So Far So Good at JMU, But Star Guard A Complex Figure

This is a feature story on Abdulai Jalloh, an enigmatic guard who transferred from St. Joseph’s to James Madison despite having led St. Joe’s in scoring and rebounding as a sophomore. This story ran as a two-part series. It is pasted in one.

HARRISONBURG — Monte Ross’ voice stalled as he pondered how to answer the question. There was a lot to say – some good, some not so good – and he hoped to be forthcoming but fair. After all, the question’s subject was someone his team would have to play against.

What is Abdulai Jalloh all about?

After a nervous laugh, he began.

“He was a very different type of individual,” said Ross, a former assistant basketball coach at St. Joseph’s and now the head coach at Delaware. “He was a really talented guy, and work ethic was second to none…”

Stop. Right there.

That’s where the consensus ends on Jalloh, the player James Madison fans have pinned their hopes on to transform the long-suffering Dukes into a Colonial Athletic Association contender. The 6-foot-1, 190-pound guard’s mystifying transfer to JMU from Atlantic 10 power St. Joseph’s after leading the Hawks in scoring and rebounding provided instant promise to a program that has been stagnant for most of a decade.

He is regarded as the most talented guard to come through JMU since two-time All-CAA pick David Fanning (1999-2003) and maybe since the Lefty Driesell era. He’s got an ankle-obliterating crossover, a gravity-mocking 43-inch vertical and a pull-up jumper that he can stick from anywhere. He can suffocate opposing ballhandlers and steal boards from players a head taller.

“He’s a kid who can dominate a game,” Hofstra coach Tom Pecora said.

He’s also a kid who has won over his new teammates and coaches, a kid whose quick smile seems to reflect his delight at his new surroundings.

But the goateed Washington, D.C., native also is as enigmatic as he is gifted, with two former teammates and two former assistant coaches saying his do-it-by-myself play disrupted team chemistry at St. Joe’s.

Coaches and teammates, past and present, describe Jalloh as everything from a dynamic backcourt presence capable of improving his whole squad to a ballhog, as everything from an engaging conversationalist and deep thinker to a walled-off loner.

The divide tends to come between the past and the present. Jalloh’s current teammates at JMU rave about his hoops skills and say he’s been anything but selfish or standoffish. Jalloh himself claims he’s matured since his days at St. Joe’s, that he’s a different person.

“Thinking back on it, I know what they were talking about,” said Jalloh, “and I wouldn’t repeat those mistakes.”

He made those remarks while standing outside the Convocation Center, watching the sun rise over the JMU arboretum after an early-morning conditioning session. It was an idyllic setting for a kid who was reared tight inside the Beltway in District Heights, Md., before heading to inner-city Philly for college ball.

Talk to different people and you get different views on Jalloh, even on his reasons for leaving St. Joe’s and transferring to James Madison. Former coaches say it was because he wanted to play point guard and couldn’t do so for the Hawks. Jalloh says only that it was for “a change of scenery.”

“Everybody’s seeing the same information differently,” said Greg Holmes, whom Jalloh calls his mentor.

So how should they see it? What is Jalloh really all about, and what does that mean for a program that yearns for him to impact JMU like star transfers Steve Hood, Fess Irvin and Louis Rowe and help end the Dukes’ streak of seven losing seasons?

Only history, of course, will be able to adequately answer that question. To even attempt, however, requires the telling of Jalloh’s entire story, one that begins with a determined woman from the west coast of Africa.

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By her account, Alice Jalloh was born into an impoverished family in Sierre Leone but moved to Washington as a teenager in 1975 to live with her sister and brother-in-law. She graduated from high school with honors and earned an academic scholarship to college, but problems with her visa kept her from enrolling right away. Within a few years, she said she married Abdul Jalloh, also a Sierre Leone native, and the couple had their first child, Clement, in 1983.

Nine years later, however, after the couple had four boys – Clement, Abdulai, Abdul Jr. and Raful – they divorced, leaving Alice as her children’s sole provider, she said.

Maintaining the family’s quality of living might have been considered a success for Alice, but she refused to raise her children in an apartment in inner-city Washington. No, her boys would have a house, a backyard to play in, a driveway, and most importantly, a safe community where the streets wouldn’t be synonymous with drugs, violence and fear.

“I found out that neighborhood was not an appropriate place for me to raise my children,” said Alice, who still speaks with a heavy Sierra Leonean accent. “I knew I had to work very hard and save money in order for me to raise these children the right way in a place where they don’t have to worry. I took hope from God and promised my children an environment where they can be safe.”

