/Lafayette Stribling heading to the Hall, and, naturally he will dress for the occasion

Lafayette Stribling heading to the Hall, and, naturally he will dress for the occasion

RIDGELAND — A visit to Lafayette Stribling’s luxurious Overlook Pointe home is incomplete without seeing his closet. His closet is nearly as large as the tiny tenancy shacks where he grew-up. Stribling proudly will show off his over 200 fashionable suits and tuxedos with shoes and tops to match. A mink coat that Stribling bought for more than he made in three years as a high-school basketball coach is more than he ever earned. Stribling, 84, is one of the most successful basketball coaches in Mississippi. He was a winner everywhere he coached, and once brought Mississippi Valley State into the national spotlight. He was also Mississippi’s most dressed coach. His fans loved seeing what he wore almost as much as watching his teams play, win fast and play well. Stribling’s elaborate wardrobe has a story. It is the reason Stribling bought his home near Barnett Reservoir. The master closet was too big. He graduated from Harmony Vocational High School in rural Pennsylvania 68 years ago. He was the proud son of sharecroppers, but he was poor. His father, who had no formal education, signed his name using an X. He had no suit for his graduation, Lafayette Stribling (or “Strib” as his friends refer to him) He only owned one pair of shoes. These were the ones he wore to school, and also to play high school basketball outdoors. Strib should tell us the rest. Stribling tells us that Stribling borrowed a suit from a Detroit first cousin who was about my height. He sent me a nice blue suede suit. That suit was my graduation dress, but I made a promise to myself that I would never have to wear someone else’s clothes when I went to college. “I was going to have mine own suits – they were going to look nice.” You’ll be amazed at what Strib will wear Saturday night at Jackson Convention Center to induct him into the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame. I am not going to tell you anything other than to say that nobody, even his most loyal fans, will be disappointed. It will be a grand entry. Many people, mostly former players, will be flying in from all parts of the country to see him. He chuckles as he tells them, “Strib, they wouldn’t miss it, I want to look at what you’re going to wear,” They won’t be disappointed.” He will have players who played at Valley and Tougaloo for him in highschool. Many people know a little bit about his life and the long road to the Hall of Fame. It is not all that well-known. It is possible that they don’t know that Strib was the second child of six children to Mary Stribling and that his brother and sister died as babies. They might not be aware that he was a farmer as a child and that Mary Stribling made Strib promise that he would use his basketball skills to help him get to college. He graduated from Mississippi Industrial College, Holly Springs. There he worked his first job as a coach for boys and girls, and was also a teacher of science, physical education, and the school bus driver. He did all this for $2,400 per year. Strib won at Walnut Grove and South Leake, then Grenada. After winning more than 900 games in high school, he was finally called to ask if he would be interested in the job at Mississippi Valley. Stribling said that he would have walked all the way from Itta Bena. “That was my dream to be a college basketball coach.” It was 1983 when the state legislature was considering closing MVSU. Valley had never seen a winning basketball team. Strib’s first team won the school’s first ever winning season. They were already winning the SWAC by 1986. Yes. On March 14, 1986, their SWAC champions traveled to Duke, the No. The NCAA Tournament’s first round saw the No. 1 team in the nation. The Duke Blue Devils, coached and led by Johnny Dawkins by Mike Krzyzewski, were a prohibitive favorite. They played just a few miles away from Greensboro, N.C. where they had just won the Atlantic Coast Conference tournament. Strib said, “Nobody gave it a chance.” Even a Jackson sports columnist wrote that it was the worst match since Poland vs Germany. He still regrets it. Valley led by seven points at the half and was leading by halftime. Duke won the game 85-78 after Valley’s five starters lost in the last five minutes. The Duke crowd gave Valley, and their elegantly dressed coach, a standing ovation. Strib states, “They had been discussing about closing us down.” “Instead of closing us down, they brought us down to Jackson, and celebrated us,” Strib said. Under Strib Valley won four SWAC regular-season championships and three SWAC tournament title. Valley hadn’t had a winning season since he arrived. While he was with the Delta Devils, he never saw a losing season. After 48 years of service in the Mississippi retirement system Strib decided to leave Valley and take a coaching job at Tougaloo. He also took over another losing program. Tougaloo won six consecutive conference championships, was the only loss in his entire career, and reached the NAIA national tourney five times. He took seven Tougaloo players, aged 76, to the conference championship and national tournament in 2011. The team was called “The Magnificent Seven”. Stribling smiles and says, “We didn’t have nearly enough players for scrimmage.” They finished with 27-4. James Carter, a banker at Trustmark who is now 28 years old, was a star player and captain of that team. It still amazes me how an older man, more than 50 years, understood his players and managed them so well. Carter says that Carter understood that treating 10 players the same way is a mistreatment of nine. He knew all the strengths and weaknesses of his players and adjusted his coaching accordingly. He worked with us, man. He made it enjoyable, even though we worked hard. Because we didn’t have as many people, we out-worked everybody else. He taught me many lessons that I still use every day.” The Tougaloo team was a final exclamation point in a remarkable coaching career. Saturday night will be a final exclamation point in an extraordinary life. Lafayette Stribling will be dressing for the occasion. *** Saturday’s guest: Joe Walker, Jr., strictly track and field coach, with Olympic medalists to prove his point