It's Coach Shehee Now, and His Game is Basketball Rather than Football
Rashaan Shehee used to run with a fast crowd in Seattle.
He was a swift and elusive University of Washington rusher who shared the ball with Napoleon Kaufman and Corey Dillon, matching huge rushing numbers with some of the most explosive tailbacks in Husky history.
Today, Shehee is back in his hometown of Bakersfield, California, comfortable with his post-football surroundings and moving at a little slower pace. He's into basketball now, both as the varsity girls coach at Bakersfield High School and as a dad for each of his two children.
It suits him.
A Bakersfield High teacher since 2001, Shehee took over the girls basketball team four years ago and he's good at it. His daughter Kailynn plays for him. The Drillers have won three conference titles and a pair of sectional championships, lost in the state semifinals last season and captured more than 80 percent of their games.
He tries to foster a close-knit group and present himself as a father figure for all of the girls involved. He's used 12 players in an aggressive and up-tempo style of play, which is somewhat reminiscent of how he used to get up and down the football field for the Huskies in 1994-97.
Back then, Shehee was a rushing terror, piling up 212 yards against Washington State, 196 against Stanford, 193 against Michigan State in the Aloha Bowl, 171 against both Notre Dame in his first college start and BYU, and 169 against Oregon State, and 2,381 yards for his UW career.
So why not coach football instead of girls basketball?
"Obviously, everyone thought I was going to coach football, wanted me to coach football, so I did it the first couple of years of my teaching career," Shehee said. "It just wasn't me at the time. I wasn't ready for it, I wasn't ready for the time commitment. It came back around a few years ago and I said I want to coach, but I want to coach basketball."
Shehee was a talented enough high school basketball player at Bakersfield's Foothills High that he received scholarship offers from Division II schools, among them Cal State-Bakersfield. The game now runs in the family.
His 11-year-old son, Rashaan Jr., might be the most talented basketball player among the Shehees. For his age group, the little point guard has been ranked as the No. 2 player on the West Coast and No. 17 nationally.
"He's way more athletic than I was at that age," the elder Shehee said. "He's pretty far advanced."
Shehee, who played in the NFL for the Kansas City Chiefs and in the XFL for the Los Angeles Express, had no trouble walking away as a football player and becoming a family man. It wasn't fun anymore.
He's comfortable mulling his accomplishments now, whereas before Shehee wouldn't go there. He already had a coach's mentality way before his time.
"Now that I'm old, I can look back and look at some of the games I had and smile," he said, "as I go through some of these things with my son."
Rashaan Shehee talks with Husky Maven/Sports Illustrated later in the week about his college and pro experiences, and more.
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