Coach Carter’s first game back at Richmond High underscores how times have changed

RICHMOND — He boasts that he can ring up Snoop Dogg on speed dial. Samuel L. Jackson depicted him in a Hollywood blockbuster. He commands speaking fees in all corners of the country, carrying trading cards and copies of his own book that he autographs for anyone who asks (and even some who don’t).

And on Thursday night, Ken Carter was one of about two dozen people inside a basketball gym, where the only signs a game was taking place were the squeaks of sneakers and four buzzers to signal the end of each quarter. The stands were empty. There was no band, no students but for a few stragglers on their cell phones.

Coach Carter is back at Richmond High School.

Now 65, a grandfather and 25 years removed from the 1999 season depicted in the 2005 box-office hit, he faces a distinctly different challenge this time around. Look no further than the final score in his first game back on the bench, a 55-31 loss to a seven-player team from a small private Oakland academy.

“Back in the day, the stands were full. I mean, totally full,” Carter said. “But I guarantee by our sixth game, we’re going to have this place full.”

It was the Oilers’ fourth game of the season and their fourth loss. Carter had other engagements that prevented him from attending the previous three, forcing them to forfeit twice, and at first glance, he didn’t appear to be there Thursday, either.

In his initial run with the program, from 1997-2002, Carter gained a reputation for wearing a suit and tie on game days and requiring his players to do the same. It was one of a number of rules set forth, as well as maintaining at least a 2.3 GPA, in a contract he had all of his players sign.

Things have changed, and so has Carter’s wardrobe, which featured a navy blue, school-branded sweatsuit and unlaced white sneakers.

He pledged to turn boys into men when he took over the program the first time around. Now, it’s about turning boys into basketball players. Back then, he inherited a team that had 45 players to fill out varsity, JV and freshman rosters. The team he took over this fall has 10 members, most of whom were struggling to fill out their jerseys.

“Our kids are undersized, some of them their first year ever playing basketball,” Carter said. “I enjoy coaching here now more than I ever did, with the kids and their attitudes. The attitude of the kids is just wonderful. … We have no problems academically. We’re just physically not a big team. But I think that’s going to change next year.  I think we’re going to be pretty good next year.”

Richmond has cycled through four coaches the past four years while posting one winning season, including a 1-21 finish last year while being outscored by an average of 48.5 points per game. Senior Jayden Briscoe said he believes Carter, a star player at Richmond in the 1970s, is dedicated to rebuilding the program.

While it was Carter’s first time on the sidelines for a game, he has been coaching the team through practice all summer.

“He makes us work a lot harder,” Briscoe said. “The other coaches, no hate to them, but their practices were a lot different. It’s a different work ethic. Carter, he’ll have us (scheduled to) practice for two hours and we’ll end up being there for four hours. The other coaches, it would be an hour and 30 minutes.”

Carter plans to put his own resources into the program and hopes that his name recognition can prevent some of the area’s most talented players from opting for private school, such as Salesian, the private power just down the road that qualified for the state Open Division tournament.

“There’s not a college coach in America that I can’t call that’s not going to return my call,” he said.

The setting that inspired the film, where he returned Thursday night, couldn’t feel further from the bright lights of Hollywood. No player on the court had been born when the movie was released. But Carter clearly still carried weight with the current generation.

“I wanted to see him so bad,” said Irvelle Winchester, a freshman guard for the opposing Envision Academy. “It was something that was local, so I liked the movie a lot. I didn’t know who he was until I watched it, but I was like, ‘Dang.’ How he turned a trash team into a good team. I lowkey look up to him.”

After one physical play, Winchester fell to the floor and Carter jumped from his seat on the bench to go check on him.

Afterward, Carter stuck around to take photos, sign autographs and chat with the entire opposing team and its coaches. After the handshake line, he made a beeline for the parking lot and returned with a stack of cards that he signed and passed around, along with a few copies of his book.

“I’m one of the so-called celebrities that you can touch,” he said. “People ask me, ‘Why did I return to Richmond?’ First of all, it was just the love of Richmond. I’d like to see this school be extremely successful. Now I have a Rolodex of resources, so we can get things done. … This completes the circle.”