By T. Scott Boatright

 

It’s kind of a case of double dribble déjà vu for Jack Thigpen, who by no means is a stranger to state basketball championships.

And seeing the Ruston Bearcats reach this year’s state tournament for the first time since 1988 has brought memories flooding back.

Thigpen was head coach of the 1988 Bearcats team that won the Class 4A state title. He also helped take state as a Ruston player in 1962 as a junior, defeating Natchitoches, and was also a member of the 1963 RHS team that fell to Neville in the state championship game.

The 2023 Bearcats are the No. 2 seed in the Division I Nonselect School boys playoffs and will take on No. 3 seed Ponchatoula in semifinals action at 6 p.m. Thursday at Barton Coliseum in Lake Charles. It’s the first time a Ruston boys team has made it back to the state tournament since the 1988 state title run.

“I’ve been thinking about it a lot over the weekend,” Thigpen said. “But I think about it often this year, particularly at the end of basketball season as someone who won state championships as both a player and a coach. It was always an exciting time as a player and a coach, and still is as a fan. I still love to go to games and know a lot of coaches in the area. 

“But it becomes a different game once you enter the playoffs. It’s just so exciting and memorable – impossible to forget. So yes, I think about those old championships every year about this time, and the fact Ruston is finally going back is making those memories even stronger and more powerful now.”

Thigpen first coached the Bearcats from 1986 through that magical 1988 season, and later, after a stint as an assistant at Louisiana Tech, served as Ruston’s head coach again from 1995 through the 2000 season.

The 1988 Bearcats were based around a pair of big men – senior forward Anthony Dade, who sent on to a standout career at Louisiana Tech, and junior Al Thurman.

“Those were two outstanding players,” Thigpen said. “Both were inside players, but Al could shoot the ball. He could go outside a little bit and had a nice, slick shot. He was good around the free-throw line.

“So we played a double post with Al and Anthony, who was real quick on his feet and made a lot of great spin moves around the basket. We played Anthony down in the low post and Al in the high post and designed plays to get those guys loose inside.”

Thigpen said the 1988 Bearcats had some good outside players and a solid point guard to mix with their double-barrelled inside attack.

“We had an outstanding shooting guard in Lance Hall who could go out on the perimeter and loosen some things up,” Thigpen said. “And Gerald Johnson and Kent Germany were two other guards who did outstanding jobs for us.

“Our point guard – Willie Melton – was an outstanding leader on that basketball team. He didn’t care about scoring, but he got the ball down and got everybody in place and made good passes. A good team has to have a good floor leader, and Willie was that. A lot of games he wouldn’t take a shot. But he was so important in helping us win games by feeding the ball where it needed to be, playing unselfishly and playing good defense.”

Ruston beat previously undefeated John McDonough for the 1988 title 55-51. 

“John McDonough beat East Ascension, who was coached by someone well known around here – Butch Smart – in the semifinals,” Thigpen said. “We beat Shaw, a Catholic school out of New Orleans, in the semifinals. They had a player – Melvin Simon – who played a lot like Anthony Dade and went on to have a heckuva career at the University of New Orleans.

“Then we beat John McDonough for the championship. It was a low-scoring, hard-fought game.”