Familiar place, new opportunity for Chambliss
May 24, 2021 | Men's Basketball, Mike Lucas
Former Badger ready to make new impact at UW
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BY MIKE LUCAS
UWBadgers.com Senior Writer
MADISON, Wis. — Sharif Chambliss got up before the crack of dawn at his hotel on the banks of Lake Mendota and took a walk "just to relax my mind a little bit" prior to his in-person interview for the assistant coaching vacancy on Wisconsin's basketball staff.
"I walked down State Street at 5 in the morning and I watched the sunrise at the union," said Chambliss, a 2005 UW graduate and no stranger to the campus and some of its more popular landmarks. "I even ran into people that I knew. It was crazy."
He next walked over to the Kohl Center.
Chambliss couldn't help but think to himself, "That place means so much to me."
Standing outside the West Dayton venue may have triggered a flashback to April of 2003 and a two-hour meeting in Bo Ryan's office. Following his junior season at Penn State, Chambliss was seriously considering transferring to Wisconsin. His dream had always been to play for his home state school.
During their visit, Ryan, then the UW head coach, made no promises beyond giving Chambliss the chance to compete for playing time; something he wasn't afforded coming out of St. Catherine's High School in Racine. The Badgers didn't offer a scholarship and he ended up with the Nittany Lions.
Now three years later, Ryan was in a position to correct that slight and informed Chambliss that there would be a spot on the roster waiting for him after completing his spring semester in State College. "I feel like I'm coming home," Chambliss said then. "You can't put a price tag on happiness."
Or can you? Since he was transferring within the Big Ten, he was obligated to finance his two years at Wisconsin through student loans, a debt that he carried for over a decade. Per NCAA transfer rules, he was ineligible in 2004 and practiced on the scout team only to tear his ACL in late March.
Yet he bounced back ahead of schedule as a senior to start the final 30 games at point guard and helped lead the Badgers to the NCAA's Elite Eight. Maybe he was thinking about that tournament run on his early morning walk which eventually took him past the Wisconsin State Capitol.
"That's where I asked my wife to marry me," he pointed out.
Chambliss met Melissa Domack in Madison and they later began dating while he was coaching at Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Did he drop to his knee on the Capitol grounds when he proposed? "You know I did," he said proudly. The couple got married in 2015 and they have two sons, Julian, 4; and Kellen, 2.
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"All of these places mean a lot to me," reflected Chambliss, retracing the steps and stops on his walk that morning. By the time that he got back to his hotel, he was ready to attack the day, ready to field questions on goals and aspirations from head coach Greg Gard who was making the hire.
"It was a long (interview) process, but when we finally got a chance to talk, Coach Gard was clear with what he wanted and I just felt that I was going to be able to go in there and execute that plan," said Chambliss, who will replace two-year interim assistant Alando Tucker, a former UW teammate.
Chambliss, 39, checked all the boxes, according to Gard, citing his experience and energy, among other attributes. Since Chambliss worked previously as Ryan's video coordinator (2010-12), Gard was able to project what a coaching-seasoned and savvy Chambliss could now bring to the program.
"This time around," Chambliss also noted, "I'll be on the floor working with the guys and I'll be able to go out and recruit kids that I know will fit the program. I've matured a lot. I've been to a lot of places. And I see the game in a different light. I'm a coach and I'm definitely able see it from that angle."
Chambliss has coached the last five seasons at Wright State for Scott Nagy, a mentor.
"I really enjoyed the player development side when I was there – I was always ready to get into the gym with the players at all times," said Chambliss, who was voted the No. 1 assistant coach in the Horizon League in 2020. "Coach Nagy is a man of great grace and I applied that to my coaching."
Chambliss has always believed in building strong, personal relationships. It's an approach that he has stressed no matter where he was at and what he was doing. His mental post-it note, by his own admission, would read: "Just remember why you're coaching. It's not about you, it's about the kids."
Prior to Wright State, Chambliss spent four years at Milwaukee where he was grateful to learn from head coach Rob Jeter, a former Ryan assistant.
"Coach Jeter has always been a mentor and a brother of mine. I was just with him the other day. He taught me about loving your players because it's bigger than basketball. A lot of the guys I coached in Milwaukee reached out to me when they saw I got the Wisconsin job. They were super excited for me."
Besides his coaching duties, Chambliss had served as a student academic advisor at Milwaukee, a role that he also held during a stint at UW-Platteville under Gard's brother, Jeff. "I had to prioritize and stay organized with what I was doing on the admissions and basketball side," he said.
It rounded him out. Before taking the Platteville job, Chambliss talked with Howard Moore, the Badger assistant who has been on medical leave since a horrific car accident two years ago that took the life of his wife and daughter. Moore's message on "looking out for each other" has never left Chambliss.
"It was just the way he went about things," he said. "I always keep Howard in mind."
Another head coach who influenced his growth was Gary Edwards who hired the unproven Chambliss at Francis Marion University, a Division-2 program in Florence, South Carolina. This was the ground floor, Chambliss acknowledged, and he had no idea what he was getting himself into.
"I had no idea where it was before I got there," he conceded. "But I saw the job opening and I wrote an email to coach Edwards and he responded back to me. When we met, he said, 'You remind me a lot of a guy who used to work for me. So, I'm going to offer you the job.'
"The guy that he was telling me about was actually Lamont Paris."
Paris had assisted Edwards at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. Paris later coached seven years at Wisconsin under Ryan and Gard before taking over the Chattanooga program. "When I was at Francis Marion," Chambliss said, "I made contact with Lamont and we've been best friends ever since."
Chambliss makes friends easily. Always has. He likes to say that he has never met a stranger. His personality should be an asset in recruiting especially with the rapidly changing landscape due to the transfer portal. Opined Chambliss, "It's the state of the game and as coaches we have to adjust to it."
As a one-and-done UW player, a transfer, Chambliss definitely impacted outcomes. Not only did he lead the team in 3-pointers with 60 – he made 11-of-24 in the NCAA tourney – but he had a 2.32 assist-to-turnover ratio, then the sixth-best in school history.
Chambliss is confident that he can have a comparable impact as a Badger assistant.
"I will hit the ground running in June," he promised. "I'm ready to roll up my sleeves and dig in."
Ready, too, for more sunrises at the union and more deep NCAA tournament runs.
