Bucknell University Athletics
Former Bison Star Charles Lee Returns to Bucknell, But the Sideline is His Home Now
12/5/2012 7:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Dec. 5, 2012
By Jon Terry, Bucknell Athletic Communications
Working on press breaks late in an October practice session, Bucknell freshman point guard Ryan Frazier dribbled the ball down the right side of the court and right into the teeth of a double team, resulting in a turnover. When Frazier was subbed out a few minutes later, the first person to greet him was first-year assistant coach Charles Lee, who took the promising young rookie aside and gave him a quick demo on a subtle head fake that can be used to freeze that second oncoming defender and clear space to get the ball up the floor.
The conversation lasted just a few seconds, but for those who were around to watch Lee's all-star career on some of the best teams in Bucknell history, it was fascinating to see him pass along a seemingly minute detail to a freshman in his new role on the sideline.
When you consider that Lee had the opportunity to play for Hall-of-Fame coach Pat Flannery at Bucknell, an NBA legend in Gregg Popovich with the San Antonio Spurs, as well as four other professional coaches in Israel, Belgium and Germany, he certainly brings back a wealth of knowledge to share with the current players at his alma mater.
Lee was the 2006 Patriot League Player of the Year and was one of the catalysts of Bucknell's 2005 and 2006 championship teams. He scored 1,147 points in his career and earned the Christy Mathewson Award as the top athlete in the Class of 2006. A 6'3" guard, Lee is one of only 17 players in program history to amass 1,000 points and 500 rebounds. He also ranks fifth in school history in steals with 167.
Lee co-captained the Bison in 2004-05 and 2005-06. In both seasons Bucknell won Patriot League championships and went on to capture first-round victories in the NCAA Tournament. Lee recorded 15 points and eight rebounds in Bucknell's historic upset of third-seeded Kansas in the 2005 NCAA Tournament. In Lee's senior year, Bucknell won a school-record 27 games, became the first Patriot League team to go undefeated in league play in the regular season, and entered the national top-25 for the first time in program history. The Bison earned a No. 9 seed in the NCAA Tournament, and led by a game-high 24 points from Lee, they knocked off Arkansas in the first round.
Following graduation with a degree in business management, Lee was invited to play with the Spurs' summer-league team. He impressed the organization during summer-league play in Salt Lake City, and he signed a two-year, non-guaranteed contract with them. At the primary training camp, Lee saw action in the Spurs' preseason games, including three on a tour of France, but he was one of the team's final cuts just prior to the start of the regular season. The Spurs had a veteran roster in 2006-07 and went on to claim the NBA title.
"My first year out of college, having a chance to play summer league with the Spurs was kind of an eye-opener," Lee says. "Playing every day against guys from the high-major conferences, guys who had just been drafted, it caught me off guard at first. But you get some respect after you show them you can play. Looking back at it, I wish I had been a little more aggressive, but the experience was unbelievable.
"I was really fortunate that training camp was overseas. We were in France for about two-and-a-half weeks and really got after it. The Spurs had just lost the previous season in the second round of the playoffs, so that was considered a disappointing year for them. So they really put us through the wringer and training camp was very grueling every day. There were seven free agents in camp, and by the end it was just me and two other guys. The Dallas exhibition game was the next thing up, and the day of the Dallas exhibition we all got cut. They ended up signing James White, who was drafted and cut by the Pacers, and the Spurs picked him up on waivers."
After getting cut Lee flew to Ithaca to spend some time with his brother, and a week later he signed a contract with Gilboa Afula in the Israeli Premier League. He averaged 9.4 points and 4.0 rebounds in his first professional season and was invited back the following year. However he injured his back after being undercut going up for a layup, and that missed time cost him a roster spot. Lee ended up playing for VOO Verviers-Pepinster in Belgium in 2007-08 before moving on to the German Bundesliga for two years. Lee played for MEG Goettingen in 2008-09, helping that upstart team to a playoff berth while averaging 13.4 points per game. His final pro stop came with the Artland Dragons in 2009-10.
