RICHMOND, Va. – In a different world, Chaisson Allen’s career would get the kind of better ending you would think it deserves. But this is the world we live in, and Allen’s career ended with his team scrambling to try to get a last-second shot off as the clock expired in a 60-58 loss to Delaware.
After steadily improving the win totals and finishing with high seeds, Allen’s Northeastern Huskies finished tenth in the CAA this season. They lost 20 games a year after they won 20. Wins were hard to come by early, and later on they struggled closing out games. They lost a number of close games, and also blew leads in a couple of games that would have been nice wins to raise the young team’s confidence. Yet he has never shown a sign that it has been difficult on him. He knew what this season would be like, and he’s taken the ups and downs in stride all along.
Still, it was a tough way to end a career, indeed, especially considering it’s one that’s seen Allen come a long way.
Allen received his share of accolades this season. He repeated as a first team All-CAA selection, a year after he was runner-up for Player of the Year. He made the All-Defensive team. He’s been lauded often by his coach and teammates as a quietly good leader, a young man who hasn’t exactly embraced the spotlight but not in a bad way. He finishes his career with over 1,500 points, good for ninth on the school’s all-time scoring list. And he would trade all of that in for a chance to go to the NCAA Tournament.
When Allen first came to Huntington Ave, the thought was he could be a four-year starter. He had good size to play both guard spots, but a lot of instincts for the point. He joined a team that had plenty of youth at the time, but potential wasn’t lacking if the unit could grow together. They did, and the Huskies were a force in the CAA for a couple of years. This year was a different story.
Allen is a level-headed young man from Murfreesboro, Tennessee, the youngest of three children in a warm and friendly family. He’s been playing basketball since the age of four, and it seemed like that was destined to be his sport even though he had others in his life. As a youngster, he also played baseball and football, even playing on a travel team with the former for a time. While he was good at both, the hardwood was the ultimate calling, and interestingly, it was a now fellow CAA coach who saw that at a young age.
Back when Buzz Peterson was the head coach at Tennessee, where one of his older brothers played football, Allen attended a basketball camp there. Peterson saw him, and being the lifelong basketball man that he is, had a sense. He figured Allen was going to grow into having guard size and perhaps be a point guard. If you weren’t sure whether or not Peterson knows something about basketball, this should convince you. The last four years have, although Peterson only saw it up close this year as he’s in his first season at CAA rival UNC Wilmington.
The point guard spot came naturally to Allen for a few reasons. One was apparent right away as a college player: he plays with a quiet confidence and never looks rattled. A team’s floor leader needs that because teammates will watch the body language of their leader. It’s something that one player who has grown while playing alongside him noticed.
“At the opening of the game, he’s composed, late in the game he’s composed, and he’s always been a factor,” said sophomore guard Jonathan Lee, Allen’s most likely successor at the point.
That leads to the other chief reason the point guard spot seemed to be the natural position for him. Allen has always been about his teammates. When he was younger and his team would get up big, and they would bring in kids who hardly ever played, he would draw a double or triple team while motioning for one of those players to get near the basket. He would hit him with a pass for a layup, and that would make everyone’s day. It’s like in college when a walk-on comes in and scores.
It hasn’t ended there, either, and his likely successor has seen that, too.
“He’s often talking in my ear, saying, ‘You take it,’ ‘You get it,’ encouraging me,” said Lee, who has grown immensely as a sophomore after playing very limited minutes as a freshman last season.
Since coming to Northeastern, Allen has improved every year. The most noticeable example of his work can be seen in his jump shot, which was just about non-existent when he first came to Huntington Ave. What passed for a jump shot was little more than a set shot, as he barely got off the ground, and not surprisingly, he didn’t shoot well although he also didn’t take a lot of them. He came back as a sophomore with a more natural stroke, getting more lift as well. The numbers weren’t there, but the stage was set for another off-season where he spent a lot of time putting up shots, and for his last two seasons he’s shot the ball very well, especially from long range.
In an age when a lot of players repeat a year of high school along the way and enter college a little older, Allen is a very young man. While it hasn’t been uncommon in recent years to see a freshman at age 20 before playing a minute of college basketball, Allen’s career is over and he won’t turn 22 for three more months. He came to the school ready to grow as a young man, and he’s done that. As he looks to play professional basketball, he has growth left in him at this young age. The NBA is a long shot, but there are sure to be other opportunities.
Whereas one older brother, Mikki, played his college ball at nearby Tennessee, Chaisson went away for school. His parents have managed to make a lot of his games over his career despite the distance from home, so they have been able to share in some of the experience. Allen has enjoyed his time at the school and the players and students he has been around, and his father speaks highly of it as well. A parent never knows what to expect when a child goes far away from home for school, but it’s fair to say there are no disappointments in this story.
Things are all set to end well off the court as he works to finish his degree this spring. In a different world, they might have ended a little better on the court. In a different world, Chaisson Allen’s career would have had the ending you would think his career deserves.
