BOSTON — A 32-year-old man identified by police as the victim of a fatal shooting was an assistant basketball coach at the University of Massachusetts-Boston campus who once played at the University of Michigan.
Boston police say Kendric Price was shot several times early Saturday morning in the city's Dorchester neighborhood and pronounced dead at the scene. He is Boston's eighth homicide victim in 2019.
"It's very heartbreaking to think about Kendric being not with us," said Carol Price, the victim's mother.
"Kendric didn't deserve that. That wasn't...that's not how he should have been leaving here."
Boston Police found Price's bullet-riddled body at 12 Greenwood Street in Dorchester, right up the street from where his mother lives.
It's an address Kendrick would go to from time to time, Carol Price says. And that's where she went looking for him after a phone call early Saturday morning.
"I went up there and they wouldn't let me get close, but I described him" Carol Price said. "I wanted to see if he was in there because somebody told me he may have been there.
"Then the detective came out and told me what he was wearing, and I knew it was him."
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Some 30 hours later, Carol Price is holding it together with the help of family, friends and memories of Kendric's smile.
"He was just a humble giant that wanted to help and love everybody," his mother said.
Records show Price, a forward, was a member of the University of Michigan basketball team for two seasons between 2005 and 2007. Kendric's proudest accomplishment was getting his college degree in just three years, his mother says.
The Boston native had also been a prep school standout at Buckingham Brown & Nichols and Melrose High School.
Word spread quickly and those who knew the victim came out to the scene.
"He probably just came here to have some drinks and to hang out and was at the wrong place and at the wrong time," said Ashlee Martin, a cousin of the victim.
"He was a very positive person, so this was very shocking to the family."
Price was an assistant basketball coach at UMass Boston, but one of his final projects came with the boy's varsity basketball team at the Edward Brooke High School in Mattapan.
The team didn't have a winning season this year, but in Kendric Price, the athletic director says they had a coach committed to building a winning program.
With two wins and ten losses, the Edward Brooke High team has a long way to go. But his mom says Kendric was all about seeing it done – even when others might think it couldn't get off the ground.
"Everybody thought he was just a dreamer. But Kendric was a visionary," Carol Price said.
"He wanted to change the world. And, you know, he tried."
UMass Boston released a statement saying, "Kendric was a great young coach who worked with our men’s basketball program. We are all saddened by the tragic news of his passing. Our thoughts and prayers are with Kendric’s family."
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Neighbors near Greenwood Street say that they don't feel unsafe in this part of Dorchester.
"I feel the people here are very, very nice and they help one another," said Pat Williams of Dorchester.
"I'm just hoping that this murder doesn’t really affect anything, that people don't panic and say, 'this is a bad neighborhood, I'm going to move out.'"
No arrests have been made and police are still searching for suspects.
Anyone with information regarding this incident is asked to contact Boston Police at 617-343-4470.