Wells: Wallace was supposed to be Lemoyne-owen coach, but Penny hired him
Lemoyne-owen basketball coach and former Memphis Grizzlies player Bonzi Wells must have had a hunch he would return to the Bluff City eventually — his phone number still begins with a Memphis area code from when he was traded to the Grizzlies in 2003.
But there was one thing about the move back to Memphis that didn't go as planned. Originally, Rasheed Wallace (who just got hired to join Penny Hardaway‘s staff with the Memphis Tigers) was set to take the head coaching job at Lemoyne-owen, while Wells would join him as an assistant, Wells said after a news conference Friday.
“That was the original plan. When the opportunity came up, Rasheed was going to take the job and I was going to be his assistant,” Wells said. “Penny comes in, you know Penny stealing people, you know how he does. You get the (No.) 1 and 2 players out of Memphis every year. Rasheed was the No. 1 coach prospect, so he took it.”
The two former NBA stars already host a podcast together called “Let's Get Technical,” and they plan to live together as well after they both make the move to Memphis.
This is Wells' first head coaching job, though he volunteered at his alma mater Ball State as an assistant. Wells said that his NBA peers, including Hardaway and Wallace, helped assure him he was ready for the position.
“We're all going to work together, and you know this is my first time doing something like this so I was a little nervous, but they were like, ‘Man, we got you. You know, we're family, we're not going to let you fail,'” Wells said. “They put the confidence in me ... like ‘You can go out there and get a job anywhere, and matter of fact, we're going to show you. So I just really appreciate those guys.”
Claire Kuwana is a sports reporting intern at the Memphis Commercial Appeal. Contact her at claire. kuwana@commercialappeal.com or follow her on Twitter @clairekuwana.