Seimone Augustus on her coaching style at LSU: 'I'm gonna be hands-on'

Seimone Augustus is returning to Baton Rouge as the newest member of the women’s basketball staff at LSU. With this next opportunity for her, she’s ready to get after it with the Tigers and share all that she knows from her career as a player.

Augustus described her coaching style during her introductory press conference alongside Kim Mulkey last week. She said that she’s going to get involved right away with the girls on the floor in her role as an assistant.

“I’m gonna to be hands-on now,” said Augustus with a smile. “We’re going to get some work in.”

However, Augustus doesn’t think they’ll need too much to be where they should be. That’s why she’s focusing more on the little aspects of their respective games. That includes their mentality as well as the little lessons that she can pass on to prepare them for the present and future.

“Just kind of, like, evaluating the players. Obviously, I’ve been watching them from afar and they really don’t need much work,” said Augustus. “Everything is mostly what we always say – mental is to physical as four is to one. It’s just a mindset of how you want to approach the game, how you want to be able to attack, utilize, you know, your gifts that you have. Then sharpening the tools that need to be sharpened in your bag. That’s what I’m here to do.”

“I’ve always been a player that’s very detailed, very structured. Coach (Starkey) would always say, ‘If you’re on time? You’re late. If you’re 10 minutes early? You’re on time’. I was that player,” Augustus said. “Just those little lessons will help them, not only here but when you think about the professional side, just being able to utilize those skillsets that they already have. It’s mainly like fine-tuning an engine.”

Augustus is as good of a model as anyone could follow at LSU, especially considering there’s a statue of her outside the arena and her jersey is in its rafters. In college, she averaged 19.3 points, 5.2 rebounds, a pair of assists, and 1.4 steals while shooting 54.4%. That made her a two-time winner of the AP Player of the Year, the Naismith Award, and the Wooden Award. She was also a four-time AP All-American along with several other conference and national awards.

From there, Augustus would be the No. 1 pick during the 2006 WNBA Draft. That started a 15-year professional career where she was an eight-time All-Star, a four-time champion, and became a Hall of Famer.

Augustus has much to offer her new players at her alma mater. That’ll be to all of their benefits as she rejoins the program to begin her new career in coaching.

“I’m just going to take my experience and be able to, you know, help them along,” said Augustus.