University of Southern Mississippi Athletics
Four Favre Memories: Joye Lee-McNelis
8/4/2016 12:00:00 AM | Football
HATTIESBURG, Miss. -- The Southern Miss athletics department will interview Golden Eagle family members about their favorite memories of Brett Favre as No. 4 enters the Pro Football Hall of Fame on Saturday. Joye Lee-McNelis, the head women's basketball coach, has known Favre the longest out of any of the prior featured guests.
Lee-McNelis knows Favre well. It goes beyond their tight-knit Hancock County background, and even includes the few weeks in 2004 where Brett and his wife, Deanna, housed her upon getting the head Southern Miss job. While Joye had seven years on Brett, it hardly mattered on their North Central High School campus that included the first through 12th grades.
"You knew everybody at the school," Lee-McNelis said. "Brett's dad, Big Irv, was the football coach and his mom taught special ed. Brett would hang out in the gym when he was young, probably middle school, and that little red-headed fellow would run around taking the ball when you're trying to shoot it. Just a jokester even from a young age."
The two friends ultimately moved on to their Southern Miss Hall of Fame careers on the hardwood and gridiron, and Lee-McNelis returned to Hattiesburg in 1986 as an assistant women's basketball coach. The next year, Favre arrived as a 17-year-old freshman.
"My two roommates were two of my cousins who were also his age," Lee-McNelis said. "I did his laundry on Fridays when the football team went out of town. He was just a regular person and he still is. Brett and mine's high school jerseys were retired in 1993, and we were excited he was going to make it. I presented him with a laundry bill."
Favre eventually earned three consecutive MVP honors from 1995-97 and led the Packers to a 35-21 Super Bowl XXXI win over New England.
"When we were inducted into the Southern Miss Hall of Fame together [1997] and he was with the Packers, I took a roll of ad machine tape and said, 'this is for laundry services, and I know you can pay for them!'"
Favre and Lee-McNelis's friendship has remained as smooth as their bike rides through Hattiesburg, even when Favre warns her of what could happen on such adventures.
"A few weeks ago, he was on me about not having my helmet on," Lee-McNelis said. "I told him I didn't go fast enough to need one. He said 'I know, you're a Hancock County girl your head is as hard as a lighter knot, and you don't think you're going to get hit. That was my wife until she got in a wreck and got a concussion.'"
Hancock County also dedicated a day to the pair, and Lee-McNelis said she was "honored" to share three stages with Favre, a man whose persona evokes the most admiration from the people around him.
"The coolest thing about Brett is that he never forgot where he came from," Lee-McNelis said. "The people that were around him and still treat him like he was before he became famous, he holds true and close to them. People don't just like him because he's in the Hall of Fame; it's because he's Brett Favre."
The ceremony for Favre's induction will be televised live on ESPN at 6 p.m. CT Saturday from Canton, Ohio.
