Family Matters
December 19, 2005 12:04 PM | General
December 19, 2005
MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Reggie McLee smiles when he recalls his young cousin Kevin McLee getting all worked up over a little league baseball game that his team had lost.
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| Junior linebacker Kevin McLee earned first team all-Big East honors in 2005 after leading the Mountaineers in tackles with 74.
WVU Sports Communications |
“He was on a team that wasn’t very good and at the end of the game he had broken down into tears like he had just lost the Super Bowl,” said Reggie. “I told him, ‘Kevin it’s a baseball game. You’ve played well and I’m proud of you.’ He always had that intensity about sports. He is probably the most intense of us all.”
Kevin, or “Boo” as he’s known at West Virginia University, is part of a McLee family that is one of the most well-known in Southwestern Pennsylvania, outside of perhaps the Muncie brothers Chuck and Nelson.
Kevin’s uncle Brad was a two-year letterman at Michigan State in 1969-70 and his uncle Billy joined second-cousin Reggie at West Virginia University in the late 1970s. Boo’s distant cousin Ernie Davis lived in Uniontown until junior high school before moving to Elmira, N.Y. The late Davis won the Heisman Trophy in 1961.
Reggie and Billy both had abbreviated careers at WVU; Reggie was a backup running back behind Robert Alexander and Billy was a linebacker plagued by injuries.
Kevin’s father, Kevin, Sr., was the most well-known of the McLees, leaving the area to play for Vince Dooley’s powerhouse Georgia teams of the mid-1970s.
“Kevin was two years ahead of me and we actually played in the backfield together at Uniontown High School,” recalled Reggie. “He had a knee injury the second game of our senior year and was lost for the season.”
Well-connected former college referee Gene Steratore helped McLee land a scholarship at Georgia.
“Gene contacted Vince Dooley and asked him if he wanted to take a chance on getting a great running back,” said Reggie. “Vince had a scholarship left and took a chance on Kevin and he was the starter by his sophomore year.”
McLee became just the second back in Georgia history to rush for more than 1,000 yards in a season and helped the Bulldogs to a pair of major bowl appearances in the 1976 Cotton and 1977 Sugar. He was named first-team all-SEC in 1976 and his 2,581 career rushing yards still remain fifth on Georgia’s all-time rushing list.
It was up to Reggie, Brad and Billy to fill little Kevin in on his dad’s college exploits.
“I heard he was a great player but I never saw him on film or anything like that,” Boo said. “I saw the articles and clippings and I listened to the stories.”
“I never really talked about my career with him,” said Kevin, Sr. from his home in Los Angeles.
The two bear a striking resemblance even though they’re separated by about 50 pounds; Kevin, Sr. weighed about 190 pounds when he played at Georgia while Kevin, Jr., is much bigger at 255 pounds.
“His jacket doesn’t even remotely fit me,” Boo chuckled. “It’s is so small it’s crazy.”
“This new generation is a lot bigger than we were,” offered Reggie.
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| Kevin McLee, Sr. was an all-SEC running back for Georgia in 1976, becoming just the second Bulldog to ever rush for more than 1,00 yards in a season.
University of Georgia photo |
Following an unsuccessful try at professional football as a late-round draft pick of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, Kevin, Sr. moved out to California after his son was born. Boo was raised by his late grandmother Elaine Murray. His mother lived in Rock Island, Ill., before dying recently.
It was his grandmother who gave him the nickname “Boo” because he was always playing peek-a-boo. Her small house on Winona Street was the center of young Kevin McLee’s life.
“It was a little, little house, man,” McLee told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette earlier this year. “But she kept it clean; it was the cleanest little house up there.”
“His grandmother raised him and they were very close,” said Reggie. “During the times when he would have gone back to live with his father his grandmother just wouldn’t have it. Every time he’d try to take back Kevin her blood pressure would go up.”
Reggie says a Pittsburgh Post-Gazette story earlier this fall depicting Boo as a hardship case having to choose between running with the wrong crowd in Uniontown or going to college and making something of his life was a little off target.
“I read that and the slant was off,” said Reggie. “Boo was a middle class kid with a lot of love around him with his extended family. It wasn’t a New York City hard-knocks kind of thing. That wasn’t him.”
