Third year is charm for Malvern coach

Malvern coach Chris Meseke gives instructions to his team during the Class 4A state championship game March 10 in Hot Springs. Meseke is the 2016 Tri-Lakes Edition Coach of the Year.
Malvern coach Chris Meseke gives instructions to his team during the Class 4A state championship game March 10 in Hot Springs. Meseke is the 2016 Tri-Lakes Edition Coach of the Year.

MALVERN — Chris Meseke knew what he was getting into when he left Fountain Lake to take over a dormant Malvern boys basketball program in 2013, but the veteran coach had a plan in place right from the start.

The Leopards hadn’t had a winning season in 10 years prior to Meseke’s arrival. In fact, the last time Malvern won a conference championship was during the 1989-1990 season, which was also the last time the Leopards won a state title. But Meseke saw an opportunity to re-establish a winning culture in a program that was once a statewide force.

“I knew coming in that there wasn’t a quick fix to the situation,” he said. “We walked into this knowing that it was going to be a process. We wanted to be able to put ourselves in position to compete for conference titles, compete for regional titles, compete for state titles.

“But we knew from the start that it wasn’t going to be easy, and we had to take steps in order to get to where we wanted to be.”

Meseke’s teams progressed considerably over his first two seasons, but it wasn’t

until his third year that the Leopards reached heights they hadn’t seen in more than two decades. Malvern won 31 games this past season en route to a conference crown and advanced to the Class 4A state championship final. For that, Meseke is named the Tri-Lakes Edition Coach of the Year.

“This was kind of the year that we hoped things would pay off,” Meseke said. “We had a senior-laden team that bought into the things we wanted to do when we got here, so we believed we were going to have a good year.”

With six seniors returning from a team that finished 17-12 last season, including forwards Harold Brownlee and Jordan Hughes, the Leopards were one of the more experienced teams in Class 4A and fully expected to be in the thick of the things in the 4A-7 Conference. But when all-state senior wing Andre Jones transferred in from Little Rock McClellan during the offseason, Malvern’s chances for extended success increased instantly.

Jones, a 6-foot-4, 190-pound small forward, averaged nearly 22 points, 10 rebounds and three steals per game while leading McClellan to the Class 5A state championship in 2015. He was also named the state tournament’s Most Valuable Player after scoring 24 points and pulling down 16 rebounds in the Lions’ 82-73 victory over Maumelle in the final. With his ability to guard multiple positions on defense and his versatility on offense, Jones drew recruiting attention from several Division I programs before committing to the University of Arkansas at Little Rock prior to the season.

“In terms of wins and losses, adding Andre to the mix spoke for itself,” Meseke said. “Anytime you have a Division I-caliber player on your team, it makes a difference. He’d won a state title and was the MVP.

“So adding him helped our team tremendously. We thought we’d be pretty good, but he got us to that next level.”

The addition of Jones made the Leopards legitimate state-title contenders, but there was still work to do. Malvern won 13 games in Meseke’s first season and improved that mark by four games a year ago. But the Leopards had the kinds of deficiencies in those campaigns that lingered.

“We thought we had the talent, but we had to grow mentally and mature,” Meseke said. “It was a slow process for us — it really was. There were times where we struggled with our maturity level, especially early on.

“But I think we finally started to move in the direction that we wanted to move in around mid-January.”

Meseke led Malvern to victories in 15 of its first 16 games. The Leopards did suffer a 73-65, overtime loss to Waldron in their fifth conference game, but they still managed to finish 13-1 in the league to cruise to a 4A-7 title. Malvern then registered back-to-back 15-point victories to win the conference tournament before registering three tough victories in the 4A-South regional tournament, including a 62-57 decision over Class 4A defending champ Monticello.

The Leopards whipped Riverview in the second round of the state tournament and knocked off Monticello again in the semifinals to advance to the final against Baptist Prep, which used its superior size advantage inside to hold on for a 61-54 victory.

“It was still a very good year for us,” Meseke said. “People don’t understand just how hard it is to win 31 games, and we overcame a lot of obstacles to do that. We came up short in the finals, but that doesn’t take away from what we were able to accomplish as a group.”

Meseke figures things will be tough for the Leopards next season, particularly because he won’t have nearly the amount of senior leadership on the roster as he had this past season. But Malvern also won’t have a bull’s-eye on its back, which may allow the Leopards to play in a more relaxed manner while sneaking up on teams in the process. Either way, Meseke’s expectations will stay the same.

“We’ll basically have a totally different group in here next year,” he said. “We’re gonna have to start over in a sense, and it’ll be tough. But we’re going to persevere because the expectations are high now.

“We had to go through some tough times this past year, and we were blessed to have so many behind the scenes that helped us have the kind of year that we did — my wife, the school board, the fans — the list goes on and on. They stuck behind us and helped make it possible for us to have success.”

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