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Yes, that’s right! The head basketball coach at Louisiana State University in Shreveport is having one heck of a season.
After eleven very successful years as the men’s basketball coach for the NAIA (small college) LSU-S Pilots, Kyle Blankenship was given a rare opportunity to double his fun this season.
Less than two weeks prior to the start of the 2023-2024 college basketball season, the women’s basketball coach at LSU-S resigned. The school’s athletic department budget and staff is, well, quite small at this public university in northwest Louisiana. The clock was ticking with few viable options available to find a coach for the women’s basketball team.
Lucas Morgan, the Director of Athletics at LSU-S, came up with a novel idea. He asked his lone remaining head basketball coach to handle both the men’s and women’s teams for this season.
“There was a very short timeline,” said men’s coach Kyle Blankenship. “He came into my office and just ran the idea by me. At first, I was like, ‘Man, I don’t know if we can make that work.’ He went back to his office, put the game schedules right in front of me, and said there’s only one day that you couldn’t do both – if you could make it happen.”
Coach Kyle Blankenship accepted the challenge. His two teams at LSU-Shreveport have won a combined 54 basketball games (and counting) this season.
But wait, there’s more!
In what must be some type of national record, Coach Kyle Blankenship just guided both the LSU-Shreveport men’s and women’s teams into the NAIA national tournament last week and each won their opening round games.
Unfortunately, the Lady Pilots lost on Saturday in Round 2. However, the #12 seeded LSU-S men pulled-off two consecutive upsets of higher seeded teams to advance to Kansas City’s Municipal Auditorium Arena this Friday at 1PM to play in a quarterfinal game against Langston State University (Oklahoma).
The not-so-glamorous basketball history of LSU-Shreveport
This commuter school opened its doors in south Shreveport in 1967 as a two-year college. By 1975, LSU-Shreveport began awarding degrees to its first four-year graduating class.
LSU-S (which happens to be where my lovely wife and I earned our bachelor’s degrees a few decades ago) is home to about 3,000 local students and has a robust online enrollment for several of its Master’s degree programs.
Alums like me fondly remember the good ol’ days when the school had just three buildings plus the lovely “Snack Shack” portable building which housed a few vending machines and the school’s bookstore.
Basketball was simply an intramural college sport. With no gym on the campus at that time, our games were played in the Louisiana National Guard’s Fort Humbug Armory building south of downtown Shreveport.
Playing basketball on a dusty, slippery wooden floor surrounded by a dozen Army tanks is an experience which many LSU-S students from my generation will always remember!
As the years rolled by, the LSU-S campus started to grow to accommodate its local students.
The Health and Physical Education building was constructed and opened in the 1980’s. However, it took several more years before the LSU-S administration finally agreed to dip its toes into the arena of competitive athletics (including basketball) in 1990. Unfortunately, the LSU-S basketball program was shut down in 1997 due to fiscal constraints.
LSU-S relit the “Pilot” light and resumed basketball after a six-year hiatus in 2003
LSU-Shreveport found the money necessary to resurrect the basketball program again in 2003.
Chad McDowell, a former player at LSU-S during the early 1990’s, was hired to become the new men’s coach.
A highly successful high school coach in Shreveport, McDowell was able to tap plenty of local basketball talent and spruced-up the LSU-S gymnasium with hopes of someday filling its 1,000 retractable bleacher seats.
LSU-S joined the NAIA’s Gulf Coast Athletic Conference (GCAC) during the fall of 2003 and had immediate success on the basketball court. Coach McDowell’s program operated on a shoestring budget at a school which always fretted about taking the students’ focus away from its solid academic programs.
With each year of success on the hardwood, the LSU-Shreveport Pilots started attracting more attention from the students and local supporters. The gym quickly took on the nickname “The Dock”. The basketball team has been a success every season since reappearing in 2003.
Chad McDowell accepted a promotion to become the school’s Director of Athletics in 2012 and promoted his former assistant Kyle Blankenship into the men’s head coaching job.
A former basketball player at Shreveport’s C.E. Byrd High School and at the University of Tulsa, Blankenship’s teams at LSU-S have been extremely successful since he took over in 2012.
In his twelve seasons as skipper of the Pilots, Kyle Blankenship’s teams have compiled a record of 280-96. That’s a nifty 75% winning percentage over a dozen years at the school in south Shreveport. He has earned conference “Coach of the Year” honors seven times.