What Boo got, according to Reggie, was a lot of love and support from his aunts, uncles and cousins -- many of whom still live in the area.
“He’s gone through a lot but what keeps him grounded is that we’re a close family who lives within close proximity of each other,” said Reggie, now living and working for Pilgrims Pride in Atlanta. “My children go back in the summertime and they go house to house playing with their cousins. The aunts and uncles all kind of chip in and help raise them and help them stay on track.”
Reggie says one of the highlights of the year takes place each July when the entire McLee family gets together for a reunion that is now approaching about a hundred with aunts, uncles, sons, daughters and cousins.
“All of the football stories have been told at every reunion and every holiday we’ll sit down and compare notes of who did what and how we did it,” Reggie said.
Today, young Boo is part of the story telling.
He broke the Uniontown High School record for touchdowns scored in a game against Laurel Highlands and rushed for more than 1,600 yards his senior season to make the Post-Gazette Fabulous 22 team. West Virginia University coach Rich Rodriguez says he knew about McLee from football camp.
“He kind of emerged late,” Rodriguez said. “He was a good athlete who played both football and basketball. We really liked the way his motor ran. He was full-speed all the time.”
Reggie, having played for Garrett Ford at WVU, knew he was the right man to help his cousin earn a college degree so he gently steered him toward Morgantown.
“One thing that was important was my knowledge of Garrett Ford and his ability to get a child and work with them academically toward graduating. It was important for me and his dad that Boo come out of there with a degree,” said Reggie.
The Georgia coaching staff sent letters to Boo and invited him to come down to see a game, but the interest was never really that intense on both sides.
“They never offered me a scholarship and I wanted to stay closer to home,” said Boo. “I liked West Virginia and I think I made a great choice.”
After committing to West Virginia, McLee decided immediately that he wanted to play defense.
“I played running back in high school way more than I did defense but I decided to come here and switch,” Boo said. “I love playing defense and hitting people. It was just a better fit for me.”
This season Boo really started to come into his own playing outside linebacker. The 6-foot-1-inch junior finished the year tied with Mike Lorello for the team lead in tackles with 74 and also had six tackles for losses, a pair of sacks and an interception. He was recently named to the all-Big East first team.
As well as he’s played, Rodriguez thinks McLee can be even better.
“We had big, big expectations for Boo coming off of playing a lot last year and also the way he worked in the summer and they type of camp he had,” said Rodriguez. “We thought Boo could have a breakout year and he’s had a good year, but I think there’s still another level that he can go to and hopefully he gets there.”
Reggie says he sees it coming.
“He’s starting to come into his own,” he said. “I’m looking forward to watching him next year. You can tell when an athlete makes the transition from mentally struggling to learning everything. Then you can let your athleticism take over and that is what is starting to happen with Boo.”
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| Reggie McLee |
In two weeks the McLees will all get together again at Reggie’s house in Atlanta to watch Boo’s West Virginia team face Kevin, Sr.’s alma mater in the 2006 Nokia Sugar Bowl. Reggie is expecting about 15-20 people from Uniontown to come down for the game, and he’s also going to have Boo’s father there from California as well.
“We’ll be at the game and I’ll be in my West Virginia gear for sure,” said Reggie. “His dad will be there with mixed emotions but I’m sure with the way he feels about Boo it’ll weigh him over toward the Mountaineers.”
“He says he’s going to be rooting for me and wearing a Georgia Bulldog hat so he’s going to be on both sides,” says Boo.
“We got closer now since I’ve been in college,” Boo added. “He’s experienced a lot of the stuff I’m going through right now in college and I talk to him about it. He helps me through it.”
Boo will just be happy to get an opportunity to spend some extra time with his father again. Boo says his dad calls about two or three times a month now and came back east earlier this year to see the Connecticut game.
“He called me after the South Florida game when he heard on TV that we were going to the Sugar Bowl,” Boo said. “He told me that he played in the Sugar Bowl against Pitt and Tony Dorsett back in 1977.”
“It’s going to be very strange,” added Kevin, Sr. “It doesn’t happen too often and I’m excited about it. I’ll wear a Georgia hat and a West Virginia jacket.
“I’m very proud of him.”
