‘So close to home’: LSU’s Kim Mulkey hasn’t stopped thinking about New Orleans attack
A Louisiana girl born and raised, growing up between Baton Rouge and New Orleans in Tangipahoa Parish, Mulkey has flown the banner for her home state dating back to her time as a player and assistant coach at Louisiana Tech to now as the head women’s basketball coach at the flagship university.
Following her No. 4-ranked LSU women’s basketball team’s dominating win at Arkansas on Thursday, Mulkey was upset about the tragic events that took place in the wee hours of New Year’s Day on Bourbon Street in New Orleans, where a man drove his truck into the large crowd, killing 14 and injuring dozens of others.
“A lot of people’s children and families, I cannot imagine how they feel,” Mulkey said. “I went back home to my state of Louisiana to be a positive. You just wish you could do something.
“I can’t quit thinking about it to be honest.”
Before the game Thursday night inside Bud Walton Arena, both teams and those in attendance observed a moment of silence that Mulkey thought appreciated.
The ripple effect of what authorities have now determined to be a terrorist attack committed by Shamsud-Din Jabbar have been felt far and wide but the personal toll the aftermath has taken and felt by Mulkey and her players has been tough.
Three of the confirmed deaths, Kareem Badawi, 18, and Tiger Bech, 27, and Reggie Hunter, 37, all had connections to Baton Rouge. LSU basketball player Izzy Besselman went to high school at Episcopal and knew Badawi.
“It’s so close to home. It hits you right smack in the face. You get emotional,” Mulkey said. “You just pray that somehow, some way (the families) can deal with it and continue on with their lives.”
Mulkey said LSU practiced the afternoon of New Year’s Eve. She and her associate head coach Bob Starkey talked with their players about the festivities and to be careful.
“It was not them you worry about. It’s others. It’s kind of like I told my own children growing up, ‘I don’t worry about you, I worry about others around you,'” Mulkey said. “We talked about it briefly. It’s too close to home, it’s too emotional.
“You can’t ignore it. You just talk about who you knew. Bech, his brother played at LSU, transferred to TCU. You feel like you know these young people personally just because we’re from such a small geographic state. When you see where everything happened, it hits young people in such a way that you talk about it. I’m telling you it’s something that’s been in my heart. I don’t even know if I’ve stopped paying attention to it long enough to let it go and breathe. It is horrific and it is gut-wrenching to think that, that happened so close to home.”
