Speaker 1: Hey, welcome to the All Ball Podcast. I'm your boy,
Speaker 1: Doug Gotlie Man Man Man, are you gonna love this?
Speaker 1: The all of this? Uh, Matt Mooney is, uh, we're
Speaker 1: always seen in basketball, said a kid, right. He's a
Speaker 1: kid from about forty five minutes outside of Chicago, Wakonda.
Speaker 1: I swear to God, that's what's called different spelling what
Speaker 1: Conda Chicago and I went to Notre Rain Prep and
Speaker 1: his journey to the NBA to the Cleveland Cavaliers is
Speaker 1: nothing shorter. For Markable, I want you to think about
Speaker 1: this for a second. He had one scholarship offer out
Speaker 1: of high school that was to go to the Air
Speaker 1: Force Academy. But he didn't get to go to Air
Speaker 1: Force right away to go to their prep school, which
Speaker 1: is on the campus in Colorado Springs. I don't want
Speaker 1: to give away what happened, but crazy story what happened.
Speaker 1: Then he he go was prepped for a year, plays
Speaker 1: there for a year, and then decides I want to
Speaker 1: leave Air Force. He goes to the University of South
Speaker 1: Dakota place for Craig Smith, who's now the head coach
Speaker 1: at Utah State. Goes to South Dakota, sits out for
Speaker 1: a year, then tears it up for two years, and
Speaker 1: then he transfers again. Was close to going to Craighton,
Speaker 1: decided to go to Texas Tech. And at Texas Tech
Speaker 1: he had a dream season. They go to a national
Speaker 1: championship game. They were tied with the ball out of
Speaker 1: bounces underneath their own basket with a couple of seconds remaining,
Speaker 1: and obviously they lost in overtime to Virginia. Then he
Speaker 1: goes to the Hawks summer. I'll let him tell the story. Nonetheless,
Speaker 1: it's a story of perseverance, of hard work, work ethic,
Speaker 1: and self belief. Um, there's also a personal side to
Speaker 1: it with his father. You're gonna love this, pot Um.
Speaker 1: A couple of quick thoughts basketball wise, Obviously, college basketball
Speaker 1: starting to come together. And it's interesting that we're talking
Speaker 1: to Matt Money, who ended one of Glenzaga's dream seasons
Speaker 1: that the preseason number one. I mean, think about this.
Speaker 1: It's been twenty years now of Golenzaga dominance in college askedball,
Speaker 1: but only recently they have they made deep runs or
Speaker 1: deeper runs in the n s A Tournament final four,
Speaker 1: the national Championship game a couple of years ago, which
Speaker 1: they end up losing by one possession. So now like
Speaker 1: Gonzaga has a legit shot to win it, to win
Speaker 1: the whole thing, and that would be the last thing
Speaker 1: to accotomplish the dominate the conference, dominator, conference tournament, set
Speaker 1: one and done of the NBA. They're now a preseason
Speaker 1: number one team in the country. They've been to a
Speaker 1: Final four, been new national championship game. The only thing
Speaker 1: left is to actually win that last game on Monday Night.
Speaker 1: We'll see this year if they can do it. We'll
Speaker 1: talk more about the teams. Baylor also right there as
Speaker 1: a almost like a cod number one. Fascinating what Scott
Speaker 1: Drew has been able to do. If you remember he
Speaker 1: took over Dave Bliss was caught an audio tape putting
Speaker 1: the blame on one of his players who was shot
Speaker 1: dead by one of his other players. I mean, they
Speaker 1: had recruited guys off campus, no scholarships this first year
Speaker 1: to building Baylor into being an Elite eight team, several
Speaker 1: times over losing the Duke a couple of questionable calls.
Speaker 1: Could this be the year that Scott Drew lives the
Speaker 1: impossible dream, gets to Final four or maybe wins the
Speaker 1: national championship at Baylor's. That's kind of what's in front
Speaker 1: of us with college basketball. The rest is a little
Speaker 1: bit messy, right. We think we're a couple of weeks
Speaker 1: away from college basketball starting, but the COVID numbers continue
Speaker 1: to rise, the restrictions get a little bit tighter, and
Speaker 1: we still don't have true clarity on how many of
Speaker 1: these events will absolutely positively go off. There's gonna be
Speaker 1: a season. What it looks like, I can't honestly tell you.
Speaker 1: But the other part that's interesting is here we are
Speaker 1: a week away from the NBA Draft, and how many
Speaker 1: of these guys can you recall at the top of
Speaker 1: your head. Now, many of you know that covering college
Speaker 1: basketball a huge proponent of sport, but of the value
Speaker 1: of the promotion of the sport. Now, I think, how
Speaker 1: many these guys can you actually name? Because you didn't
Speaker 1: see Anthony Elberts playing the n c term probably win't
Speaker 1: of anyway, but you didn't see you name the player,
Speaker 1: and you didn't uh the a choral kid from Auburn
Speaker 1: will be a top seven pick. Didn't see him play,
Speaker 1: not because of anything he did, but because of COVID.
Speaker 1: It shows the value of the n c A Tournament,
Speaker 1: So we'll get to some of that with Matt Mooney.
Speaker 1: Last thing, boy, the NBA is in a pickle. They're
Speaker 1: gonna start before Christmas, play those Christmas games. And that's
Speaker 1: great for the Golden State Warriors, who also get a
Speaker 1: little bit of tax relief with some of the CBA
Speaker 1: rules that have been up put down. But what do
Speaker 1: you do with Lebron James and what do you do
Speaker 1: with the heat those teams that just got done playing
Speaker 1: and now have such a limited offseason. My guess is
Speaker 1: the Lebrons of the world will suddenly take a lot
Speaker 1: more breaks, not just in December, in January, in the
Speaker 1: February and slow rollout how much they played this NBA season.
Speaker 1: All right, let's get to our discussion with that money.
