KALAMAZOO — When Kevin White counsels an unruly student, he usually understands what’s going on.

At one time, he was that student.

For the dean of students at Kalamazoo Hackett Catholic Prep, White’s life has come full circle.

He thrived while attending St. Monica Elementary School as a child, but after his father Damon passed away in 1989, the family moved to Portage and he changed schools.

“Eighth and ninth grades there was a change in behavior and grade point average,” White said. “Right about Christmas break, I had three gentlemen in my living room. 

“Mike Smith, Shawn Potts and Nib Reisterer were having a conversation with my mom. They were worried about the direction I was headed and I think somehow those three came up with a plan to get me back (to Hackett).

He soon realized he needed the structure, discipline and smaller class sizes available there. But the worst part of transferring to Hackett was that he had to sit out the upcoming basketball season.

“I was not allowed to play right away because they decided my grades weren’t good enough to play, only to practice,” he recalled. “To sit on the bench as a high school kid with a bad GPA, and (bad attitude), it was like when I was little. If I wanted to do things, I had to do them the right way.”

At Hackett, he was reunited with Reisterer, his mentor who put him through some tough workouts.

“They were some of the hardest workouts I ever had because I had to go back to changing some bad habits, which changed pretty quickly,” White said.

He also had to face the players he idolized as a child when they asked why he wasn’t playing.

“That’s when I knew I had to kick it into gear because I didn’t want to let those guys down,” White said. “They said, ‘You wanted to wear that jersey since you were in fifth grade.’ My mom says peer pressure is the best pressure.”

Learning from the best

White first encountered Reisterer, who changed his life, during elementary school.

After losing his father, White would have to remain at school until his mother, Sheila, who was a police officer, picked him up.

“This gym teacher was, ‘Hey, do you want to hang out in the gym?’ Then he said he had basketball practice at 5 and did I want to come with him to practice? And he’s been stuck with me ever since,” White recalled. “It turned into ‘can I come to practice’ to ‘can I go to a couple games?’ Then I got to ride the bus. Then the Reisterer vacations at the lake became ‘Kevin’s coming too.’  There was a time when the Reisterers became my extended family, and within that came a basketball family.”

Reisterer, who was physical education teacher at St. Monica, said he knew White’s situation and wanted to help.

“My son Ryan was only a couple years younger than Kevin,” he said. “Ryan just adored him, and Kevin became my second son.”

Reisterer, who was also Hackett’s head boys basketball coach, noted, “Kevin became my ball boy. He came to every practice and did all the drills with the kids. He led the team in warmups before the game and became quite a celebrity himself.”

The highlight of his younger years was riding the bus with the Irish players, White said.

“Doing my third-grade homework with them showing me how to do the math problems and arguing about giving me the answers or not giving me the answers,” White laughed.

“The reward was, if you behaved in school you got to go to the games. So it was real easy to behave because I wanted to hang out with the high school guys and be on the bench.”

That sparked his love of basketball.

White graduated from Hackett in 1998 and then played at Glen Oaks Community College. With thoughts of prolonging his career in basketball after college – he went on to graduate from Western Michigan University – White remembered words he heard in passing.

“The guy said, ‘You might be able to play for a long time, but you’ll coach a lot longer than you’ll play if you start coaching right away,’” White said. “As a young guy, you hear it but you don’t think about it.

“Then you get into coaching and start working camps and going to the Final Fours and start networking. I like playing, but I love teaching the game. It’s been fun doing it that way.”

Reisterer said White wasn’t going to “set the world on fire” as a basketball player, but he worked his way through the coaching ranks, from instructing young kids and contributing at summer camps to filling roles at the high school and college levels, learning at each stop. 

“He has quite a network of coaches and a lot of experience,” Reisterer added.

Prioritizing family life

As an assistant coach at Kalamazoo College, White met athletic trainer Kathleen O’Farrell and was immediately smitten. He credits her with making him more detailed and organized.

They eventually married and have two children – Vincent, 7, and Riley, 3.

“Vincent is at the age where he wants to come to practice with dad,” White said. “People ask if he’s going to play basketball.

“Right now he loves to swim, loves to play soccer. I love that because I can just sit there and be Dad.”

Vincent not only goes to practice with his dad, but has his own whistle, his own spot in the locker room and his own practice plan.

“He’s in charge of the clock,” White added. “I make him sweep the floor because I had to sweep the floor when I was young. If he decides to coach, I wouldn’t be upset.”

White called his daughter a “mini-me.”

“She will say hello to anyone,” he said. “She’s got confidence, she will speak up. If she doesn’t like something, she will tell you.”

White honed his coaching skills as an assistant to several college and high school coaches, including at Hackett last season, and discovered that working at the same school where he coaches is special.

“I will tell any young coach, if you can get a high school job in today’s age and work in the school, that’s a win-win,” White noted. “The relationship with players is an advantage of working in the school because you’re with them during the day and after school, a lot of times more than they’re with their parents.”

White is running the summer basketball program at Hackett, but that’s not all the gregarious coach is doing.

As the current president of the Basketball Coaches Association of Michigan (BCAM), “We run an event called Reaching Higher,” he said. “High school teams are selected from all over the state and they come for two days to play at Grand Valley University.

“It’s open to college coaches all over the country to watch the top high school players from the state.”

He was also involved in Midwest Live where 20-40 Michigan teams compete against teams from Ohio, West Virginia and Pennsylvania at Cedar Point.

But next month, White will be back at Hackett, working to keep students on task.

“I see a lot of my classmates and myself in students today,” White said. “Yes, times have changed, but kids still want to be taken care of and want to be treated well and have support. Yes, some discipline comes with my job, but it’s also built on relationship and trust.

“I want (alumni) to come back and tell current kids that yes, Mr. White was hard on me about x, y and z, but when I needed something, he was there for me and if I didn’t follow through, he made sure I did.”

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PHOTOS (Top) At left, third-grader Kevin White celebrates with the Hackett boys basketball team in 1989. At right, White huddles with his players this past season while serving as an assistant with the Irish varsity. (Middle) White stands for a photo with BCAM Executive Director Dan Young. (Below) White poses with wife Kathleen and children Vincent and Riley. (Photos provided by Kevin White.)