebound–again
By Paul Jordan
As a player, a coach, and a father, John Pelphrey has managed to overcome adversity. He has overcome difficult trials in order to become successful at what he does. It has helped him learn over time, and I am pretty sure it is something he even preaches to his players as a coach and a role model.
As a player at Kentucky, John arrived on campus as “Mr. Basketball” in the state of Kentucky in 1987. Despite this honor, he played during one of the roughest stretches for the UK basketball program. Amidst the scandals and departures, Pelhrey stuck around the program with a group of Kentucky-bred boys who, along with the new head coach, put UK basketball back on the map. Pitino, along with the players dubbed “The Unforgettables”, came back from UK’s first and only losing season post-Rupp to the SEC Championship and an Elite Eight birth his senior year in 1992.
As a father, Pelphrey has been through some personal struggles that most parents can not relate to. As you might have read before, a story came out last month on a bond that Florida’s Billy Donovan, Alabama’s Anthony Grant, and Pelphrey. It is more than just a simple coaching bond or friendship from working with each other for so many years. Each have lost someone close to them, in the case of all three it happens to be the loss of an infant child. Pelphrey lost his infant son shortly after birth due to complications from blood loss. Pelprhey’s daughter, Grace, was born a few years earlier with complications but managed to survive. Unfortunately, his son was not. It is truly unimaginable to me for someone to experience something has tragic as losing a child, but it helped strengthen the relationship between the three coaches and also made them come back stronger as coaches.
As a coach, Pelphrey has also been through some ups and downs. In his first three seasons at South Alabama, he had a losing season each year. And then in 2006, he turned it around with a 24-7 record, Sun Belt Conference Championship, and led South Alabama to their first ever NCAA Tournament birth as a 16 seed. They were, however, eliminated by Billy Donovan’s Gators who ended up winning that year. In 2007, they finished with a 20-12 record and an NIT trip. Considering his assistant coaching resume that had stops at Marshall and Florida, Pelphrey was one of the hot coaches in the country looking to land a new job the next season, and he did so with Arkansas. For his first season on the job in 2008, Arkansas was impressive with a first year coach: a 23-13 record and made it to the second round of the NCAA Tournament. After that, though, his teams were able to get off to hot starts early in the season but not able to remain consistent and fell apart late. In the last two seasons, his teams have won a combined 9 of 38 conference games, and only 14 total wins each year.
This year, his Razorbacks are sticking around in third place in the SEC West with a 16-10 record. Even though the Arkansas faithful have become impatient with his output, they should remain patient. He has a great recruiting class next year, including two four-star players and one five-star player in BJ Young. All three of these players are also in Pelhrey’s backyard, and he is continuing to recruit talented players in that area. John Pelphrey has gone through a lot to get to where he is now, and still has a long way to go.
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