Speaker 1: All right, let's welcome in. He's uh Matt, Matt Mooney
Speaker 1: joins us. I want to get to your life and
Speaker 1: and and everything. But it's fascinating like this, just like
Speaker 1: this is what I really want, like basketball, and I
Speaker 1: think you're starting to you probably already know this and
Speaker 1: you're starting to figure it out. There's so much connectivity
Speaker 1: right Like it's it's interesting. My guaranty is the player
Speaker 1: development coach. That was his term. His name is right there. Yeah. Okay,
Speaker 1: so my garitty grew up in Orange County. When he
Speaker 1: was just a little twarp, he was probably six seventh grade.
Speaker 1: My dad used to have um a basketball academy workout
Speaker 1: Sundays at Woodbridge High School in Irvine, California, and there
Speaker 1: used to be this little kid and the dad was like,
Speaker 1: this guy is gonna be a player. He wants to
Speaker 1: be the next Gottlieb Mike Gary war forty four. Because
Speaker 1: I was this guy and now he's he's your developmental
Speaker 1: coach and he played at USC stud player good Year.
Speaker 1: He's great. Isn't that funny that? Yeah, that's a no.
Speaker 1: It is a small world. I heard that he was
Speaker 1: out training Mike Brown's son, and then when Mike Brown
Speaker 1: got the job here, he brought him on just because
Speaker 1: you know, he uh he liked what he was doing.
Speaker 1: But he's really good at what he does. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: it's it's really amazing. Um, Okay, where in Chicago did
Speaker 1: you go up? So? I grew up in Wakonda. It's
Speaker 1: uh forty five minutes northwest. What kinda man forever? Yeah,
Speaker 1: now that's the joke people mate different spelling. Okay, So
Speaker 1: it's it's forty five minutes from Chicago, which which direction northwest? Okay,
Speaker 1: so that's like so that's not like glenn Brook North
Speaker 1: and all that. That's past that, right past that. Have
Speaker 1: you been out that way? Yeah? Yeah, I mean I
Speaker 1: was born in Milwaukee, I spent I have friends a
Speaker 1: lot of friends from from that part of around there
Speaker 1: in Chicago. Whatever. Done some work there as well at
Speaker 1: times is awesome, I mean. Okay, so your first memory
Speaker 1: of basketball is where? What do you like? First memory?
Speaker 1: What kind of park district? Uh? Just playing? Like I
Speaker 1: think I was probably in kindergarten, first grade. My dad
Speaker 1: was coaching. I know your dad was coaching, Uh you
Speaker 1: growing up. I've listened to your stuff. My brother listens
Speaker 1: to a lot of your stuff actually, Um, but my
Speaker 1: dad was coaching kind of park district, you know, playing
Speaker 1: on those eight foot goals and uh, you know, everybody
Speaker 1: just runs to the ball type of thing and every
Speaker 1: time you get it, you shoot it. That's probably what
Speaker 1: I first memory. Okay. So then as you as you
Speaker 1: grew up, were you only a ball guy? Did you
Speaker 1: play baseball, football? Other sports? No? I played other sports,
Speaker 1: but I loved basketball. Um and I was small. I
Speaker 1: was real small, so like football. I love football. I
Speaker 1: liked football, but I was like I was too skinny.
Speaker 1: Uh So in baseball, I was pretty good at baseball.
Speaker 1: I like soccer too, But around fifth grade I gave
Speaker 1: everything up. I played football eighth grade, but fifth grade
Speaker 1: I gave everything up because you know, baseball in the
Speaker 1: summer conflicts with you, and uh I gave it up,
Speaker 1: you know. And my dad was always trying to think, like,
Speaker 1: all right, what's the best way we can get him
Speaker 1: a scholarship, So he was trying to keep me in
Speaker 1: baseball or other sports because he didn't know, you know.
Speaker 1: So basketball ended up working out, but I I just
Speaker 1: loved it. I I understand. So Okay, so you're like
Speaker 1: fifth grade, sixth grade, You're you're little, and you're like, dad,
Speaker 1: this is what I want to do. He wants to
Speaker 1: like this is by the way, it's like a snapshot
Speaker 1: of my life. My son's left hand. And I'm like, bro,
Speaker 1: you ain't given up baseball. But he loves he loves
Speaker 1: huh yeah, he loves he loves Hooper. But I don't know,
Speaker 1: like I'm I'm smaller than you, and I don't know
Speaker 1: if he's gonna beat my size. Um, so, uh were you?
Speaker 1: Were you really good? Did you blossom? Like? Okay, middle
Speaker 1: school type type age? Were you? How good were you?
Speaker 1: I was good? Um, I was good in middle school
Speaker 1: and high school was where you know, I just didn't hit.
Speaker 1: I didn't hit my gross furred and you know I
Speaker 1: was I was still good, but I wasn't You remember
Speaker 1: how big you were when you entered high school? Yeah?
Speaker 1: It was five five five five or five six. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so here's so here's my So I was five ft
Speaker 1: tall at the end of eighth grade, five ft a
Speaker 1: hundred five pounds. And my dad the whole year was like,
Speaker 1: he's staying back because I grew late. He's gonna be late.
Speaker 1: So I stayed back and end up I stayed in
Speaker 1: the same school district with different school and then I
Speaker 1: switched school district, school to high school. And I entered
Speaker 1: high school at like five so fifteen months, I grew
Speaker 1: nine inches and I was like and I was during
Speaker 1: the year. I grew so much. I was terrible when
Speaker 1: I was okay as as a freshman. So, uh, you're
Speaker 1: a freshman. You played JV freshman team, like what will
Speaker 1: we use a freshman? Well, so I ended up going
Speaker 1: to high school like right on the north side of Chicago.
Speaker 1: I went kind of far away because my dad was,
Speaker 1: you know, trying to figure out where to where to
Speaker 1: send me because we're trying to get a scholarship, right. Um,
Speaker 1: So I went to play for tom Less Notre Dame
Speaker 1: High School there on the north side, and I was
Speaker 1: a basketball school. So it was just you know, I
Speaker 1: was gonna be Uh that was the focus. And you know,
Speaker 1: we we were going to play against kids in the
Speaker 1: city better company Titian. So he sent me there, and uh,
Speaker 1: I mean we were good. So I played sophomore as
Speaker 1: a freshman, and then I played sophomore as a sophomore,
Speaker 1: and I played varsity as a junior. I didn't really
Speaker 1: even start my junior year until like halfway through. So, okay,
Speaker 1: so in your senior year, how good were you? My
Speaker 1: senior year? I was good. I mean we were we
Speaker 1: were like top five, top ten in the state in Chicago.
