The Pilgrim’s Progress of Anthony Lucas: Kismet, Divine Retribution and the Journey to PA

Pictured above: Lucas, who has led PA to consecutive state titles at the 5A and 6A levels, embodies what Bruin football is, according to his AD.

 

It is mid-August, and the post-practice, late afternoon sun is reminding those still milling about of one irrefutable fact: Football season may be looming, but fall most certainly is not.

 

Inside the comfort of a student lounge that overlooks the field at Pulaski Academy’s Hatcher Stadium and once served as football fieldhouse, Anthony Lucas gives a writer his undivided attention.

In Arkansas, one does not have the undivided attention of Anthony Lucas and not ask about 1999. It would be like having the ear of Gen. Douglas MacArthur and not asking about that triumphant return to the Philippines.

 

After guiding PA to consecutive state titles, Lucas is well on his way to building a coaching legacy, but his celebrity in Arkansas was born as an all-American Razorback football player in the late 1990s, and his legend was cemented on Nov. 13, 1999 with “The Catch” against Tennessee.

Twenty-four years later, Lucas is asked regularly about that game, about the game-winning touchdown pass he caught from Clint Stoerner, about the stadium shaking and the goal posts taking off for Dickson Street. It was more than just a win and one of the biggest individual moments in Razorback football history — it was divine retribution.

 

But we’ll come back to that.

 

***

 

It was not any of the big games he played in a Razorback uniform that made Lucas the most nervous. It was not playing for high school basketball state championships back in Tallulah, La., or being recruited — for football and basketball — by major Div. 1 schools. It was not even reporting to his first NFL training camp.

 

All those big stages notwithstanding, nerves almost got him just one time, when he addressed the PA team in the locker room before his first game as head coach.

 

It was opening night 2021, and the Bruins were just down Arkansas 10 in west Little Rock at Joe T. Robinson High School. Lucas had been on the PA staff for a decade, coaching wide receivers and helping oil the Bruins’ finely tuned offense. As an assistant, the soft-spoken Lucas never had to give the pre-game speech. Now, as the coach taking over for the legendary Kevin Kelley, pre-game speeches were his to deliver.

 

The Bruins were about to launch the post-Kelley era, and eyes would be fixed on this game.

 

Lucas admitted that a moment of self-doubt surfaced before he addressed the team, but it was for a moment only.

 

“I remember just like it happened yesterday,” Lucas said. “It was time for me to address the team. I walked in there, and I was nervous. My heart was pumping Kool-Aid, but I was shaking. I was super-nervous getting ready to talk to them. I’m like, ‘You can’t let these kids see that you’re nervous.’ I had to tell myself, ‘You’ve been around these kids. You’ve watched Coach Kelley. You know how to lead people,’ and I had to challenge myself.”

 

He was up for the challenge; PA went on to win that night, and three months later, the team capped the season with another Class 5A state title. Lucas and the Bruins followed it up with another state championship in 2022, the school’s first at the 6A level.

 

Jason Wyatt, PA’s athletics director and longtime defensive coordinator, has been at the school for 20 years and had a front-row seat for the transition. The program didn’t skip a beat, he said, once Lucas took the reins. Four of six assistant coaches remained with the program after Kelley left, and Wyatt said each one “knew what Bruin football was” and wanted it to continue. Lucas embodies that desire, he said.

 

“Anthony believes in what he’s doing, and he has so much passion. He’s done a tremendous job in that aspect.”

***

 

Rena and Gerald Lucas always figured their son would end up playing college basketball. A 6-foot-3-inch frame meant he was destined to play center for his old McCall High teams, but Anthony’s athleticism stood out on the court nonetheless. In fact, Gerald said he believes basketball helped develop Anthony’s timing as a receiver, especially when going up for his specialty, jump balls of the football variety. His junior year, Anthony led the Dragons to a state title, but despite basketball coming naturally, he was drawn more to football.

 

Gerald often took his young son to games at nearby historically black colleges and universities like Grambling State University and the elder Lucas’ alma mater, Alcorn State University. Anthony grew up idolizing HBCU players like Jerry Rice, who played college ball at Mississippi Valley State University, and Alcorn’s own Steve McNair.

 

So when colleges came calling, there was not necessarily a favorite home-state school in the lead for Anthony’s signature. Louisiana State University recruited him early but backed off, and Lucas said he had not really grown up a fan anyway. His five official visits were to Texas A&M; Georgia State University; the University of Nevada-Las Vegas; Louisiana Tech University; and the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville. At one time, Lucas envisioned himself playing at an HBCU school and even took an unofficial visit to Alcorn.

