BATON ROUGE — The LSU men’s basketball team has given retiring Cox Communications Center for Student-Athletes Director Roger Grooters an early retirement present of sorts.
Grooters told LSU men’s basketball coach John Brady and Athletic Director Skip Bertman that the team, which has continually improved its academic status since both Coach Brady and Dr. Grooters have arrived on campus, has posted a GPA for the spring semester of 3.01.
“It’s the first time in my 19 years, directing five academic centers at five different major universities that I’ve had a men’s basketball team record a GPA over 3.0. Ten of the 13 players individually had 3.0 GPAs or higher,” said Dr. Grooters, who will retire from the Cox Center later this summer.
The Tigers had four players make the All-SEC Academic Honor Roll for men’s basketball — Glen Davis (Sophomore), David Fleshman (Sophomore), Darnell Lazare (Junior); Darrel Mitchell (Senior) and Garrett Temple (redshirt freshman). Mitchell graduated in four years at LSU as part of the commencement ceremonies here on Friday.
More impressive about the Tigers GPA this spring was the fact that the LSU players were virtually gone from the campus for nearly four weeks because of the SEC Tournament in Atlanta and three weeks of NCAA Tournament play in Jacksonville, Fla. (1st and second rounds); Atlanta, Ga. (regional semis and finals) and Indianapolis, Ind. (Final Four).
“The team members have been very, very good about keeping up with their class work,” said Dr. Grooters. “We were able to send an academic center member with the team during the NCAA Tournament who was able to work with the student-athletes and help them during a very busy time keep up with their assignments. Also, once the team returned from the Final Four, they were very good about getting back fully into attending class and handling their assignments.”
“I’m very proud of the fine young men that did well in the classroom, and the significant thing to me is that they accomplished what they did coming off a Final Four season when over the last three or four weeks of school, they only attended classes Monday and part of Tuesday before we had to leave,” LSU men’s basketball head coach John Brady said. “They showed great commitment and dedication by making sure they did the work they had to while we were on our run and especially after we got back. It’s a tribute to them and to the people at the Cox Academic Center who helped them achieve what they did.”