Speaker 1: You know, it's pretty good. And you know I was
Speaker 1: our best player. Um. We didn't have any other Division
Speaker 1: one guys. We had some talented guys. Uh, we had
Speaker 1: some good players, some other college players. We had really
Speaker 1: good like high school players. But my senior year, I
Speaker 1: think my my senior I average almost twenty a game,
Speaker 1: you know, and five something something along those lines. But
Speaker 1: I wasn't All state or anything. What are you program?
Speaker 1: Shot down? Diablos? Who's on the team? Um? You know
Speaker 1: nobody that you would know, you know, Chris A Breath.
Speaker 1: He ended up going Juco and then went to Sam
Speaker 1: Houston State. Uh, Josh daus when of my team end
Speaker 1: up playing at with me at the University of South Dakota.
Speaker 1: We had a little point guard who played Division two ari.
Speaker 1: We were you know. We we had a dude, Gavin Shilling,
Speaker 1: who left our team end up playing at Michigan State,
Speaker 1: but he went to Mcurvan Fire. My coach, Chuck Demons,
Speaker 1: he just put together some guys in the city and
Speaker 1: made a team and we weren't sponsored or anything like that.
Speaker 1: So then, um, how did so then from there you
Speaker 1: went to did you got the Air Force? Prep? Would
Speaker 1: you got the Air Force? Right away? I went to
Speaker 1: Prep because I broke my ankle out of high school.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I was around for a little while in
Speaker 1: college out of high school, right before I was gonna
Speaker 1: go to the uh to the academy. I was supposed
Speaker 1: to just go to the academy. And I was being stupid.
Speaker 1: I mean, I wasn't being stupid, but I was, what
Speaker 1: were you doing? I was being stupid. I was I
Speaker 1: was right the bike. You know, I was trying to
Speaker 1: get ready for basic training and I had like a
Speaker 1: something wrong with my foot. So the doctor told me
Speaker 1: just just ride a bike to stay in shape. So
Speaker 1: it's raining outside and me and my brother we we
Speaker 1: grab our we grab our bikes, and we're going for
Speaker 1: a bike ride. And we get to this, uh, this trail.
Speaker 1: It's like a one mile loop, and you know, I'm
Speaker 1: pretty competitive, and I'm like, all right, Joe, you go,
Speaker 1: you go left, I'm gonna go right. We're gonna race.
Speaker 1: The first one to get back here wins. So I
Speaker 1: start going I'm going way too fast. We got these
Speaker 1: really old bikes that you know, they're not very good.
Speaker 1: We we don't bike ever, and uh, I start going
Speaker 1: down this hill and you know, I get to the
Speaker 1: bottom of the hill, my back tires slips out. I
Speaker 1: smashed my foot in the ground, break my ankle. So
Speaker 1: then air Force was like all right, you can't do
Speaker 1: basic training with the busted ankle. So they sent me
Speaker 1: to the press school, who recouged you to Air Force. Uh,
Speaker 1: Steve Snell and Dave Pulpovic coach PIO. So when they
Speaker 1: came to your house, was or any was there ever
Speaker 1: a point where like, I do not want to be
Speaker 1: in the Air Force. So I, I know, you want
Speaker 1: to play hoop and I've called games air Force, like
Speaker 1: I actually kind of dig the place. It's beautiful, and
Speaker 1: like you want to hoop. You want to hoop, but
Speaker 1: they're like, hey, by the way, afterwards, you're gonna have
Speaker 1: to be in the Air Force. Although air Force is
Speaker 1: kind of cool, the chance of maybe fly a plane.
Speaker 1: I don't know. No, I never wanted to be in
Speaker 1: the military. It wasn't like, uh you know, I didn't
Speaker 1: come from a military family. I didn't want to fly plane.
Speaker 1: But that was my only Division one offer, and you
Speaker 1: know my dream was always Division one. So I went
Speaker 1: on a visit. They never came to my house, but
Speaker 1: I went on the visit, and uh, you know, I
Speaker 1: like the facilities, I like the coaching staff, I like
Speaker 1: coach p So I just decided, you know, this is
Speaker 1: if this is what I gotta do to to fulfill
Speaker 1: my dream of Division one. Then I'm gonna do it.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go through the basic training and all the
Speaker 1: military and all that stuff. And uh so I took it.
Speaker 1: And plus they're in the Mountain West, which is a
Speaker 1: good league, and he's a good league. It was really
Speaker 1: a good league at the time. Yeah, not not as good,
Speaker 1: not as good when you left it was. And that's
Speaker 1: why I got bad. Was you left? Really that's that's
Speaker 1: that's good. Okay. So so you you can't do basic,
Speaker 1: you go and now all of a sudden, you're an
Speaker 1: Air Force prep now for people who don't know to
Speaker 1: prep school is literally on the same campus, right like
Speaker 1: where you guys have your own dorms or you're intermingled
Speaker 1: with with regular cardads. Like what's that existence? Like, no,
Speaker 1: I'm surprised you know that that much about it. It's uh,
Speaker 1: it's on the base and it's like three miles away
Speaker 1: from the academy. And then we're I mean we're in
Speaker 1: the military. We had to do basic training as well,
Speaker 1: but they allowed me to do it with the broken leg,
Speaker 1: and uh it was hardening. It was hard, well, hardest
Speaker 1: things hardest to do, hardest thing I had to do.
Speaker 1: Yeah there, Yeah, well, so I went through three weeks
Speaker 1: of basic training at the prep to go through that
Speaker 1: school year and then yeah, that year was tough, but
Speaker 1: and I only played about half the season because I
Speaker 1: was still getting healthy. And then the next year I
Speaker 1: went through basic training again for six weeks. But the
Speaker 1: hardest thing you have to do is you just the thing.