 

“He got a lot of letters, and it was thrilling for him to go on all the visits,” Rena said. “He did have offers in basketball, but his goal was football.”

 

***

 

Anthony Lucas ended his collegiate career at Arkansas as an all-American. He was drafted in the fourth round of the 2000 NFL draft by Green Bay, but his NFL career was cut short at three years by knee injuries just 10 months apart.

 

His post-playing journey began in the Springdale corporate office of Tyson Foods, but his path soon led to Little Rock and Life CHAMPS Youth Sports. The faith-based youth football league was started by Little Rock lawyer Steve Snyder and the man who recruited Lucas to Arkansas in the first place, Fitz Hill.

 

Lucas remembers getting the call from his old position coach at Arkansas, who was, by this time, the head coach at San José State University. The two often kept in touch, and this time, Hill had another offer on the table.

 

“They were looking to start a youth sports organization that focused on character,” Lucas said, “and they asked me if I’d mind moving to Little Rock to get it started. I was kind of hesitant at first, but Coach Hill and I always had a great relationship, and still do, and I said, ‘Why not?’ I’d always thought of Little Rock as the midway point for me driving from Fayetteville to Tallulah. I never thought I would be living in the capital of Arkansas, but I ended up moving down here, and the rest has been history.”

 

With its focus on developing character as much as football skills, Life CHAMPS provided Lucas a perfect reintroduction to football. Throughout his playing career, Lucas had been known as much for his own strength of character as for his stat lines, and that is saying something. Lucas is etched into Arkansas football lore as one of the program’s greatest receivers of all time. In 1998, he became the first UA player to amass more than 1,000 receiving yards in a single season, and he remains second in career receiving yards (2,879). He was inducted into the Arkansas Sports Hall of Fame in 2020.

 

Lucas and his older sister, Latasha, were raised to hit the books first and live as examples of their Christian faith, and Anthony Lucas did not veer from that path in Fayetteville. He took a college degree with him to the NFL, and once back in northwest Arkansas after his playing days were done, Lucas earned a master’s degree.

 

Hill, who went on to become president of HBCU Arkansas Baptist College in Little Rock and is now a pastor for New Life Church, knew there was just one person for the job when Life CHAMPS was being launched.

 

Lucas, he said, was a consummate teammate at Arkansas. He did not care who got the credit as long as it helped the team. He even helped coaches recruit other players to Fayetteville. Lucas led by example, Hill said, and that was just the kind of leadership Life CHAMPS was looking for.

 

“Anthony was a perfect fit,” Hill said. “When Steve asked me who I thought would be a good candidate to lead it, I knew immediately that Anthony was the one who could help teach these kids the game of football and, more importantly, about the game of life.”

 

Lucas credits his humility to his upbringing. Rena credits family on either side for helping mold Anthony into the person he became.

 

“He was reared by a village,” she said. “My parents and my husband’s parents. We were all very close. My husband’s father was a minister who pastored four churches. That had a lot to do with it.”

 

Gerald said success never changed his son’s outlook.

 

“Throughout all the high levels of achievement,” he said, “Anthony always stayed humble.”

 

***

The coaching bug finally bit in 2012. Anthony had led Life CHAMPS to massive growth and was working with local athletes at D1 training in Little Rock when Kelley called. The PA coach, by then already nationally notorious for his unusual approach to the game, offered Anthony the opportunity to join the Bruin staff and coach wide receivers. Gerald said his son had found his ultimate match.

 

“When he told us that he was getting into coaching, we thought it was the best thing for him,” Gerald said. “He loves football. He lives football. He eats football. We had a feeling he wanted to get into coaching.”

 

Anthony Lucas said he remembers his parents asking him what took so long.

 

“But as they taught me growing up, always remember that you’re not on your time, you’re on God’s time,” Lucas said. “It was just God’s time, and I’m grateful that Coach Kelley gave me the opportunity to come and coach here.”

 

Growing up, Lucas took note of how hard his parents worked — more than 80 years of teaching experience between them — and for little pay, but ultimately, he “was called to coach and teach.”

 

Lucas joined the PA program as it was making a national name for itself thanks to Kelley’s unique, percentages-based system (no punts, always onside kick, no return game) that relied heavily on a high-flying offense and an aggressive defense often put in precarious situations. By the time Lucas was tabbed to replace Kelley as head coach in 2021, the standard at PA was state title or bust. The Bruins had won nine state championships in 17 years, including six of the last seven, under the trailblazing Kelley, whose philosophy was the subject of stories by the likes of Sports Illustrated and ESPN.

 

Lucas, therefore, knew all about the tricky nature of replacing a legendary coach. As Polish author Stanisław Lem once noted, “You climb to reach the summit, but once there, discover that all roads lead down.”

