Lebanon's Hall chooses Tulsa basketball
Nov. 1—Answering a question on the minds of local basketball aficionados for more than a year, Lebanon High senior Jarred Hall revealed his intention to play college ball for the University of Tulsa before a group of LHS students at Campbell Brandon Gym/Hester Gibbs Court early yesterday afternoon.
The 6-foot-8 Hall, a leaper with 3-point range, had received more than 20 Division I offers dating to the summer of 2021, including three from the Southeastern Conference that summer. Most of his recent offers came from the level immediately below the Power 5 conferences.
"They did a real good job reaching out," said Hall, who visited the campus in Oklahoma a couple of weekends ago. "They did the best job at building relationships... (They said) what I could do there I could do anywhere as long as I put the work in."
Tulsa plays in the American Athletic Conference which includes Memphis, Cincinnati, 2022 Final Four-participant Houston and Temple, among others with a rich basketball pedigree. Cincinnati and Houston will leave the AAC next summer but six Conference USA schools, including Alabama-Birmingham, are in line to come in at the same time. The AAC routinely sends multiple teams to the NCAA tournament.
The Golden Hurricane have been relevant in the NCAA since Nolan Richardson was hired in 1980, taking them to the NIT championship the following year and the NCAA tournament afterward before leaving for Arkansas in '85. Since then, the school has been a springboard for several coaches on their way to Power 5 jobs, including current NCAA-champion Kansas coach Bill Self and former Kentucky coach Tubby Smith.
Eric Konkol became head coach from the Louisiana Tech staff in March to replace Frank Haith, who resigned following an 11-20 campaign.
"Every game's not going to be a breeze," Hall said of the AAC. "It's going to be a dogfight every night."
Hall, whose mother Debbie Watkins played for legendary coach Campbell Brandon in the 1980s, was a guard at Carroll-Oakland before coming to LHS where he hit a couple of growth spurts. As his size and game grew, he helped transform the Blue Devils into a state tournament team which reached the final four last March.
"He's special," Lebanon coach Jim McDowell said. "You could see it even from a young age. Just the ability level, the IQ level, a lot of the physical gifts he's been blessed with. But as good of a basketball player as he is, he's that good of a young man. He's a lot of fun to coach. He's a hard worker. He's developed into a really good leader for our team and I'm excited about the opportunity he has to play at Tulsa and the opportunity to play for us during his senior season.
"He grew up as a guard. He was always a taller guard. But when he hit a couple of growth spurts when he came in at 6-4 and now he's 6-8, maybe 6-8 1/2, and he was able to continue to maintain the skill level with his ball-handling, his passing and his shooting from the perimeter. He's gotten a lot stronger so he can go inside and score. He's positionless, and that was also a factor in him making his decision. He wanted to go somewhere where he felt he could play that same way, I know he'll be able to do that at Tulsa."
Hall can officially sign with Tulsa when the early signing period begins Nov. 9 and runs through the 16th.
When he does so, he'll be the first Division I-signee from LHS since Demetric Reese signed with St. Peter's (he later transferred to Maryland-Eastern Shore) in 1995. Kip Puryear signed with MIddle Tennessee State in 1973. Other Blue Devils, including Troy Bond (LHS Class of '87, Tennessee State) and Malcolm Manier (2001, Georgia State), also played DI basketball after beginning their college careers on the junior-college level.