Speaker 1: The thing about Air Force and like the military and
Speaker 1: basic training is like you're constantly doing things you don't
Speaker 1: want to do. When you don't want to do them,
Speaker 1: you know, you just have no say, you just got
Speaker 1: to do it. And you know you're up at four
Speaker 1: thirty in the morning and first thing you're doing, you know,
Speaker 1: sirens are going off, beating on the door, and you're
Speaker 1: just going for like a ten mile run and you're
Speaker 1: doing pushups, and you know, there was a time, there
Speaker 1: was a time we literally you're not gonna believe this,
Speaker 1: people probably are gonna believe this, but we did a
Speaker 1: hundred my squadron, we did a d twenty push ups
Speaker 1: in a row without stopping. Like the forum Pride wasn't great,
Speaker 1: but I never would have thought I could do that,
Speaker 1: and it's just like you push yourself past your your
Speaker 1: limits mentally you're you're a lot stronger than you realize.
Speaker 1: It's more it's one of those if you can do this,
Speaker 1: there's nothing you can't do. Right, It's doesn't I mean
Speaker 1: that's look in no way does it compared to what
Speaker 1: does it said? It's a pleave in the army? What
Speaker 1: does it call when you're a freshman at at a
Speaker 1: deer force? Well, I can't believe. I can't think of
Speaker 1: it right now. You can't remember. Oh man, it's gonna
Speaker 1: come to me during this conversation. You will, okay. So um,
Speaker 1: But like so when I went to Oklahoma State, we
Speaker 1: we decided with my first time running, I get there,
Speaker 1: it's like August and August in Oklahoma's hot at balls, right,
Speaker 1: So we're running and we had we had to run
Speaker 1: from the weight room to the track, which is like
Speaker 1: a half mile, like just a jog to warm up,
Speaker 1: and then we did our sprints and stuff on the
Speaker 1: track and then we run back, right remember, and we
Speaker 1: were running back, dudes, you're just thrown up. And I
Speaker 1: was like, and I told coach, I was like, hey man,
Speaker 1: it is not safe. Is a hundred degrees and you
Speaker 1: got some big dude. He's like, all right, were you
Speaker 1: running six? And the more ring We're like okay. So
Speaker 1: it kind of became our thing, and it's like, dude,
Speaker 1: And the worst part this is what I'm interested in, right,
Speaker 1: and I guess I don't know. They do the bugle whatever.
Speaker 1: The worst part is not getting up. It's the fear
Speaker 1: of not waking up, which wakes you up, like at
Speaker 1: three in the morning, at four in the morning, at
Speaker 1: four three in the morning, at five in the morning,
Speaker 1: and five through Oh ship, Now I gotta get up, right,
Speaker 1: So how do you how do you overcome that? The
Speaker 1: idea it's not the oversleeping, because everybody gets up and
Speaker 1: waits up, but it's the mindset of, oh God, I
Speaker 1: can't oversleep or then there's going to be hell to pay.
Speaker 1: How do you overcome it? When it where an air force? Yes, well,
Speaker 1: in basic training you have no choice like that. You
Speaker 1: don't have your phone, so they're banging and sirens are
Speaker 1: going off. But then in the school year, yeah, if
Speaker 1: you if you do not wake up, what they do
Speaker 1: is they just punish everybody else and they may keep
Speaker 1: staying there and watch so you feel terrible about it. Um.
Speaker 1: I I don't know if I ever missed it because
Speaker 1: I was so afraid of not waking up. I was
Speaker 1: already in trouble. You know. They didn't like me, you
Speaker 1: know from the jump there, so I knew, like I
Speaker 1: can't miss this. Um. And it's crazy like how our
Speaker 1: bodies work. We just kind of automatically wake up. But
Speaker 1: nowadays we got the cell phones and we can set
Speaker 1: the alarms. So I don't think I ever missed one.
Speaker 1: What what do you remember about playing there? Uh, Princeton offense. Heah,
Speaker 1: I don't like it. I didn't enjoy the Princeton Uh.
Speaker 1: And I like and I just you know, I've had
Speaker 1: David on the pod, like David gil okay and and
Speaker 1: and so. But and this goes back to I used
Speaker 1: to cover Air Force when because Delik was there and
Speaker 1: before him when uh, when Chris Mooney was the head
Speaker 1: coach there. I guess Mooney's my guy. He's been on
Speaker 1: the pod and he's a Princeton guy. And I just
Speaker 1: that's just not my jam. It's just it's it's it's
Speaker 1: so um like I've always I've always been I always
Speaker 1: think it's funny that guys that run Princeton like they
Speaker 1: can't even function in normal pickup basketball because they're so
Speaker 1: kind of programmed to elbow sin. You know, when you
Speaker 1: when you if you've been in a couple of years,
Speaker 1: you can play you can play basketball, but you struggle
Speaker 1: to play basketball sometimes. Yeah, And that's the hard thing
Speaker 1: with the Prince. And I agree with you. I don't
Speaker 1: want to bass the Princeton or Coach p. Know, Coach
Speaker 1: pe was a good coach and he had some success
Speaker 1: over there, um, but it takes away your instincts. Like basketball,
Speaker 1: the thing that I love about the game is the
Speaker 1: creativity that you can, you know, use your instincts and
Speaker 1: read and react to what the defense does. With the Princeton,
Speaker 1: it's just already kind of premeditated. And I didn't enjoy it, um,
Speaker 1: you know, and I think there's a way to run
Speaker 1: it with a little bit more Dully's that's what they
Speaker 1: call you a duelli right now now, it's not a dutey,
Speaker 1: that's what it says. Just uh is it a dutey Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: which means like servant. It's I need a text. One
Speaker 1: of my guys. I can't believe I can think about
Speaker 1: it's not a plea plea of his army telling you
Speaker 1: is a duey anyway, it's not huh, it's not. We
Speaker 1: were cadets, but they call us something else. How how
Speaker 1: did you play it? One or two years? One year?
