Great interview with Asheville’s Rashad McCants on the Raleigh News & Observer’s basketball blog called ACC Now. I briefly interviewed McCants during his stop at Bele Chere a couple of months ago, and he was his usual stand-offish self, an attitude that I think he takes as a defensive measure with most any reporter. But in this interview, Rashad says more than I’ve ever heard him say on a range of UNC Tar Heel basketball topics:
Q: Do you feel like you’ve been embraced by Carolina fans? Do you want to be embraced more?
A: I think the Carolina fans are amazing. Even going back, I just get teary thinking about the times I had at Carolina. I feel like, personally, there aren’t a lot of other college basketball players that embraced the fans like I did. I took control over the fact that fans can give you more juice than anything. My interactions with the fans, even today, keep me motivated to just keep playing.
Q: How is your relationship with your 2005 teammates now?
A: Probably the only one of those guys that I’m only close to now is Marvin [Williams]. We keep in touch throughout the year … when I was in Minnesota, I was the farthest away out of those guys – Marvin was in Atlanta, Raymond [Felton] and Sean [May] were in Charlotte. They were a little closer [to Chapel Hill] … I’m in the Midwest, and it was a lot harder for me to come back, and do things I wanted to do to stay in contact with these guys. … I talk to Raymond every now and again when I’m in Charlotte, or talk to Sean every now and again when I’m in Chapel Hill, but the only real one I keep in touch with is Marvin.
Q: What does it mean to you that Makhtar Ndiaye, Shammond Williams and several other former UNC players reached out to you over alumni weekend?
A: It means that they actually care about my progression as a player and a person, and that they feel that I’ve been wrongly treated. And to hear that from another perspective is amazing; it’s amazing to feel appreciated, that guys [four] years later are saying, ‘Man, you’re so good – how are you not on a team right now? It’s unfair to you, it’s unfair to us as fans of yours to not see you playing right now.’ So that alone, to me, is just breathtaking?
Q: What are your feelings today about Roy Williams?
A: Roy Williams, to me, is a person who really helped me change [my] perception when he got there; he gave me a fresh start. He actually gave me a lot of confidence my sophomore year; I averaged 20 ppg that season. … Coach just told me to be aggressive, and he had confidence in my ability to take over games, and to help my teammates. He put my scoring ability out as a strength, and a powerful strength, for me. I’ll always honor Coach Williams for that, and the fact that he told me to my face, ‘I’m here this year, and we’re going to make the tournament. We’re probably not going to go all the way, but next year, we’re going to win it all.’ And that’s what we did.