Fifteen years and a thousand miles stand between Deon Thomas and his all-too-brief memories of basketball stardom. Or at least, the memories based in America, which are all from college. Thomas' professional basketball success took place across the Atlantic. One of the greatest players to ever wear the orange jersey of the Illinois Fighting Illini, a recently retired Thomas today enjoys relative anonymity at his home in Pembroke Pines. While coaching the J.V. team at the University School on For
Deon Thomas was a Chicago hoops legend. He would become one of the University of Illinois' all-time basketball greats. And for the last decade-plus, he was a globe-trotting, championship-winning professional basketball star. Now he's a JV coach in the Broward 'burbs.Specifically, Thomas is the absurdly overqualified coach of the junior varsity team at the University School on the far west side of Fort Lauderdale. And that's not even the ironic part. It's that Thomas would coach, period, consider
C. StilesThomas, pictured with his two daughters and their friends from their Pembrokes Pines neighborhoodDeon Thomas, the former University of Illinois basketball star who had retired in South Florida and who started a new career coaching junior varsity at The University School in Fort Lauderdale, just landed his first collegiate coaching job. Thomas is the new head basketball coach and athletic director of Lewis & Clark Community College in Alton, Ill.With his fiery on-court demeanor and h
Deon ThomasWe reported a few weeks ago that Deon Thomas, the University of Illinois basketball program's all-time leading scorer who settled briefly in Pembroke Pines, was taking a job as the coach of a community college near St. Louis. And now Thomas tells Juice that he's taking some of the region's prep basketball talent with him: Brison Smith and Rico Pierre-Villus, both stars on the Santaluces High School Chiefs team in Lantana.Thomas dropped us an email on his way out of town, describing th
Flickr: Nick Carlson​Back in May, Juice did a two-part series on Deon Thomas, the former high school phenom and University of Illinois star who after a lengthy career playing pro ball had retired to Pembroke Pines where he had been coaching a junior varsity team and running clinics on the weekend. (part 1 here; part 2 here)Thomas told me he was itching to get back on the hardwood -- this time as a coach. A career choice that seemed ironic considering how he'd been burned by people in that prof
Flickr: pnther60Former Dolphin and Chicago Bear Marty Booker postponed his Pines retirement to play for the Falcons.​What is it about Pembroke Pines that makes retired athletes flock there? We've told you about Kenny Anderson, the former New Jersey Nets star who recently invited a slew of his illegitimate children to the city, as well as Deon Thomas, the University of Illinois great who became a star in European basketball and retired to Pembroke Pines before taking a job to coach a community