Speaker 1: So you're there two years? Right, you're in the Springs
Speaker 1: for two years? What's the decision like to leave? Like
Speaker 1: to take me through? How was it hard? Did you
Speaker 1: go see coach p did you text him? Did you
Speaker 1: go sit down face to face? Like what what was
Speaker 1: taking me through the experience? Yeah? I don't know what
Speaker 1: I mean, it was it was a very tough decision. Um.
Speaker 1: You know, because here's here's the the thought process of
Speaker 1: people who get into the accoun at me because so
Speaker 1: many people try to get in. It's like it's your
Speaker 1: ticket if you graduate from there. You know, the saying
Speaker 1: is you work hard for four years, you have fun
Speaker 1: for forty And they say, you know, if you go
Speaker 1: to another school, you have fun for four years and
Speaker 1: you work hard for forty. That's kind of the mantra um.
Speaker 1: So like everybody there, it's like, okay, once you get
Speaker 1: in there, you might hate it there, but it's your
Speaker 1: ticket because if you graduate you know, you do your
Speaker 1: time in the Air Force, you're set for life. You're
Speaker 1: set great school, great reputation, you set get any job
Speaker 1: you want when you're done. And that's kind of it
Speaker 1: keeps a lot of guys there who don't want to
Speaker 1: be there. And I just kind of got that out
Speaker 1: of my head. It's like, I don't have to stay
Speaker 1: here to be successful no matter which way I go
Speaker 1: with hoops or whatever I do. And I didn't know
Speaker 1: like playing professionally was going to be You're an option
Speaker 1: at the time, but I knew I wanted to see
Speaker 1: how far I could go with the game of basketball,
Speaker 1: because that was the hard part there too, was uh
Speaker 1: you know, you had limited time to focus on hoops.
Speaker 1: Um it was military and school was was your priorities.
Speaker 1: But I had to sit down with coach Pete before
Speaker 1: spring break because we get a week off to go
Speaker 1: home for spring break. I had to sit down with
Speaker 1: him and just told them, you know, my frustrations this
Speaker 1: and dead and um you know, a long story short,
Speaker 1: I just wasn't happy there, and uh, you know, it
Speaker 1: was a tough year for me when when it came out,
Speaker 1: it came out that you had alleged that you were
Speaker 1: bullied there, right right, Yeah, yeah, that made things way
Speaker 1: worse because I talked about I talked to some guy
Speaker 1: and I just said, you know, bullying and stuff happens here, um,
Speaker 1: and it's just part of the system, you know, the upperclassmen,
Speaker 1: like you're an underclassman. It's like the in the military.
Speaker 1: You know, it's like you have to listen to somebody
Speaker 1: who ranks higher than you. So if they tell you
Speaker 1: to do anything, they want to do anything too. It's
Speaker 1: it's like, okay, like upper class would come in my room,
Speaker 1: They'll be like, right, you know, your room's dirty, and
Speaker 1: then they just throw my bed on the floor and
Speaker 1: throw some clothes out on the floor, and then I
Speaker 1: gotta clean it all up to like the proper standards
Speaker 1: and fold my clothes ten by ten. And it's like
Speaker 1: that stuff would happen, and it's just um, I mean,
Speaker 1: I guess it's part of it, but it's it would
Speaker 1: happen to me in my roommate more than I guess
Speaker 1: I guess. Here's the here's the question I've I kind
Speaker 1: of wonder the picture painting, which is you're a very
Speaker 1: religious guy. Religion is very important to you and air
Speaker 1: Force he's a place where it has always been. It's
Speaker 1: it's kind of come out that it's the very there's
Speaker 1: a lot of very very Christian beliefs, and there's a
Speaker 1: lot of people that are at least alleged to be
Speaker 1: very religious there. Doesn't that go counter to the idea
Speaker 1: of throwing somebody's stuff all out on the floor and
Speaker 1: treating them like dirt just because they're a freshmen. Well, first,
Speaker 1: a couple of things. One, you know, I don't want
Speaker 1: to talk bad about air Force is part of like
Speaker 1: you know, it's part of the process and training and
Speaker 1: getting making guys tougher mentally and physically. And I there
Speaker 1: are some people there who abuse their power, and that
Speaker 1: that happens in any line of work you're in. But
Speaker 1: also there's a lot of great people there. So like
Speaker 1: you're saying, it's Christian and good people and no matter
Speaker 1: what they believe, good people. Then the third thing I
Speaker 1: would just say, it's like I'm not a you know,
Speaker 1: it's hard to explain, but I wouldn't say I'm a
Speaker 1: religious person. I just I'm more of a relational you know,
Speaker 1: I I'm working on my relationship with God. You know,
Speaker 1: religion is following us out of rules and you know
Speaker 1: you got to do these things, uh checking off the
Speaker 1: boxes and that. But I'm more of a relational persona
Speaker 1: we look at it. Okay. So yeah you had it.
Speaker 1: You had a buddy at AU teammate at South Dakota,
Speaker 1: right you you're not you're going to transfer and he
Speaker 1: wasn't there yet. Huh, he was not there yet. He
Speaker 1: was you're but you're not, You're going to transfer. Okay,
Speaker 1: But it wasn't like you killed it an air force,
Speaker 1: no disrespect. Right, you play time, you shot well, you
Speaker 1: guys weren't good. Um, okay, know how did you get
Speaker 1: to How did you get to play at South Dakota. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they were like the first school to call me, I
Speaker 1: think them, and uh maybe I'm not sure. They were
Speaker 1: like one of the first schools to call me. And
Speaker 1: coach Hansen was the assistant there. It's my guy, and
Speaker 1: you know, coach Smith had just got there. You know,
Speaker 1: I was fortunate enough to play for like two of
Speaker 1: the best coaches in college basketball, Smith and Beard. But anyway,
Speaker 1: Smith was there and they were building brand new facilities there.
Speaker 1: It was a little bit closer to home. You know both.