She bought a two-story home in District Heights, where each resident appears to have purchased the basic package of the American Dream – a safe neighborhood, but one devoid of frills. Every house has a backyard, but few of them are big enough to host a neighborhood football game. Every house has a driveway, but most of them are insufficient for two vehicles, so the streets are crammed with cars.

For a single mother without a college degree, maintaining even that modest existence was taxing. Throughout Abdulai’s childhood, she said she always worked two jobs and sometimes three. She was an ice cream lady for Good Humor and a security guard. She worked at a hospital, and for a while she was a driving instructor. She said she also was working class by class toward her degree in public health at the University of the District of Columbia, which she finally finished in June 2005.

Sometimes, Alice would come home from one job at night and leave for another by the time her children woke up in the morning. Their clothes, laid out on the couch in the living room, were the only evidence that she’d been home. Alice said she relied on babysitters and neighbors to keep an eye on the boys, but mostly, they raised each other, she said, with Clement and Abdulai taking care of the younger siblings.

Her example, though, still shaped them.

“I’m thinking like, ‘If she’s working this hard, and we’re just getting here, we’re just able to keep our nose above water,” Jalloh said, “then for me to get where I have aspirations of going, I gotta work at least five times harder than her.”

And when Alice signed up all the boys for basketball through the local Boys & Girls Club when Jalloh was in seventh grade, that’s what he tried to do. He would stay out so late playing on the portable hoop in his back yard that neighbors would complain he was keeping them awake. Alice eventually took the carpet off the floor in the basement so Jalloh could stay up until all hours dribbling.

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It was through basketball that Jalloh met Greg Holmes, who was then coaching a Christian Youth Organization team. Holmes was holding a practice at an open gym when the 13-year-old approached him.

“He said, ‘Hey old man, can you teach me some of that stuff?'” said Holmes, now a 38-year-old project manager for the Department of Defense. “We exchanged numbers and it kind of went from there.”

In Jalloh’s infectious smile, inquisitive mind and man-of-the-house-too-soon maturity, Holmes saw potential that he believed could only be properly tapped if the boy had a father figure, which he tried to provide.

The relationship started with basketball workouts that were just as much for Jalloh’s mind as his hoops skills, as the two talked politics, religion and, mostly, life while Jalloh was warming up and taking shots. It continued elsewhere. Holmes took Jalloh to church with his family, allowed him to baby-sit his two young sons, and even added him to his campaign team last summer during an unsuccessful run for a state senate seat.

“I guess that’s the answer to how did I overcome not having a father around the house,” Jalloh said. “… He would just keep me around and then take me home, and I just looked forward to seeing him again the next day.”

Because of Holmes, Jalloh doesn’t speak with bitterness about his father, referring to Abdul as “a cool guy.”

“I’m just thankful that I knew who he was,” Jalloh said, though he declined to provide contact information for his father. “I got a chance to see his face probably 10 times a year. I was just thankful I got to see his face, and I still do see his face, you know. A lot of people don’t have that opportunity, or at least a lot of people I grew up with.”

Holmes, however, saw one personality trait in Jalloh that is common in children of broken homes – a hesitance to trust others, which would turn into an issue down the road.

“He’s got a discerning spirit about people and with that discerning spirit, it takes him a while to allow people in,” Holmes said. “…Not having that dad around, not having that model affects your ability to interact with other people. You become an introvert until that person kind of earns your trust.”

That reluctance didn’t have a major effect on Jalloh in high school, at least not enough to raise any red flags with then-St. Joseph’s assistant Matt Brady, now the head coach at Marist. The fact that Jalloh went to three different high schools – Archbishop Carroll in Washington as a freshman, Bishop McNamara in Forestville, Md., as a sophomore and National Christian Academy in Fort Washington, Md., his final two seasons – wasn’t considered a problem either.

Brady offered Jalloh a scholarship to St. Joe’s, which went to the Elite Eight in the guard’s senior year of high school. That year, Jalloh led a loaded National Christian squad, headlined by Kevin Durant – the No. 2 pick in July’s NBA draft – and four other major Division I players, to a 26-3 record. Jalloh earned first-team All-Met honors in the Washington Post by averaging 17 points, six rebounds and five assists per game.

To that point, he’d made his way mostly on his own, having put his faith in only a select few. It was apparently his determination to stay on that path, however, that caused the opinions on him to divide. When he left St. Joe’s, former coaches and teammates say, there were few, if any, tears shed on Hawk Hill. He’s received a far different reaction from his new teammates at James Madison.

