Clark Atlanta Panthers men’s basketball head coach Alfred Jordan sat on a section of bleachers under one of the baskets inside L.S. Epps Gymnasium on a Friday afternoon. His team was back home after playing consecutive games in Alabama the previous week and going through a regularly scheduled workout.
The Panthers, 6-2 overall, won’t have a game for another week when they host the Lane College Dragons (3-2 overall) on Saturday, Dec. 16. Jordan, dressed in team gear that matched his black Jordan 15’s, hopes that game will be the start of a winning streak and the end of his team’s current two-game losing streak. “Put 45 on the clock and let it run,” Jordan said, referring to the scoreboard clock that doubles as a workout timer. The week of practice and workouts without a game in between might be the break the Panthers need, according to their coach.
Clark Atlanta won eight games last year, Jordan’s first as head coach at his alma mater. The tide changed at the start of this season, however. Clark Atlanta won all six of their regular season games to begin the season by an average of 13.3 points per game. They are now on that before-mentioned two-game losing streak after taking consecutive one-point losses on the road at Spring Hill College (94-93) and Tuskegee University (71-70) on December 2 and 4. Another lesson he hopes his team learned during that unsuccessful road trip is to control your own destiny as much as you can, he said. “We can’t let referees decide the games,” Jordan said.
Asked what he believes his team has learned from the consecutive losses, Jordan said, “I think what the losses taught us is adversity and that when we lose we have to come together even more.”
This is not last year’s Panthers squad.
Veteran Presences
A big reason for the strong start to the season is the play of guard Chris Martin. A grad student and native of Charlotte, North Carolina, Martin was named Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SIAC) men’s player of the week on November 21 after scoring a combined 78 points during victories over West Florida and Montevallo. The 41 points Martin scored in the regular season opener against West Florida, a 77-57 victory, remains a season-high.
Martin transferred to Clark Atlanta following a career at Division I Presbyterian College and sat out last season to be the floor leader for this year’s team.
“In Martin, you have a kid that’s really good and sat out a year, so he got to watch the game,” Jordan said. “His strengths are coming from his time sitting out and really getting to see the game.”
In an 87-78 road victory at Clayton State University last month, Martin scored a team-high 31 points on 8-12 shooting from the field, with three of those shots coming on four attempts from beyond the three-point arch.
The Stewart twins, Andrew and Elijah, are very familiar with the Atlanta University Center. Four-year players and graduates of Morehouse College, the Chicago natives are spending a graduate year playing for the Panthers. Jordan coached the pair while he was an assistant coach at Morehouse. He knew exactly what he was getting when he brought the Stewarts up the street to play for his squad.
“They are both huge leaders in our locker room, they know my coaching style and what my expectations are,” Jordan said. “They bridge the gap between the coaches and the players.”
Both Stewarts are guards who have been through the wars and immediately added scoring and ball handling to the roster. Elijah averages just over 11 points per game while Andrew is chipping in nine points per contest. It’s the intangibles that are helping the team win, however. During the victory over Montevallo, Andrew grabbed a season-high seven rebounds and 10 points. Elijah scored 13 points and added four assists against Fisk.
There have been a couple of tough nights as well. Andrew shot 3-14 from the field and 2-7 from three during the loss at Tuskegee, for example. Clark Atlanta finished that game with a total of five assists as a team. Martin, who scored a team-high 27 points, which includes making all 16 of his free throw attempts, only had two assists to go along with five turnovers.
Junior center Kharye Cayne is averaging six rebounds per game and has blocked 15 shots in eight games this season. The 6-foot-10 North Carolina native is an important piece of how the team plays, says Jordan. Fellow junior Silas Mason, a transfer from UNC-Asheville, has also made an impact.
Jalen Nesmith, another New Yorker on the roster and the son of streetball legend Malloy “Future” Nesmith, came to Atlanta by way of Jacksonville University and has added steady backcourt play to the team. Nesimth has started seven of the eight games and is playing 20 minutes per game thus far.
On the younger side of the roster is starting sophomore forward Shemani Fuller. The Bronx native is second on the team in scoring this season (14.3 per game) behind Martin and averages just under seven rebounds per game. Despite being in foul trouble late in the Tuskegee game, Fuller managed to score 18 points and grabbed 12 rebounds. Fellow sophomore forward Dez’Mond Perkins is also getting minutes off the bench for the Panthers. Perkins scored 20 points (8-15 FG) against Valdosta State earlier this season.
Asked what he believes his team’s strength is, Jordan, a former Panthers guard and assistant coach under current University of Arkansas at Little Rock men’s head basketball coach Darrell Walker, pondered the question before answering.
“Defense,” he said. “Our defensive effort and intensity is what has been the difference from last season. These guys take their defensive matchups personally.”
Against Lane next Saturday, senior forward Darrell Johnson (15.8 points per game) and junior guard Floyd Williams (10 points per game) will be two players to keep an eye on.
Jordan said his veteran team needs to “capitalize” on how experienced they are at the moment. “I do a good job of recruiting, but you never know if a team will gel like this one has,” he said.
Great expectations
At either corner of the gym above the floor are two red banners signifying the two conference championships the team won in 2017 and 2018. Jordan was the lead assistant coach on those teams. He wants to get back to that level of play, he says.
“Our main goal is to win a national championship,” Jordan said. “We feel like we have an NCAA tournament-caliber roster.”
There isn’t a Division II championship banner hanging above the floor at Epps yet.
“The better we get, the closer we get to accomplishing that,” said Jordan.