Speaker 1: My family was in the Chicago area, so that was
Speaker 1: like a seven eight hour drive, and that the Summit League.
Speaker 1: There's some school like Indiana and you need Western Illinois
Speaker 1: in the Summit League. No, they're they're I don't know
Speaker 1: what league there. I e p U I I think
Speaker 1: is right now. They used to be who we uh POI.
Speaker 1: But you know, honestly, it just was it was the coaches.
Speaker 1: I I visited cold Oh it's cold Gate. It came
Speaker 1: down to Colgate in South Dakota. And I really liked
Speaker 1: the guys over at cold Gate. And you know, my
Speaker 1: dad is kind of like my uh, you know, my
Speaker 1: basketball mentor um, and he really wanted me to go
Speaker 1: to Coldgate. And so it was really hard for me.
Speaker 1: I was like, man, I don't really want to go
Speaker 1: out here a small town out in New York and
Speaker 1: pick South Dakota and said, I just you know, right right,
Speaker 1: but hey, I love South Dakota. I'm not saying you
Speaker 1: don't like I'm okay, So South University South Dakota is
Speaker 1: located where it's in Vermillion, it's like an hour south
Speaker 1: of Sioux Falls. Okay, how many people in Vermllion. But
Speaker 1: that's the thing. Colgate was even smaller. Cold was like
Speaker 1: three thousand people. Know, and I know all those schools
Speaker 1: in the Patriot League are like that, great schools, a
Speaker 1: ton of fun on campus, nothing to do outside of that.
Speaker 1: Uh South Dakota, how many people? How many people? How
Speaker 1: many students? Okay, it just came down to look, I
Speaker 1: love the coaches at Colgate, and I love the guys
Speaker 1: in South Dakota. But yeah, he is good. He's good.
Speaker 1: He uh he was a good player too, and I
Speaker 1: think that would have been a good fit for me too,
Speaker 1: you know. But I just I really like coach Hansen
Speaker 1: and Coach Smith, and I felt like they were building
Speaker 1: something there. Uh. So I decided on that I want
Speaker 1: to do something. Normally I do this, I like to
Speaker 1: do it in chronological core, but I won't stop for
Speaker 1: one second. And I want you to think about something. Okay,
Speaker 1: you leave Air Force, you're sitting out at South Dakota.
Speaker 1: If I would have told you at that moment that
Speaker 1: you would be a member of the Cleveland Cavaliers in
Speaker 1: the NBA, what percentage of you would have liked mm hmmm.
Speaker 1: I don't know, man. I always That's why I mean
Speaker 1: I wouldn't believe you. I wouldn't believe you, but I
Speaker 1: always but you might have somewhere, but people around you
Speaker 1: have been like no. It was something I could never say.
Speaker 1: It was something internally I felt like, man, I can
Speaker 1: get there. I can get that. I just need a
Speaker 1: shot I needed and I need to keep getting better.
Speaker 1: But I felt like I can get there one day. Um,
Speaker 1: But it was I knew it was a small possibility,
Speaker 1: like if I was gonna get there, it was gonna
Speaker 1: have to be uh, you know, take everything I had
Speaker 1: in me, and you know, I'm gonna have to catch
Speaker 1: some brakes along the way. So you sit out in
Speaker 1: South Dakota, Okay, and you transfer what was that You're like,
Speaker 1: for you like, this is another year sitting out, another
Speaker 1: year not hoping. What what were you just in the
Speaker 1: gym all the time? Was it tough for you mentally?
Speaker 1: What was that You're like, Yeah, that's where that was
Speaker 1: a tough year. Um for me, just I had some
Speaker 1: things going on with my family and then not being
Speaker 1: I tried to get a waiver, didn't get the waivers.
Speaker 1: So then when that news came in and uh, you know,
Speaker 1: I was just trying to find my way. I was like, man,
Speaker 1: I had an injury and played one year and I
Speaker 1: had to sit out, and um, so I just was
Speaker 1: in the gym all the time, and uh, me and
Speaker 1: coach Hansen and coach g and I would be in
Speaker 1: there in the morning before class and practice, and I
Speaker 1: go back at night and pretty much every day and uh,
Speaker 1: you know, we just focused on pretty much three things.
Speaker 1: We focused on, Uh, shots off the move, you know,
Speaker 1: one or two dribble pull ups, and shots off the catch.
Speaker 1: Like that's all I drilled. Um, just really trying to
Speaker 1: get good at those those things. And you know, it
Speaker 1: was it was a long year for sure, but it
Speaker 1: was looking back, it might have been the most important
Speaker 1: year of my college just because I got to really
Speaker 1: improve on my game for that year. Now, all of
Speaker 1: a sudden, you're like, you you have the gift of
Speaker 1: having played some Division one basketball, You're a little bit older,
Speaker 1: your bodies kind of filled out, you mature, and you
Speaker 1: had a year of working just on your game with
Speaker 1: those coaches. All right. Now, Now, what was that first
Speaker 1: year like playing in South Dakota. It was hard getting
Speaker 1: into it. The first half of the season was not
Speaker 1: very good. I was I was our leading score. But
Speaker 1: I was inefficient. And you know at South Dakota and
Speaker 1: now I played primarily point guard. Over there, I was
Speaker 1: playing the two, and uh, you know I was I
Speaker 1: was really struggling. I remember halfway through the season, I
Speaker 1: sat down with coach Smith and we had it. We
Speaker 1: had to talk and uh, I was a coach, just
Speaker 1: just give me that green light. I'm not gonna let
Speaker 1: you down. Just give me that green light, just because
Speaker 1: I didn't feel it from him. And you know, I
Speaker 1: wasn't playing very well. We were solid, but um, you know,
Speaker 1: he's like, all right, I'll give you that green light,
Speaker 1: but if you if you mess up, and you know,
Speaker 1: I gotta go with somebody else type of thing. And
Speaker 1: he gave me the green light and gave me more,
Speaker 1: you know, ran more plays for me and gave me
Speaker 1: that confidence. And the second half of the season, I
Speaker 1: you know, played played unbelievable. Um, not unbelievable. I played well,
Speaker 1: and we won the league and uh, you know, we
Speaker 1: had a really good season. We we won our league,
Speaker 1: but we lost on a buzzer beater in the conference tournament.
