MICHAEL KIRAL / L’Observateur / December 11, 1999

DESTREHAN – As LSU’s sixth-leading all-time rusher, Rondell Mealey is used to pulling away from tugs on his jersey.

Thursday morning, Mealey was again feeling tugs on his No. 7 LSU jersey.Only this time, he had no intention of pulling away from them. Those tugswere coming from pre-kindergartners in Andrea Lambert’s Pre-K B class at St. Charles Borromeo.Mealey was on hand as a show-and-tell project for Veronica Hall, a friend of his and one of his biggest fans. When he appeared in their classroomThursday morning, Lambert’s students were as excited to see Mealey as LSU fans on a Saturday night when he usually led the team out of the tunnel at Tiger Stadium. But it was hard to see who was having more fun,the students or Mealey, sitting in a chair half his size, playing with them on a computer.

“Whenever I come down, I like to come here and talk to the students and show them a good time,” Mealey said. “I like it too so they are not the onlyones having fun.”For Mealey, the 1999 season was anything but fun. A season that startedwith promise, with wins in the first two games, suddenly and dramatically went downhill with eight straight losses. There were closecalls against ranked teams Georgia, Mississippi State and Alabama, but also blowouts by Auburn, Florida, Kentucky and Ole Miss.

“It was a rough season,” Mealey said. “We lose by one point one week andthe next week we would get blown out.”To the credit of many of the players, including Mealey, they continued to play hard even as the losses piled up and the criticism of the team rose.

“I couldn’t quit,” Mealey said. “I had to go out and play as hard as I couldand tried to make something happen.”One bright spot of the season came in the final game against 17th-ranked Arkansas at Tiger Stadium. Head coach Gerry DiNardo had been let go afterthe Houston game and assistant coach Hal Hunter had taken over on an interim basis.

Relieving all the frustrations of the season out on the Razorbacks, the Tigers rolled to a 35-10 victory, snapping the school-record eight-game losing streak and a 10-game losing streak in SEC play.

“We decided through the coaching changes that we were going to have fun the last game,” Mealey said. “We played for us and for coach Hunter and wehad fun for a change.”Mealey was one of the players having the most fun. With LSU holding a 14-3 lead late in the first half, defensive tackle Johnny Mitchell grabbed a deflected pass to give the Tigers possession at the LSU 46. Two playslater, Mealey got open over the middle behind the Arkansas defense and Rohan Davey found him on a 48-yard scoring strike, increasing the lead to 21-3 at the half.

Davey, who was seeing his first extensive action since the Auburn game in the third week of the season, was another player having fun in the game.

After taking over for Josh Booty in the second quarter, Davey completed 10 of his 12 passes for 224 yards and three touchdowns and was named the SEC player of the week.

Mealey and Davey became good friends while at LSU. Mealey, who took overfrom Kevin Faulk as the Tigers’ top runner this season, recognized that Davey, who had played behind Herb Tyler last season, were in the same situation.

“He’s a good friend,” Mealey said. “He was in the same situation I was inso I gave him pointers on what to do and what not to do. Once he was giventhe opportunity, he was fine.”On the first series of the third quarter, Mealey scampered around left end and scored from 20 yards out to increase the lead to 28-3. He finished thegame with 82 yards on 17 carries and with four catches for 70 yards. Thefinal touchdown was his 29th of his career, moving him into a tie for fourth in career rushing touchdowns on the LSU list with another former River Parishes great, Terry Robiskie.

Mealey finished the season with 637 yards on 170 carries, ranking 10th in the SEC in rushing. His 2,238 career yards rank sixth on the LSU rushinglist behind Faulk, Dalton Hilliard, Charles Alexander, Harvey Williams and Robiskie.

Mealey went to LSU right after one coach, Curley Hallman, was fired and another, DiNardo, hired. He was one of a handful of players who was withDiNardo through all five of his seasons, having red-shirted his freshman season.

“We had some good times and we had some bad times as well,” Mealey said. “The only problem I had with Coach D was that he worked us hard butI was fine with everything else.”Now as Mealey is completing his years at LSU, another coach, Nick Saban is coming on board. Mealey said he has not met with the new coach anddoesn’t know anything about Saban but that he is confident the Tigers will do ok next season especially if the offensive line, decimated by injuries this season, can improve.

“The defense played really well,” Mealey said. “As soon as the offensecatches up with the defense they will have no problem.” Mealey’s college career is not over yet. He has been selected to play in theBlue-Gray Classic in Montgomery, Ala., Christmas Day and the GridironClassic in Orlando Jan. 29. From there he will head to the NFL Combine towork out for the pro scouts.

If a pro career does not pan out, Mealey has a plan to fall back on. He isscheduled to graduate Friday and is planning to go into sports administration. The value of education is another reason Mealey wastalking to the students at St. Charles Borromeo Thursday.”The most valuable thing is education,” Mealey said. “I worked hard andplayed hard in football and I found out it paid off for me.”And through the wins and losses with the Tigers, there was one group of fans that remained loyal to him. The pre-kindergartners at St. CharlesBorromeo held a mini pep rally every Friday complete with the LSU fight songs and colored pictures of Mealey in preparation of his visit. And withyoung Veronica Hall gently tugging at his jersey, waiting anxiously to show him off to the other students at the school, Mealey was saying it wouldn’t be the last time he would be there.

“I have no problem doing this,” Mealey, with his familiar smile shining through, said. “No matter what I do, I want to come back and do this.”

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