It’s pretty impressive what Chris LaBelle can accomplish when he has time to map it all out.
One game into the 2023-24 season, the Hamilton native was abruptly promoted from assistant to head coach of the Centenary University men’s basketball team after the head man stepped down.
While happy for the opportunity at age 24, it was also a precarious situation. LaBelle was learning on the fly, with no margin for error, since every game mattered. His system was not ingrained, and the result was a 2-23 record and an 0-12 Atlantic East Conference mark.
But LaBelle did enough good things coaching his alma mater to be hired full time, and took complete advantage this year.
After having a full summer and preseason to mold his kind of team, LaBelle guided the Cyclones to an 11-15 overall record and 5-7 in the conference, which provided a berth in the AEC Tournament. It was Centenary’s best record and first tournament appearance this decade.
The league took notice. LaBelle and his staff became the first in program history to earn the AEC Coaching Staff of the Year award. On the bench with Chris was big brother Nick LaBelle, a former Steinert standout, Kyle O’Brien, Tyler Clark, Jake McMullan and Michael Young.
“It was a good group, it was really fun to be a part of,” LaBelle said. “We got to see a lot of growth from the year prior.”
Growth he expected.
“A lot of the guys coming back were very young last year, so you set goals for them to develop over the summer and work hard to get better,” LaBelle said. “As a coaching staff we tried to do the same thing and set goals for ourselves.
“I think we left some meat on the bone with some games this year. Obviously coming off a two-win season, you don’t have a ton of expectations, but it was nice to have some expectations and for the guys to live up to them.”
* * *
The Staff of the Year was a group award, but LaBelle is the figurehead.
“I like his accountability,” said freshman Dom Raymond, a Nottingham High grad. “As a second-year head coach, people overlooked him. But he fought every day in practice just yelling at us about defense. He knows the scoring is gonna come, but he talks about us playing defense all the time.”
It was obvious, as the Cyclones became more disciplined and tougher to break down defensively, resulting in allowing an average of four less points per game than last season.
A major factor was that LaBelle was able to develop his culture and have the players like-minded to his plan.
“You get to put your own identity onto your program,” he said. “It was awesome to have a preseason and get the opportunity to work with the guys for a couple months before just jumping into games.”
Centenary showed progress throughout the campaign, winning five games in January while suffering four losses by seven points or fewer.
“We had a big improvement,” Raymond said. “Just the practices this year. In the beginning I was like, ‘Whoa, this is really hard!’ He had us doing everything. The environment in the gym was at the next level I never thought of. It was crazy.”
LaBelle and his staff worked hard on player development, and were helped by the fact that six players were from Mercer County or Bordentown.
“A lot of these kids have been playing with or against each other for a long time,” LaBelle said. “Once they got into the same room, they wanted to work hard and be in each other’s company. That’s why we were able to make the quick jump that we did.”
By helping his team make that jump, it proved to LaBelle that he was ready to run his own program. That wasn’t always the case during last season’s struggles.
“For sure there’s some doubts, especially being a competitor,” he said. “You hate losing, and at the end of the day as head coach it all falls on you. You start to wonder, was this too early for me?”
Once the season ended and LaBelle was able to reflect, he understood that all he could was keep working at it.
“I gave myself the opportunity this summer to put my head down, do everything I could to try to be the best coach for these guys on and off the court and they did that as players as well,” he said.
The former Steinert/Trenton Catholic player felt he learned a lot from last year’s adversity. One of the biggest things he realized is that every game is not a make-or-break affair.
“The competitor in you kills you, you want to win every single game,” he said. “When you don’t win game, you expect to win, you have to compartmentalize it, find a way to get over it quickly and just worry about winning the next one.
“You feel like every single time you lose you’re losing your Super Bowl. You start to realize it’s part of a process, you take it on the chin and just worry about winning the next game. We did that really well. We didn’t let our losses affect us and have a lot of highs and lows.”
LaBelle praised his staff, which includes several former Cyclones “who really care about Centenary basketball.” He is also happy to have brother Nick, who previously coached in AAU and at Trenton Catholic.
“It’s nice to have somebody to turn around to who you can trust on the sideline and yell at him and you know he won’t get mad because we’ve known each other for a long time,” LaBelle said.
As the little brother, Chris is making up for all the times Nick yelled at him as kids. “I abuse it as much as I can,” he said with a laugh. “The slim chances I get to yell at him I take full advantage of it.”
Raymond noted that one of LaBelle’s big themes in practice is to call his players DAWGS – D for discipline, A for accountability, W for work ethic, G for gritty and S for sacrifice.
Those traits fit in with Raymond’s personality, as he has lived by them his entire career. After being named The Trentonian’s CVC co-Player of the Year last year, the former Northstar chose Centenary because he was familiar with the coaches. In fact, Chris LaBelle played baseball with Dom’s brother Sam at TCA.
“Coach Nick used to coach me with Bob Fusik,” Raymond said. “Those two helped me a lot and I knew if I trusted coach Nick my whole life I would trust coach Chris. It was basically homegrown, I knew the kids on the team from Ewing and Steinert (freshman Avery Cannato).”
Raymond had to adjust to less playing time as a freshman. He appeared in 19 games and averaged 4.3 points and 2.7 rebounds. He had his moments, such as collecting 12 points and five rebounds while hitting the game-winning shot against Immaculata.
“Dom played really well as a freshman,” LaBelle said. “It’s very hard for a freshman to come in and play right away. It’s a different speed of the game, you’re going against 22, 23 year olds. Dom did a really good job, he always adjusted and worked hard in practice.”
One of the things LaBelle likes most about Raymond is that his character matches the coach’s philosophy.
“Dom’s a home run,” LaBelle said. “You bring in your own kids to create the culture you want. Dom is the spitting image of it. He’s the first guy in the gym, he’s constantly getting extra shots up. He goes to study hours, does all he’s supposed to do off the court; and on the court he’s a beast. He deserves all the good things that are gonna come his way.”
And as LaBelle continues to grow as a coach and further put his stamp on the program, some good things may be coming for the Cyclones as well.
