— Not often does a coach get one, let alone two players the caliber of Stephen Jackson and Kendrick Perkins. So Andre Boutte will be the first to tell you how fortunate he's been.

    “To be successful you have to be blessed and you have to have good players, '' said Boutte, who won Texas state championships first at Lincoln High in Port Arthur with Jackson in 1996, then at Clifton J. Ozen High in Beaumont with Perkins five years later.  “I was blessed to have that and it's something you don't realize until you sit back later.

    “I'm here in Austin at the state tournament and can vividly remember those guys playing here and how great the feeling was with them.''

    Boutte recalls first seeing an 11-year-old Jackson, who shot the ball with both hands, but had learned to put the ball on the floor by the time he arrived at Lincoln.  “He had a real good grasp of the game at an early age,'' said Boutte, now athletic director in Port Arthur.

    “Stephen really didn't have a position. He'd play inside. He'd play outside. One of his best attributes was his ability to pass the ball.  He's always had a great basketball IQ.''

    With Jackson leading the way, Lincoln got to the state semifinals in 1995, then won it all the following season, before Jackson left Texas to finish his schooling at famed Oak Hill Academy in Virginia.

    Jackson went from there to play in Venezuela and the CBA, before reaching the NBA in 2001. In the interim, Boutte had moved on to Ozen, where he inherited a talented but raw big man who would guide him to three straight 4A state title games, including a 36-0 championship season in 2001.

    “Kendrick was not as far developed as Stephen when he came to high school,'' recalled Boutte, whose club dropped the 2002 title game to Chris Bosh's 40-0 Lincoln (Dallas) powerhouse. “You knew he'd have size, but didn't know how big he'd be.

    “We decided to teach him an aspect of the game no one else does; to have him concentrate on his defense. Kendrick was brought along in the mold of the old-school post man. He's probably one of the few guys in the NBA who has a hook shot.

    “He had a good work ethic.  There were a lot of things we were able to learn by Stephen being ahead of Kendrick. With Stephen having already taken the bumps,  that ensured Kendrick's road was a lot smoother.''

    Today, both of Boutte's prodigies are doing their old coach proud, yet never forgetting their roots.  “We both had the same coach in high school,  Andre Boutte, who was a great teacher,'' noted Jackson.  “I've been blessed to have a lot of great coaches: Rick Carlisle, Larry Brown, Gregg Popovic and  Don Nelson.

    “Every coach I've played for has enhanced my career, so I pay homage to all of them.''

    Perkins feels the same.  Now should Jackson's Bobcats and Perkins' Celtics meet in the NBA playoffs, their old coach has figured out what could otherwise be a sticky situation. “I'll have to root for whoever gets me the best seats,''  Andre laughed.

    For Andre Boutte, it doesn't get any better than this.

    Jon Marks covers the NBA for the Philadelphia Sports Examiner