From his days as a player – high school in Thomaston, college at Auburn University, professionally in Europe – to a remarkable career as a high school coach, Darrell Lockhart has spent most of his life around basketball.
Now in his third season as the Valdosta Wildcats head coach, Lockhart is applying that wealth of experience to build a contender at a school far better known for its football achievements.
“I played basketball for a long time,” said Lockhart, who also enjoyed a brief stint with the NBA’s San Antonio Spurs in 1983 before leaving to play overseas. “I just coach based on all the coaches before me. I had some pretty good coaches along the way, and I think I learned a little bit from each one of them. It’s experience, and I draw from that well.”
Lockhart was hired at Valdosta in 2019 following a 14-year career at Thomaston’s Upson-Lee High School. He played high school ball at Upson-Lee’s predecessor, Robert E. Lee Institute, which merged with Upson-Lee High in 1992. As a coach, Lockhart led his hometown Knights to 294 victories, including a 75-game win streak and back-to-back Class 4A state championships in 2017 and 2018.
At Valdosta, Lockhart immediately turned around a team that had gone 12-15 overall and 3-8 in region play the previous season. In 2019-20, the Wildcats posted a 24-4 overall record while winning both the regular-season and region tournament titles along the way.
Lockhart recorded his 300th career win that season against crosstown rival Lowndes County High School. The feat was formally recognized with a surprise ceremony in the current season at the Wildcats’ game against Coffee County on January 14.
“It’s something that I’ll probably enjoy more as the years pass because right now we’re in the middle of trying to play the best we can, and it really hasn’t sunk in yet,” said Lockhart. “But I enjoyed the respect and the honor.”
The Wildcats posted a 19-6 record in 2020-21 and stood at 14-7 with two games left in the 2021-22 season, bringing Lockhart’s win total to 351 and counting.
Coaching basketball in a football-first culture presents some unique challenges, but Lockhart takes it all in stride. Considering what he’s done already, the Wildcats’ future on the hardwood appears bright.
“A lot of the athletes have been trained in football terms and football knowledge since they were little,” said Lockhart. “They have limited basketball knowledge. It’s just the way the school is, the way the city is. It’s all about football, and I certainly understand that.”
Despite the town’s focus on football, Lockhart sees the potential in his players.
“It’s just going to take some time to compete with the top teams,” said Lockhart. “We’ve managed to win a few games, but we have to win a few more to really make [an impact]. The kids work hard, they’re willing to learn, and that’s all I ask.”
Looking back on his long career in the game, Lockhart has plenty of highlights to appreciate. At Auburn, he averaged 11 points and almost six rebounds per game over four years. For two of those seasons, he was teammates with future NBA star Charles Barkley. During his time with the Spurs, who drafted him in the second round with the 35th overall pick in 1983, he played alongside a pair of legends, Artis Gilmore and George Gervin. In Europe, he was part of a championship team.
“I played on a team of young men in Spain that by themselves didn’t stand out, but as a group, we were pretty formidable,” said Lockhart. “That’s my main focus [in coaching] – trying to push through a team concept. [For Auburn] I played in Rupp Arena at the University of Kentucky. We were able to win a game there, and that was amazing. There are a lot of good memories.”
And chief among those memories? The countless players who have come under his tutelage and left as better players and better young men.
“What I enjoy most is seeing a guy come in as a freshman and watching him develop and seeing him become a senior and go off to the next level,” said Lockhart. “That’s the biggest reason I do it.”