Part 2

Mike Rice answered the question as if he’d spent years preparing for it, issuing his response almost as soon as the query was finished.

What is Abdulai Jalloh all about?

“If he could dedicate himself toward his teammates like he dedicates himself in improving,” said Rice, a former assistant at St. Joseph’s and now the head basketball coach at Robert Morris, “he would be unstoppable.”

That’s the rub. It’s the first thing his ex-coaches and teammates at St. Joseph’s mention when you ask them about the James Madison transfer’s weaknesses – at least the few who will talk. Coach Phil Martelli declined comment for this story through a St. Joe’s spokesperson, and also refused to make his current players available for interviews.

Jalloh left St. Joe’s for JMU following his sophomore year, saying only that he needed a “change of scenery.” After sitting out last winter under NCAA transfer rules, he is now eligible to play for the Dukes, a program in desperate need of a playmaker after enduring seven consecutive losing seasons.

Many expect Jalloh to fill that role.

Former players and coaches rave about Jalloh ‘s work ethic, about the days they’d literally have to kick him out of the gym and the nights he’d go there to take shots as soon as the bus got back to Hawk Hill after tough losses on the road.

And no one sells his talent short, either. How could they? As a sophomore, Jalloh was the team’s leading scorer, pumping in 15.1 points per game – including 30 against Ohio State – while also grabbing a team-best 5.5 rebounds per game, an eye-popping number for a 6-foot-2, 190-pound guard. He was rewarded with a spot on the All-Atlantic 10 second-team.

In his two years, however, the Hawks were unable to recreate their magical 2003-04 season, which began with 27 straight wins and ended in the Elite Eight. They were in the NIT both seasons, losing in the final his freshman year.

“As far as being athletically talented and gifted, his upside is unbelievable,” Rice said. “…He’s relentless, whether he’s going to the basket or he’s defending. He’s just a relentless competitor.”

But by several accounts, he was so confident in his talent that he tried to do it all, the sort of player who would force contested shots and home-run passes, which his critics saw as an attempt to create highlight videos instead of win games.

That often worked against Jalloh and the Hawks. Jalloh topped the team in field-goal attempts his sophomore year and shot a middling 37.5 percent while making just 34.2 percent of his 3-pointers. He also committed the most turnovers on the team with 91, high for a non-point guard.

” Abdulai wanted the ball in his hands more than anyone,” former St. Joseph’s guard Chet Stachitas said via e-mail from Poland, where he is playing for a professional team. “But he wanted it for the wrong reasons. Yes, he wanted to win, but he wanted to win so that he would get the glory for it, not the team.”

Said former St. Joe’s forward Dave Mallon, also by e-mail from England, where he plays for the Worcester Wolves of the British Basketball League: “He always wanted the attention and that was a problem on that team. Not that anyone else wanted the attention, but we all played as a team, and he made it feel like it was St. Joe’s and Abdulai Jalloh vs. ____ team.”

Despite those critical assessments, Stachitas and Mallon both said they liked Jalloh personally, though he was a bit of a loner. The issue, they said, was one of trust.

“I think sometimes he put so much work in that I’m not sure he trusted his teammates all the time,” said former St. Joe’s assistant Monte Ross, now the head coach at Delaware. “He tried to do too much individually because he had such a strong work ethic and he felt like his teammates didn’t do as much as he did.”

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What he did was impressive. He’d go to the gym two or three times a day until he didn’t just shoot but made 5,000 shots a week, Greg Holmes, his mentor, said. He shot free throws until he could make 10 straight with his eyes closed.

Take a look at Jalloh ‘s background – the genesis of his work ethic – and his belief that he had to be the man becomes apparent. Jalloh said he and his brothers had to take care of themselves while their mother was working multiple jobs to pay the bills, so didn’t he have to believe in himself ahead of just about everyone else?

“He was doing that in his family anyway,” said Holmes. “If people aren’t stepping up, if people aren’t working out in the gym, if people aren’t putting in the extra work….he thinks he has to step up and be the one. ‘I have to take the hit.’ He did that in his family. You can’t think he’s going to do anything any different with the team. He’s had to do it growing up, and I don’t think they took time to understand that.”

Still, Jalloh doesn’t use that as an excuse. No, failing to trust his teammates, he said, was simply a product of his immaturity.

“Now that I look back at it, I was 19,” he said. “I’m 21 now, and I was 19, thrust into an environment when I’m your leading scorer and leading rebounder, and I’m like, ‘Uh, what’s going on?’ And I was trying to put everything in perspective, and I really didn’t know how.

