Assistant men’s basketball coach Mark Slessinger completed his best recruiting job Saturday evening when he exchanged wedding vows with the former Toni Purvis.
He’s a native Hoosier, growing up in Bloomington, Indiana, where his mom was an usher at Indiana basketball games, working the area immediately behind the bench where Bob Knight prowled for so long.
A Slessinger family friend at the wedding told a story about Coach Knight that sounded like something Mike McConathy would do. The man and his son got front-row seats for an early season Hoosiers home game, but got lost in Assembly Hall and wound up in a tunnel – the same tunnel the team used to access the floor from the locker room. The team was warming up, but there in the tunnel was Coach Knight, who quickly walked up, pleasantly asked if he could help, and actually walked the duo to their seats!
The new Mrs. Slessinger, BTW, is a North Carolina native. So if there’s a Hoosiers – Tar Heels hoops matchup, it could briefly stress family ties.
Toni’s father was a paratrooper who was stationed at Fort Polk in the mid-1970s.
The ceremonies were slated to be held outdoors, in the beautiful back yard of the Prudhomme-Roquier House on Jefferson Street, but a thunderstorm about an hour before the wedding moved things inside.
It also set up a funny moment. With the wedding party standing at the fireplace in the small living room, guests were watching from the wings, literally. Those who weren’t seated in the room were lined up on the staircase, or looking through windows from the porch (as I was) or looking in from the doorway to the anteroom off the living room (where coach McCoanthy was standing).
So Greg Burke, Chris Maggio, David Stamey, Andy Perot and I shared the perfect angle to see the funniest moment of the evening.
The groom was standing with his back to us, so that we could see the left side of his face as he looked forward. He was standing at an angle, with the bride and her attendants facing us. He was also facing coach Mike.
That set up McConathy, who waited until a few minutes into the ceremonies before catching Sless’s eye, and making the timeout signal, then using the 30-second timeout signal to bring a chuckle to the groom and those of us on the porch.
Our friend “Coach Black” was the official greeter for the ceremonies, decked out in a classy looking tuxedo. Also in attendance – new McNeese head coach and longtime NSU assistant Dave Simmons and his wife, Denise, who ruled the dance floor.
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