 

That may be so, but under Lucas, the program still enjoys a view from the top. The Bruins repeated as Class 5A state champs in his first season as head coach, and despite being moved up in class for 2022-23, added a 6A crown to the trophy case.   

 

Kelley is back in Little Rock with Kid Champion, where he teaches young kids how to develop athletic skills and fitness concepts. He said he is not surprised by PA’s continued success.

 

“I’m a big Anthony Lucas fan,” he said. “Everybody loves him; he’s such a great person and he does a great job as coach. I’m smart enough to know that if things are going well, I’m not going to reinvent the wheel, and Anthony’s the same way, but he’s made some tweaks and is doing it his own way, and that’s what he should do.”

 

The Bruins defeated Greenwood High School in the 6A state championship game last fall, avenging a regular season loss. In the title game, PA held on in part by playing it safe. Lucas opted to punt and pin the Bulldogs deep three times. Kelley said Lucas obviously made the right calls because the Bruins won. Pressed a little, he admitted that he would have gone for it two of those three times. The fact that he would have punted even once is rare for him.

 

Throughout his tenure at PA, Kelley was known to forego the punt, even from deep in his own territory. As he explained to Sports Illustrated in 2011, when a team punts from near its own end zone, the opponent will take possession inside the 40 and then score a touchdown 77 percent of the time. If the opponent takes over on downs inside the 10, it will score a touchdown 92 percent of the time.

 

“So [forsaking] a punt, you give your offense a chance to stay on the field,” he said. “If you miss, the odds of the other team scoring only increase 15 percent. It’s like someone said, ‘[Punting] is what you do on fourth down,’ and everyone did it without asking why.”

 

Kelley preferred to roll with PA’s precision offense. Often enough, the Bruins converted or the equally aggressive PA defense held when it did not — or, of course, the other team scored. Either way, Kelley’s system created one of the state’s all-time dynasties. 

 

Lucas may have tweaked Kelly’s techniques slightly, but it looks very much the same as it did when PA was rising to prominence. Those punts in the championship game represented three of the Bruins’ four punts the entire 2022 season.

 

“We really haven’t backed off from [the system],” Lucas said. “We’ve basically, you know, done it our way. We did do something that PA hadn’t done in a while when we punted three times last year in the state championship, and I still say, if we don’t punt those three times, we don’t win the game. So we’ve adjusted some.”

 

Each time there is a decision to make, Lucas said he consults with his staff and makes a final call based on the flow and circumstances of the game. On rare occasions, that may lead to a punt or a field goal where Kelley would have gone for the first down or touchdown, but Lucas is fully bought into the system; you can’t coach at PA and not be. Still, the first time he was on staff and the Bruins went for it on fourth down deep in their own territory, Lucas admitted he was a little nervous.

 

“We were backed way up,” he said, “and everybody was like, we’re going for it. Let’s go. It’s just the culture here.”

 

That culture extends to discipline and execution. It is doubtful there are many college teams, much less high school squads, as adept at kicking and recovering onside kicks and PA’s potent offense runs on timing and precision.

 

Like Kelley did before him, Lucas uses the system to overcome typical disadvantages in size, both of players and rosters. For example, PA used consecutive onside recoveries to open the second half and break open a close game against Russellville on Sept. 8.

 

“We teach it according to what our kids can do,” Lucas said. “We get our kids to play extremely hard, and they’re disciplined. We’re not the biggest, we’re not the fastest, but for the most part, it’s the culture. We do what we do, and we’re pretty good at it.”

 

For Lucas, coaching is about much more than football. He relishes the opportunity to impact players in a positive way — as he says, to help kids stay on the right track or get back on it.

 

“I think the most satisfying thing for me is that I get to invest in a lot of kids,” he said. “I know the expectations here at Pulaski Academy and the program. I know we have to win, and winning is the tradition here, but I also get excited when I can tell a kid when he’s messed up and I can steer a kid into going in the right direction.

 

“I’m big on character, you know? I stress that so much, so I get the opportunity to teach a kid not only to be a football player, but how to be a phenomenal person off the field, as well, and me being an example. I had three years in the NFL, and I’m grateful for that time, but my character is what I hope I can bring the most. I’m not perfect, but I’m big on character.”

 

As a coach, he draws on his vast experience as a football player on every level, from peewee to Sundays. Perhaps more importantly, he uses his position as coach to share the life lessons he was taught growing up.

 

“You can’t lead with John 3:16 because we’re not a Christian school and we’re in this day and time, but the kids know my values and know I’m a God-fearing man,” he said. “I have my own way to reach them in that aspect of life.”

