Jamal Roberts became a household name in May 2025 for winning season 23 of “American Idol,” but in his hometown of Meridian, Mississippi, he’s still known as Coach Jamal.
After “American Idol,” the dad of three had to leave his post as a beloved gym teacher at Crestwood Elementary due to his jam-packed schedule of appearances and concerts. However, before going on tour with R&B greats Brandy and Monica in October, Roberts has made time to coach a summer basketball team of 17 elementary school kids.
The team didn’t win the state championship as they had the summer before, but Roberts sweetly decided to reward them anyway for their hard work and great attitudes. On September 11, he posted videos of himself pulling up to the school with a trunk full of new Nike basketball shoes for his team and an important lesson to share with them.
Jamal Roberts Says He Wanted Kids to Know a ‘Losing Season’ is Still Worth Celebrating
Roberts has been riding high since his “American Idol” win, but he also knows how it feels to lose after doing your very best — including in 2021, when he placed third on the BET show “Sunday’s Best.”
“‘Sunday Best’ has prepared me because it gave me thick skin,” Roberts told WTOK in March, before his big win. “It broke my heart a little bit, you know?… Because I was expecting to be great, to do something great, and then I was told that I’m not.”
But he singer didn’t want the boys who played on his team this summer to walk away from their season feeling as deflated as he did after “Sunday Best,” especially after fighting so hard out on the court. Roberts went on Facebook Live as he drove to the school on September 11, and posed the question to his viewers, “How do you handle a loss?”
“Even though losses are technically lessons,” Roberts continued, “how do you cope with it? How do you help somebody else cope with it? How do you handle a loss in public? We all like to win, everybody likes to win in life, no matter what it is.”
“These kids, they fought so hard last night, I couldn’t say nothing,” Roberts said. “I didn’t give (any critiques) because I honestly thought they fought their hardest. And even though they didn’t come up with a win in the end, those boys can play some basketball. I wouldn’t trade ’em for nothing!”
Roberts continued, “So, what I was thinking about all that, taking losses, ’cause I remember losing in life … I know it didn’t feel good, and we’ve all got feelings. So the question to myself was, ‘Can you be rewarded during a losing season?”
“I feel like, if you applied yourself, and you did the best you could do, then you can be rewarded,” Roberts said, adding, “I hate to see my kids sad (or) down. They’re kids, of course, they’re going to have to learn how to deal with their feelings on their own.”
Boys Screamed & Girls Beamed as Jamal Roberts Surprised Them With Shoes
Roberts went on Facebook Live on September 11 as he walked through the school, saying hi to many of his old colleagues, before gathering the boys on his team out near his SUV.
“I wanted to tell y’all you played a good game, everybody that I put in. It’s okay, it’s okay. Everybody played a good game. I know I told y’all that if y’all won, I was gonna buy you all some shoes. But I didn’t know y’all was gonna play like that. So I still kept my end of the bargain.”
With that, he remotely opened the trunk of his vehicle and the boys started screaming, running to the SUV with excitement as they saw what was inside: a box with Air Jordan 4’s for each one of them, already purchased in their sizes. The sneakers typically retail for $160 in kid sizes.
Posting a photo of all the boys holding their Nike boxes, Roberts wrote, “A question was asked, can you be rewarded in a losing season, and the answer is yes … Good game, Crestwood; we’ll get them next year. You played a great game, and if I had to choose another team, it would be you. Until after the tour, Coach Roberts signing off.”
Roberts, who has three young daughters, revealed on September 12, also provided new shoes to the girls’ basketball team, posting a photo of them beaming with their own boxes of Nikes.
He captioned the post, “I could never forget about my girls 🥰 They a lil sassy so I made them wait a day 🤣 #girldad”
Fans swooned over Roberts’ generosity in the comments of his posts, with one writing, “What a blessing you are to them ❤️ 💖”
Another commented, “Y’all made the right person famous. Well done America! ❤️”
Roberts will be on the road from October through mid-December on Brandy and Monica’s “The Boys is Mine” U.S. tour.
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