Coach Blankenship proved to be ambidextrous in 2023
Once LSU-S lost its women’s basketball coach less than two weeks prior to the start of the basketball season this fall, Kyle Blankenship accepted the challenge to coach both the men’s and women’s teams.
Coach Blankenship told the women that they would need to learn the same offensive and defensive schemes which the men’s team utilized. Though it meant a much quicker pace of play than the women had been used to, Kyle Blankenship saw a great deal of potential with this season’s squad.
“I had a good idea of the women’s team’s possibilities prior to season as the ladies team regularly beat the men in shooting drills,” said Coach Blankenship.
In addition to having a hard working graduate assistant named Devin Jackson helping with the women’s team, Coach Blankenship also depended on his wife to help win over the ladies.
“She’s been the MVP of this whole process,” said Kyle Blankenship said of his supporting spouse, Alexis. “She’s built a tremendous relationship with the women’s team. She does all the things that she’s always done for the men. No way I could have done this without her.”
The coach’s wife even baked cupcakes and cookies for Valentine’s Day for the men’s and women’s players. Nothing creates a bond with a hungry basketball team like some tasty homemade treats!
After some initial adjustments, the LSU-S women’s team went on an incredible 28-game winning streak. The Lady Pilots posted an unbeaten 22-0 record in the Red River Athletic Conference and then swept to the conference tournament title.
The women traveled to Salina, Kansas and won a game in the NAIA national tournament for the first time in school history last week. They defeated Tabor College of Hillsboro, Kansas 69-59 in the opening round. The LSU-S women dominated inside the paint by outscoring their opponents 48-24 down low.
“That’s what we practice every day – pounding, pounding, pounding on the inside,” said 6’3” senior center Destanee Roblow.
Unfortunately, the Lady Pilots lost 86-65 in the second round of the NAIA regionals Saturday to Mayville State University from Madison, South Dakota. LSU-S ran into a buzz saw as Mayville (now 26-3) shot 53% from the floor and pulled away during the fourth quarter.
The LSU-S Lady Pilots finished their season with a 30-3 record.
But don’t forget about the LSU-S men’s team!
After posting a 22-8 regular season record, the LSU-S Pilots also received an invitation to play in the NAIA tournament. Fortunately for Coach Kyle Blankenship, the men’s team was assigned to play at the same regional site (Salina, Kansas) as the LSU-S women were playing.
In the men’s opening NAIA game on Friday against #5 seed Kansas Wesleyan, the Pilots had five players score in double digits and survived an overtime period to win a 95-89 thriller. The LSU-S bench outscored Kansas Wesleyan by an incredible 52-12 margin.
On Saturday, the Pilots raced to a 55-34 halftime advantage over #4 seed Concordia University (Seward, Nebraska) and cruised to a surprisingly easy 91-67 win. The team shot a sizzling 60.3% from the field to earn a spot in this week’s NAIA national championship round in Kansas City.
To capture the national championship, the LSU-S men must win four games in five days in KC to bring the school’s first national title trophy in basketball home to The Dock in Shreveport.
This Friday at 1PM, LSU-S will take on the #1 seed of their region, Langston State University.
The Lions are an impressive 31-1. Langston played their first two NAIA tournament games on its own home court last week and demolished both opponents in cruising into this week’s championship round.
In December, Langston and LSU-S met on a neutral court in Fort Worth. The Lions hit 12 of 14 free throws down the stretch to prevail in overtime 71-59.
Will Kyle Blankenship coach both basketball teams at LSU-S again next season?
Blankenship indicated that he is willing to discuss the dual role again next season as long as his graduate assistant Devin Jackson will receive an opportunity to apply and interview for the job.
“He’s probably the hardest working person at LSU Shreveport,” said Blankenship during a recent radio interview.
With his own season record currently at a gaudy 54-11 (30-3 for the women and 24-8 for the men), Coach Kyle Blankenship has earned a nice vacation coming up soon. He has captained his Pilots with distinction this basketball season.
“Winning is fun,” Blankenship said. “There’s nothing greater than that, and we’ve done that as well as any four-year program in the state of Louisiana over the last twenty years. We hope that will always continue.”
After posting 54 wins already this season, LSU-S Coach Kyle Blankenship is having more fun than any other college basketball coach in America.