Perry’s coaching career began at 14

The biography on the Kansas State website for assistant basketball coach Rodney Perry cites 28 years of coaching experience beginning in 1994, but he really got started sooner than that.

Much sooner.

“Actually, I started coaching when I was 14 years old,” said Perry, a Fort Smith native who graduated from Northside High School. “It was at the Stephens Boys and Girls Club where my aunt, Judy Manning, worked. She got me into it. I was her assistant, the offensive coordinator for football, then the head coach for basketball once football was over.”

Fast-forward several decades and Perry was coaching for a Kansas State men’s basketball team that played Florida Atlantic on Saturday night for the right to advance to the Final Four of the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament.

Basketball fans in Arkansas may have recognized some other familiar faces in the tournament other than the ones connected with the Razorbacks. Kansas State has three with Arkansas ties.

There’s Perry, who is in his first year as an assistant coach with the Wildcats, who beat elite programs in Kentucky and Michigan State in the tournament before facing FAU. Starting guard Markquis Nowell began his college career at Arkansas-Little Rock before transferring to Kansas State and starting guard Desi Sills is a Jonesboro High School graduate who played for both the Razorbacks and Arkansas State before joining KSU.

“Desi is a winner,” said Perry, who has coached a number of top athletes, including Atlanta Hawks guard Trae Young. “He’s a big-time player who’s willing to do whatever it takes to win.”

Perry and his younger brother, Fred Perry, got involved with the Boys and Girls Club in Fort Smith at an early age and Fred Perry became a football star who spent nine seasons in the Canadian Football League. In 1986, Rodney Perry was voted Youth of the Year at the Stephens unit, which earned him a trip as a representative from Arkansas to Washington, D.C. for the Young Leaders Conference.

“Rodney displayed great promise as a teenager coaching at the Fort Smith Boys and Girls Club,” said Jerry Glidewell, former executive director of the Fort Smith Boys and Girls Clubs. “He had a natural ability to connect with players while displaying poise and maturity well beyond his age.”

Perry grew into a Grizzly who played basketball for Doug McKinney at Northside and for Doc Sadler at Westark Community College (now the University of Arkansas-Fort Smith).

Perry finished his basketball career at Missouri State from 1991-93 under Charlie Spoonhour, a Rogers High School graduate.

“Hall of Fame,” Perry said of Spoonhour. “He taught me so much about being a coach. Nolan Richardson, when he was at Arkansas, also helped and he gave me the best advice I’ve ever had when he said that, if you want to be successful as a coach, you had to learn how to motivate, communicate, and teach. That stuck with me and I’ve tried to apply it to wherever I’ve been.”

To say Perry has been everywhere is only a slight exaggeration. His coaching career includes stops at Oral Roberts, Western Illinois, Duquesne, Southwest Baptist, Missouri-Kansas City, Avila University, AAU basketball, and on the high school level with teams mostly in Missouri. He came to Kansas State from Link Academy in Branson, where he helped develop several star players, including Arkansas freshman forward Jordan Walsh.

When the 2022-2023 season is over, Perry and other members of the Wildcats staff will get busy building a team for next year, a task that’s become more difficult with the advent of the transfer portal that allows college athletes to jump from team to team without penalty.

Perry said recruiting now starts within the team.

“It used to be the guys on the bench who weren’t getting to play that you were most concerned about,” Perry said. “Now, a guy could be the leading scorer on the team and he’s wanting to go somewhere else in some cases. So, it’s definitely made the job harder.”

Perry, who’s been a head coach on six different occasions during his long career, said young people hoping to break into the profession must be proactive in their pursuit.

“Network, network, network,” said Perry, who spent six years as a head coach at NAIA Avila in Kansas City. “That means getting to know the coaches and establishing relationships. Go to a basketball camp and become a volunteer, where the coach can get to know you and see you work.

“Go to coaching clinics. Put yourself out there. Let them know who you are.”