LAPLACE — Mickey Roussel wants the world to know that he did try.

When Ricardo Gathers landed at Riverside Academy shortly after the sudden closing of the nearby Reserve Christian School, he was already a mammoth young man as a sophomore.

Of course Roussel, then the Riverside Academy football coach, hoped to get the new kid suited up on the football team. He tried to lure him over, Roussel said, but back then, Gathers was all about basketball. He hadn’t played football since he was 13 years old and in middle school.

“We talked about it,” Roussel said. “We knew his situation, that basketball was his focus. At the end of his junior year we knew he would really make it to the college level in basketball, so that was the end of that. Everything was all about basketball.”
It didn’t keep Roussel from wishing, however.

“Every now and then we’d joke about suiting him up and just sending him out as captain during the coin flip just to scare the other team a little bit,” Roussel joked. “We used to laugh about that.”

Some folks might be laughing now as Gathers, now a 6-foot-7, 275-pound senior at Baylor, has spent the last several weeks trying to make the transition from basketball player to football player.

Gathers wants the world to know that he is dead serious.

He has not only declared his intention to become an NFL tight end, he has had several workouts for several teams. Monday he held workout at Saints camp in Metairie that was attended by representatives from more than 20 NFL teams.

“It has gone very well,” Gathers said last week. “I have gotten a lot of positive feedback from a lot of people.”

Gathers said this was all part of a master plan put into place when he was a youngster. The idea, he said, was to devote his early years to basketball while avoiding football and the wear and tear it can put on a body. When the time came after basketball, then he would revert back to football.

“That was the plan,” Gathers said. “I sat down with my family and we thought it out. They said, ‘You can always go back to play football.’ The idea was to chase the basketball dream as long as you can.”

Gathers began the chase at Reserve Christian School, the tiny private school that had no football team but won seven state championships in basketball.

Coach Timmy Byrd said he and Gathers had discussed his future without football. He also said he never discouraged the youngster from playing football.

“I made sure he was serious,” Byrd said. “I asked him before he came to Reserve Christian, ‘Are you sure you want to give up football?’ I made sure he knew what he was giving up.”

Gathers was a freshman on the last Reserve Christian team in 2009, which won the school’s seventh LHSAA title. No ordinary freshman, though, he was named the MVP of the state championship game.

When the school suddenly closed a few months later, Gathers had his pick of schools. He could have gone to East St. John, where his brother had been an All-State football player, or to any of the then-basketball powerhouses across the country.

He chose Riverside Academy, even though the school had only three winning seasons in boys basketball prior to 2009, following his teammates and Byrd.

The following year Riverside would win the first of its five titles and Gathers was the MVP of the championship game in his sophomore and junior years. In his senior season, his team fell to John Curtis in the final but Gathers was named Louisiana’s Gatorade Player of the Year.

He signed with Baylor, putting together a solid career and leading the Big 12 Conference in rebounding as a junior.

Then he decided to forego the NBA draft to chase his NFL dream of becoming a tight end.

“It’s hasn’t been hard exactly,” he said. “The biggest challenge is the leg work and learning the technique. I’ve had to learn everything I’ve missed over the last nine years.”

Greg Gathers, who is acting as his brother’s “consultant” said: “The thing is, he’s not just a basketball player who’s trying to be a football player. He was a football player who chose to play basketball. It’s not like he doesn’t have any other avenues.

“He’s doing this because he genuinely wants to play football.”

Whether or not Gathers will be selected in the draft, which begins Thursday, remains to be seen. Some think he has an excellent chance; others do not.

NFL and College Draft analyst Mike Detillier believes Gathers is in the former camp.

“He certainly has the athleticism,” Detillier said.

“I really think he’s got a shot.

If he’s not picked, I’m pretty sure he’d have a number of teams interested in signing him. He’ll get a shot somewhere.”