John Shulman couldn’t help but laugh while watching Omar Wattad, one of his former players at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, at work on the sideline as head coach of the Lander University men’s basketball team.
“I am thrilled that Omar Wattad has somebody to thin his hair out as bad as he thinned my hair out,” said Shulman, who had a nine-year run as head coach at UTC from 2004-13 and is coming off a 22-win season in his second year at Central Arkansas. “I asked him, ‘How old are you, man?’ He was like, ‘Coach, I’m 36,’ to which I told him he was very mature, I was very proud of him and he’s very bald.
“So that made me happy right there.”
But it’s that pride that Shulman can’t hide, especially while watching Wattad guide Lander — which has an enrollment of 4,600-plus and is located in Greenwood, South Carolina — to this weekend’s NCAA Division II national championship game. The Bearcats (30-5) will face Gannon University (33-3) from Erie, Pennsylvania, at 1 p.m. Sunday at Gainbridge Fieldhouse in Indianapolis, with CBS televising the title matchup.
During his on-court days, Wattad started his college career with two seasons at Georgetown, but after sitting out a year per NCAA transfer rules at the time, he played his final two for Shulman’s Mocs from 2010-12, and it’s in Chattanooga where he took off, averaging 13.2 points and 3.7 rebounds in 62 games (57 starts) for the Mocs. He left as one of the most productive shooters in UTC history, having knocked down 168 3-pointers.