Photo credit: Joshua Halley/Southern Digest

Adolph Randall paces the sidelines at Southern University's Felton G. Clark Activity Center during a Feb. 13 game against Mississippi Valley State. "Whether they take me for granted or not, " said the Southern University New Orleans graduate and Katrina evacuee, "we're not going to let those other teams beat us in our gym."

By Kamilah R. Stroy
Black College Wire

Walking down the hall to a practice room inside Southern University's DeBose Hall, one can't help but glance at one man standing inside. He has a guitar strapped across his chest and is concentrating on sheet music atop an upright piano.

He has appeared at every home basketball game this season.

"I arrived early at the games. No one was in attendance, it was scarce. Only a handful was there," said Adolph Randall, a New Orleans evacuee.

Randall was the voice of the chants, "Give us the ball," "Call timeout," and, "We want a basket."

A former member of the Southern University of New Orleans track team, Randall's view is that even if he was not physically on the team, he could still play a part by supporting it.

"There wasn't anyone in the stands," Randall said of the SUNO basketball games. "No one was there for the first few games, just me. I was there to cheer the team on."

His attendance at the Baton Rouge basketball games did not go unnoticed. He traveled with Southern's Six Man Club of team supporters to Birmingham, Ala., for the Southwestern Athletic Conference tournament, cheering on both the men's and women's basketball teams. During the championship celebration, sophomore forward Ralph Hishaw called him from the stands to the floor and members of the women's team chanted, "Give him a shirt, give him a shirt!"

"I felt honored to be called to the floor," Randall said. "I was thinking maybe they didn't appreciate me as well, or I was wondering if I was taken for granted. Regardless, whether they take me for granted or not, we're not going to let those other teams beat us in our gym."

Randall lived in the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans before Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast. He was born in a military hospital in New York -- he won't say when -- and moved with his parents to Louisiana when he was about a year old. His parents were originally from the Crescent City.

Randall stayed in the Superdome at the beginning of the evacuation before being moved to a town outside Dallas, then went to a cousin's in Virginia before deciding to come back to Louisiana. A professor at SUNO contacted him about graduate studies while he was housed on the Baton Rouge campus. When SUNO reopened in New Orleans, Randall decided to stay.

Randall began playing the guitar right after Katrina and has been playing piano on and off since childhood. He is learning classical and gospel music. He was offered music lessons and felt that it would be wise to stay at Southern's Baton Rouge campus and study under its faculty.

"A lot, it helps a lot," Randall said about the soothing comfort of playing the guitar after the storm. "However, I'm here to study. Hopefully, Southern will help me achieve to get my teaching certification in elementary schools."

He has earned a degree in elementary education from SUNO and would like to get his teaching certificate to purse his dreams of attaining a doctoral degree in educational psychology.

"Before the athletic events, our main focus is our academics," Randall said. "But we can support our teams. I try to encourage the students that . . . this is our university and whatever the team does, it is a reflection of us. We should try to represent our university well."

Kamilah R. Stroy, a student at Southern University, writes for the Southern Digest.

Posted April 10, 2006