"It was tough to mentally get myself out of being cut by the Spurs," Lee says of the initial adjustment going overseas. "Who knows how close I really was to making the team. You never really know what management's thoughts are. Maybe they just let me hang around because he's a Bucknell kid with a good story, but I definitely felt like I was close. I felt like I was right there, and now all of the sudden I'm in Israel. As great as Israel is as far as being a very good league, it was really laid back. It was not the atmosphere I was used to. I had Coach Flannery on my back for four years and then I had Coach Pop yelling at me, and now all of the sudden there is just practice once a day, you lift whenever you feel like it, and it was just a totally different structure. Obviously self-motivation was key, but at that time I kind of needed that person yelling down my back."
In Lee's second year in Germany with Artland, he got to go up against his former teammate, Chris McNaughton, twice in league play. McNaughton had signed that year with Lee's former team in Goettingen, and they split a pair of head-to-head matchups. Lee had a potential game-winner in the second meeting go in and out at the buzzer, or his team would have had the sweep.
"It was an experience that I will never forget," says Lee. "My time at Bucknell was obviously very special, but my professional career was everything I could have asked for. To get a taste of every level, from the NBA to overseas to high-level Euro competition, it was great."
While his passion for basketball was still strong, four years of a long-distance relationship with his then-girlfriend and current wife Lindsey, had begun to wear on him, and he missed his family. Lindsey, who was a former captain of the Bison women's basketball team, had a good job in New York City and her father was battling cancer, so she was not able to relocate to Europe.
So he retired from professional basketball in 2010, started networking and put his Bucknell degree to good use on Wall Street, working for Bank of America Merrill Lynch. He started in the company's global banking and markets rotational program and eventually moved up to equities trader.
"I was so focused on basketball for all of those years that I had never really done any internships or gotten any experience in the business world," Lee recalls. "I thought about pharmaceutical sales or even working in the NBA video department in Newark, but Lindsey thought I would be a good salesman in the financial market. One day I sat with one of her roommates on the trading floor, and I immediately thought that if I wasn't going to be playing anymore I want to do something fast-paced, and this is it. I reached out to several Bucknellians, like [former basketball player] Kevin Wenk, and one thing led to another. I got back in May and landed a job in June."
Throughout his playing days, Lee continued to follow the Bison team, and then even more so when he got back stateside in 2010. Coach Dave Paulsen called him while in the city for an alumni event, and the two of them hit it off immediately. Sitting in a little café, Paulsen hinted that Lee should think about getting into coaching. Lee shrugged off that notion immediately, as his Wall Street career was just getting started.
But Lee could not get rid of his passion for basketball. He started volunteering at youth camps and clinics in the area. He helped out at a weekend tournament with an anti-bullying theme run by former Bison women's star Molly Creamer in New Jersey. For the first time he really had a chance to watch a lot of college and pro basketball on television. He even returned to the court to play in some games for the New York Athletic Club.
The more he was back around the game, the more he realized how much knowledge he had to share with younger players. So when assistant coach Michael Cotton left Bucknell for a position on the staff at Rider, Lee was a natural fit to replace him.
"It worked out perfectly that I could come to a place like Bucknell and work with guys who have a very similar background to what I had experienced," says Lee. "We can relate to each other, and this is obviously a program that I really want to see continue to thrive."
Lee admits that nostalgically it has been a challenge being on the other side of the whistle during practices at Sojka Pavilion. During the team's first preseason scrimmage, Lee got a quick glance from Paulsen, and his first reaction was, "Does he want me to go in?"
A few days prior to the season opener at Purdue, Lee was not sure how he would feel walking through the tunnel to the floor for the first time wearing a suit instead of a uniform. Former teammate Kevin Bettencourt, who is now a successful assistant coach at Bentley College, gave him some advice on that.
"Bettencourt told me to be careful," says Lee with a laugh. "He told me that your first few games, especially a big game like Purdue, you are going to think to yourself, `oh man I want to be out there.' But I am really excited for this team, because I know how hard they have worked and I want to see them get the results that they deserve."
Note: This story appeared in a recent edition of the Bucknell Basketball Gameday Program.