Speaker 1: You know how it is with the mid major, it's
Speaker 1: brutal and what I'm looking at the stats. I'm just
Speaker 1: you know, I'm looking at the stats of that game.
Speaker 1: What do you remember which game? And I t game No,
Speaker 1: the the end of season game, the one that ended
Speaker 1: your the one that ended ended that year. In the
Speaker 1: conference tournament, Well, I remember I played pretty well. I
Speaker 1: mean I was, um, I think I had thirty or
Speaker 1: so and I had a shot. What happened was I
Speaker 1: had a shot in the corner with like twenty seconds
Speaker 1: left to put us up by three, and I thought
Speaker 1: that was it. You know, it was a tough shot.
Speaker 1: I thought like, okay, we're going And then Mike Tom
Speaker 1: I don't know if you remember Mike Dom you probably
Speaker 1: do my basketball. Yeah, yeah, good, really good college player.
Speaker 1: He came down and a big guy followed him. He
Speaker 1: went like, we followed him right away. He went to
Speaker 1: the free throw line, made both an hour, up one,
Speaker 1: and then they filed uh one of our guys, a
Speaker 1: freshman who was a really solid player, but he over
Speaker 1: to the line and missed the one and one star
Speaker 1: up one, and they had this dude, this point guard.
Speaker 1: We knew they were trying to get the ball to down,
Speaker 1: so we were, you know, trying to not let him
Speaker 1: get in the point guard is pulled up and hit
Speaker 1: the shot at you know, with point nine seconds left.
Speaker 1: That was it. And uh, that was really hard to
Speaker 1: deal with because like my dream was Division one, but
Speaker 1: my dream was n C A tournament. I mean I
Speaker 1: just kept school tournament when I was a kid. Yes,
Speaker 1: And then okay, so I think think about that heartbreak
Speaker 1: and then like you, I'm sure at the time, you're like,
Speaker 1: I'm never that's not not gonna happen for me. You
Speaker 1: fast forward two years later and you're in the final four, right,
Speaker 1: Like that's it is, like your path so interesting? Okay,
Speaker 1: so you have a second year. Next year you played
Speaker 1: in the c B. I yeah, yeah, you get done.
Speaker 1: Mm hmm. Coach Smith is gonna e to Utah State, right,
Speaker 1: did you know you were gonna You're gonna grab transfer
Speaker 1: at that point? At that point you're like, I'm I'm
Speaker 1: playing really well, I can graduate. Did when did when
Speaker 1: did it? When did it happen that you? I want
Speaker 1: to grab transfer and go somewhere bigger. So obviously that
Speaker 1: was on my mind, but I think I was gonna
Speaker 1: stay with Smith. You know, we because we didn't get
Speaker 1: to the tournament. I loved my teammates there, I love
Speaker 1: the university. But I was getting a little bit older,
Speaker 1: you know, I was getting almost twenty three. I think,
Speaker 1: um trying to remember that year. But I was like,
Speaker 1: all right, do I stay here at South Dakota, try
Speaker 1: to get to the tournament, finish what we started, or
Speaker 1: do I go somewhere bigger, take a chance on myself,
Speaker 1: try to get some exposure. But the risk there is
Speaker 1: you go somewhere bigger and you don't play. Well. Now
Speaker 1: I got nothing, you know, unless you have what what
Speaker 1: they don't tell what, what people don't realize is like
Speaker 1: if you stayed the South Dakota, Okay, you didn't make
Speaker 1: the tournament, you your legend there, you could coach there,
Speaker 1: you brought in case, you live there. You do whatever.
Speaker 1: Dudes that transfer that second time you kind of if
Speaker 1: it doesn't work out, Like for you it worked out great,
Speaker 1: But for most people, you're kind of a man without
Speaker 1: a home. You know, you don't have you get back
Speaker 1: to alumni games when you played, when you were at
Speaker 1: school for nine months, you know what I mean? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I know you hit it on the head. And that's
Speaker 1: something I thought about a lot. Was like I don't
Speaker 1: have a legacy anywhere. You know, I don't have a legacy.
Speaker 1: I don't have somewhere I can come back to, and
Speaker 1: like I love South Dakota, I was like, man, I
Speaker 1: probably won't be able to come back to here anymore
Speaker 1: if I leave. Um. But you know, I talked about,
Speaker 1: you know, my faith is really important to me and
Speaker 1: my relationship for God, and that's something I prayed a
Speaker 1: lot about and sometimes you know, for most people call
Speaker 1: it that gut feeling. You know, I believe it's it's
Speaker 1: the Holy Spirit. And I just felt like I had
Speaker 1: to I had to go. And once Smith got the
Speaker 1: job at Utah State, this kind I knew it was like,
Speaker 1: all right, I probably gotta you know, go somewhere else
Speaker 1: and try to play against the best competition and see
Speaker 1: see how I stack up. Why. I know, there was
Speaker 1: a bunch of schools, why Tech coach Beard Um, you know,
Speaker 1: pretty simple Northwestern. I like those guys a lot, and
Speaker 1: it was close to home. My family wanted me to go.
Speaker 1: There was Craton. I thought their style of play was
Speaker 1: good for me. But you know, I think I think
Speaker 1: something that has really helped me is just being uncomfortable
Speaker 1: and putting myself in uncomfortable positions and uh, you know,
Speaker 1: stay going close to home. That was comfortable. Going to Crayton,
Speaker 1: similar system close to South Dakota, Like it was two
Speaker 1: hours from South Dakota, so I'd still be by my friends. Um,
Speaker 1: but Texas Tech like, and I remember I went to
Speaker 1: Texas Tech and I played pick up down there, and
Speaker 1: I didn't play very good. The other places stuff huh.