“…Thinking back on it, I know what they were talking about and I wouldn’t repeat those mistakes.”

He certainly wouldn’t repeat them in Philadelphia. In May after his sophomore season, he decided to transfer.

The reasons he left are still in dispute. According to coaches, Jalloh left because he wanted to be the starting point guard, which wasn’t going to happen at St. Joe’s.

“It pretty much boiled down to he wanted to be the point guard,” Rice said. “… He wanted to be the point guard and Phil thought he was best suited as a combo guard.”

Jalloh claims his reasons were more far-sighted. He denies the point guard assertion, noting that he likely won’t play the position at JMU. Sophomore Pierre Curtis started there last year, and though Jalloh and Curtis could share duties, it doesn’t appear that Curtis will move completely off the ball.

“At the end of the year, I looked at it and just evaluated where I wanted to be and what I wanted to accomplish in life,” said Jalloh , who goes out of his way to avoid saying anything negative about his former school. “… Look, I figure, here I am in mainstream Philadelphia, let’s go to the opposite of that. Here we are in Virginia. Harrisonburg. Complete opposite of Philadelphia.

“…I knew I could take my body further. I could take this a lot further. I can add value to another program. A lot more value. I made a decision that I felt I needed to make in order to continue my growth as a man.”

Ross saw Jalloh ‘s departure a little differently.

“It seemed like he was always searching for something,” he said. “I’m not sure exactly what it was, and I’m not sure he knows what it was – or is – he’s searching for. My hope would be he has found what he’s searching for at James Madison.”

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Dean Keener answers the question as he does just about every one – carefully and with a preconceived plan. But the James Madison coach’s answer includes words you don’t hear from the guys who were around Jalloh at St. Joe’s.

What is Abdulai Jalloh all about?

“I think if you talk to him, you’ll find that he’s a really engaging guy,” he said. “I just think he can be misunderstood.”

Keener talks about e-mails he’s received from the sociology major’s professors and advisors commending the dean’s list student for taking class discussion to another level. He talks about how Jalloh , who writes poetry in his spare time, can break down the political situation in Iran just as easily as he can an opposing defense.

“From the time he was here on his visit, I knew he had a lot of interests besides basketball,” Keener said. “He asked a lot of questions that a lot of our guys don’t ask.”

Keener asked Jalloh ‘s former coaches a lot of questions as well. He heard some of the criticism, but still believed Jalloh wouldn’t be a problem.

“You always have to do a lot of research, because they obviously left for a reason,” Keener said of transfers. “But sometimes everything just checks out and this was one of those times. We heard, ‘Great player, works hard, decision making is a little suspect, but he can help your program.'”

Keener, of course, has a keen interest in Jalloh . If the Washington native hadn’t transferred to JMU, the Dukes’ prospects for a .500-or-better season would be slimmer. So would Keener’s job security, thanks to a 18-68 record in four years at Madison that has probably made this a do-or-die season.

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Jalloh has already opened himself up at JMU in ways he never did at St. Joe’s. The situation he entered was a more comfortable one. Senior forward Terrance Carter grew up on Jalloh ‘s street and now rooms with him.

“He’s comes in and he doesn’t have to feel by himself,” Carter said. “He’s got somebody that he knows, for sure, that’s going to have his back.”

Jalloh hasn’t exactly become the team’s social chairman, but his demeanor is a far cry from how critics portrayed it at St. Joseph’s.

During JMU games last season, he stood up and cheered his teammates, and at halftime of some games, he addressed the team before the coaches got in the locker room.

“He’s not a loner at all,” said guard Stephen Kendall, also a transfer. “… It takes a lot of guts when you’re losing at halftime to stand up and say, ‘Listen guys. This is what we’re doing wrong and we need to do better.’ … That’s what a leader does.”

One key example of his strides in the trust and decision-making department is his relationship with Curtis. The two have showed brilliant chemistry in the preseason, with the best example being a recent two-on-two game after a workout between Jalloh and Curtis and freshman Ben Louis and assistant coach Louis Rowe.

Jalloh and Curtis picked their opponents apart, with the highlight being a perfect ally-oop pass from Jalloh to Curtis, which the 6-3, 170-pounder slammed down one-handed.

“You know y’all are the best guard tandem in the league, right?” Rowe proclaimed to them after the game. “When y’all play off each other like that, you will be.”

Playing brilliantly off a teammate. Trusting someone else to perform and succeeding by coexisting. When he leaves James Madison, the Dukes hope they will be able to say that was what Abdulai Jalloh was all about.