 

Lucas deflects all credit to his parents. He said they taught him to be humble, to always give glory to God and never to think he is bigger than anyone else.

 

“Do something for somebody all the time. Treat people with respect, and you know, all those things fall under character,” he said. “I really get excited about that, and not just with my football team, but with the kids here at Pulaski Academy, the faculty and staff, as well.”

 

Lucas believes that is something every kid needs to hear, regardless of where they were raised.   

 

“If you can get one kid to change, you’ve done a great job,” he said, “and I do feel like that. The kids, they know my expectations of them and how I want them to take care of themselves, and since I’ve been in this position, I’ve noticed a difference in a few kids. You know, a lot of people are like, ‘Y’all don’t have problems like that in private school.’ I say, you have no idea. You have no idea what these kids may be going through at home.”

 

Wyatt, who has been at PA since 2000, said Lucas provided a seamless transition while placing his own stamp on the program.

 

“You couldn’t ask for a better leader of young men,” he said. “He’s very charismatic, and his charisma comes through to anyone who’s around him for 30 seconds. He genuinely cares about each individual, and that becomes apparent with each conversation with him, and it becomes apparent pretty quickly.”

 

***

 

It must have been something like kismet that brought Lucas to Fayetteville to play for the Razorbacks. If he had picked basketball over football or chosen to play somewhere else, he never would have found his adopted home in Arkansas and never would have found divine retribution in the south end zone of Razorback Stadium.

 

The kismet comes in when one considers that Lucas recorded both the first and last touchdown catches of his organized football career in the state of Arkansas. His parents were at both games — the first as a seventh grader from Tallulah playing about 50 miles up U.S. 65 in Eudora. The last? Well, that one still gets replayed in Arkansas. It came on the afternoon of Nov. 13, 1999, and it provided the final score in a 28-24 win over No. 3 Tennessee that avenged a loss by the same score from ’98 that SB Nation’s Football Study Hall years would later call “one of the biggest gut-punch near-upsets in college football’s history.”

 

On a national scale, the outcome of that ’99 game moved the needle only because it eliminated Tennessee from the national title chase and made the Hogs bowl eligible.

 

But from an Arkansas perspective, needles moved because the earth shook. Lucas ran a post, gaining his customary step on the cornerback, and took in a 23-yard scoring strike from Stoerner with 3:24 left to play. The defense survived a couple of Tee Martin throws into the end zone to give Arkansas its most cathartic win in program history.

 

The previous year, Lucas had owned the University of Tennessee’s secondary. Eight catches, 172 yards, two scores. He could not be covered. Both teams had entered the highly anticipated ’98 game at 8-0 with SEC and national title implications at play. The Hogs built a 21-10 lead and outplayed the top-ranked Vols for three and a half quarters. Then things happened late, things no coach could plan for, and the Hogs left Knoxville numb in the aftermath of a 28-24 defeat. 

 

That Stoerner and Lucas connected for the game-winner a year later, matching the ’98 final score, was nothing short of what Lucas would describe as a “God thing.”

 

Lucas remembers seeing the goal posts being carried out of the stadium by a moving mass of students and fans through what was then the open-air south end zone. They — the goalposts and the mass — would end up on Dickson Street, which those even remotely familiar with the lay of the land around Razorback Stadium know is no easy trip. Later that night, as Dickson Street was thumping into the wee hours, the Razorback heroes were beckoned.

 

“They called Stoerner; somebody had his number,” Lucas said. “We were at his house hanging out. My parents were there. We all went over there and just hung out, and man, we got a call. I mean, I could hear the guy: ‘Hey, y’all need to come down. We got the goal posts down here at Ozark Brewery. You need to sign ‘em.’ It was wild, but man, what a memorable moment.”

 

***

 

Rena and Gerald said they are grateful for Arkansas’ symbolic adoption of their son.

 

“Arkansas has shown an extreme amount of love for our son,” Rena said. “We really thank Arkansas for being so good to him. We’ll go to Walmart or something when we visit, and Anthony can’t get out of the store, can’t get out of the parking lot because of all the people who recognize him and want to say something.”

 

For his part, Lucas said he does not see himself going anywhere, though he will not rule out coaching at the collegiate level one day should the opportunity arise. But he is not searching it out. He and his wife, Devae, are raising their two kids, Kassidy, 12, and Kaylee, 6, in Little Rock and living a blessed life.

 

“Right now, I’m so grateful. I’ve got a great group of coaches that I work with, and I can’t say enough about this,” he said. “The staff here, these guys are so talented, and we are so different in our own little ways, but we come together, and we get our kids to perform. I don’t know where the journey’s going to take me. I just try to live one day and one week at a time.”

 

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