Antoine Pettway • Alabama, 2004 • First season
Entering his first season on the Gamecocks coaching staff, Antoine Pettway brings with him a reputation of knowing how to win.
The former standout at the University of Alabama was hired by Mike LaPlante in June of 2006, giving Pettway his first full-time coaching job after he served one season as a graduate assistant under Mark Gottfried at his alma mater. His responsibilities at JSU include recruiting, player development, on-floor coaching and other administrative duties.
In his one season on the Crimson Tide’s coaching staff, Pettway helped guide Alabama to an NCAA Tournament trip that included a first-round win over Marquette. The Tide finished 18-13 in Pettway’s inaugural coaching season and finished second in the Southeastern Conference’s Western Division to Final Four participant LSU.
Pettway, a walk-on point guard as a freshman at Alabama in 2000, emerged as the Crimson Tide’s starting point guard by his junior season and earned a reputation for hitting game-winning shots for Alabama in several big games.
A 2004 graduate of the University of Alabama with a degree in health care management, Pettway played four seasons for the Crimson Tide and started every game of his senior season at point guard, helping lead Alabama to the school’s first-ever trip to the Elite 8 of the NCAA Tournament. His game-winning buzzer-beater in the first round beat Southern Illinois and set up Alabama for its second-round upset of No. 1 Stanford. Pettway also drained the last-second shot against Florida in 2002 that gave the Crimson Tide the Southeastern Conference regular-season title.
A native of Alberta, Ala., Pettway played prep basketball for his father Joseph Pettway at Wilcox-Central High School in Camden, Ala., where he led the Jaguars to the 2000 AHSAA 5A State Championship as a senior. He was also a first-team all-state performer and a selection to the Birmingham News “Super 5” as a senior. He excelled in the classroom at WCHS, where he was salutatorian of his class and his 4.0 GPA landed him an academic scholarship to Alabama. Prior to his career with the Jaguars, Pettway played for his father at Keith High School, where they won the 1998 state title.
He plans to finish his master’s degree in sports management at Alabama in May.
He is engaged to the Kimberly Minor of Starkville, Miss.