Speaker 1: They told me the story by the one what they
Speaker 1: say I played bad or what They're like, yeah, I
Speaker 1: think he's better. He was better, they said. They were like, man,
Speaker 1: we loved him on tape and then he was down
Speaker 1: here was like yeah, and and Beer was like, yeah,
Speaker 1: he's tougher than ship. He's my kind of Guy's my
Speaker 1: kind of player. And and the other guys and staff
Speaker 1: are like, yeah, I don't know if he's athletic enough
Speaker 1: to play at this level. Yeah they still I mean,
Speaker 1: I still don't know if I'm athletic enough. But they
Speaker 1: that's that's right. I never heard that story. That's funny.
Speaker 1: I didn't play very good down there. I wanted to
Speaker 1: play pick up just to see how they play the
Speaker 1: style of playing the system, and you know those guys
Speaker 1: guard uh and they were garden and pickup and it
Speaker 1: was different. Uh. But at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: I went down there because I knew I was going
Speaker 1: to get better, Like the resources they have, the player development,
Speaker 1: the g as, the coaches, like, I knew they were
Speaker 1: gonna win. And you know, there was other schools recruiting
Speaker 1: me that have kind of fell that had fallen off.
Speaker 1: And I won't I won't say which school in particular,
Speaker 1: but I remember, you know, one one of the schools
Speaker 1: had gone to the tournament and they didn't go to
Speaker 1: the tournament and they kind of had excuses for it,
Speaker 1: um and they brought their whole team back, you know.
Speaker 1: And uh, my brother was just like my older brother Dan,
Speaker 1: he was just like man Beard would never let that happen.
Speaker 1: He's like, he's gonna find a way to win. And
Speaker 1: and Tech lost like most of their guys. You know,
Speaker 1: we weren't projected to be very I know, you guys unbelievable.
Speaker 1: I mean, he's literally unbelievable. It's different. Okay. So I
Speaker 1: was like to play duke because because I want to
Speaker 1: get too final, I want to get to the NBA.
Speaker 1: But for all of us, like you and me who
Speaker 1: grew up watching the n c A tournament. Now you're
Speaker 1: playing Duke neutral side game, you know, playing for tech,
Speaker 1: and I know you didn't play all that well, um no,
Speaker 1: not at all. What but like, what's that feeling like
Speaker 1: like Holy ship about to play? Do? Yeah? No, Duke
Speaker 1: is like the I don't know. It's like Yankees there
Speaker 1: the team everybody wants to play. Yeah, the Yankees, whatever,
Speaker 1: the Bulls in the nineties, they're the top dogs. They're
Speaker 1: the team you know you see on TV, and it's
Speaker 1: just like they got legends that come out of their
Speaker 1: coach k So, like the hype was crazy. We were undefeated.
Speaker 1: I think they were number two, uh in the Garden,
Speaker 1: So it was electric in there. I think it was
Speaker 1: sold out too, I don't I don't know. I mean
Speaker 1: other than the final four. I mean, there's some really
Speaker 1: good atmospheres in the Big twelve, but that was something.
Speaker 1: It was a really good experience. I wish I could
Speaker 1: have that one back. We all, do you know we
Speaker 1: we should have had that game? Yeah? Um, okay. Then
Speaker 1: you go on this magical run in the in the
Speaker 1: n c A tournament and you go all the way
Speaker 1: to the Final four, but it's like so much of
Speaker 1: it's a blur, right, Like you crushed Michigan State like
Speaker 1: that was. But I mean you hit all those you
Speaker 1: hit a bunch of threes against Gonzaga, and you guys,
Speaker 1: I mean really sliced and dice Gonzaga. Um, when you
Speaker 1: close your eyes and you think back that, But our
Speaker 1: memories are different as fans. What what you what do
Speaker 1: you remember? Yeah? I remember the Gonzaga game, um, in
Speaker 1: Michigan State. You know the last three, you know the
Speaker 1: Virginia one. Obviously, I don't don't want to remember that,
Speaker 1: but I gotta move on, Like you remember the losses
Speaker 1: more than the wins. Right, that's a good point, um.
Speaker 1: But I remember the Gonzaga game and Gonzaga. Gonzaga was
Speaker 1: really good and that was like to there. I was
Speaker 1: in training camp with Memphis with Brandon Clark, and you
Speaker 1: know that was their year. They thought that was their year.
Speaker 1: They were they were stacked. Um. And I just remember
Speaker 1: we played out of our minds. I mean we played
Speaker 1: really well, like as a team. Um. And I just
Speaker 1: remember I remember one play where I got to steal
Speaker 1: and I threw it away and they dunked it, and um,
Speaker 1: I remember the play late where you know the Perkins
Speaker 1: Morrow dribble it off his foot already and then they
Speaker 1: pit the three and I was like, oh no, man,
Speaker 1: like here we go. This is what you see on
Speaker 1: TV every year. But um, that was a lot of fun.
Speaker 1: That was probably one of my most fun games. It
Speaker 1: was a complete game for myself, for the team, and
Speaker 1: in Michigan State. You can't really explain the final four,
Speaker 1: um two people unless I mean people have been there.
Speaker 1: But like playing in it is hard to explain because
Speaker 1: it's just so different than any other time I've ever played,
Speaker 1: you know, eighty thousand people, seventy thousand whatever it was
Speaker 1: instead of fifteen. You know, even fifteen is not just
Speaker 1: sold out fifteen thousand, but seventy thousand. It's hard to
Speaker 1: explain how cool that is. What happened in the time out,
Speaker 1: That's what I want to know, I said, not what
Speaker 1: happened at the time. You guys got the ball underneath
Speaker 1: your own basket and confusion, and then you guys got
Speaker 1: huh which game at the end? Tie games? Yes, what
Speaker 1: happened in the time out, we were, you know, we
Speaker 1: wanted to get the ball to Jarret. You know, I
Speaker 1: you know, we there was discussions of maybe making him
Speaker 1: a deep go away and trying to do something else,
Speaker 1: but it happens so quick and you don't have much time,
Speaker 1: and you know, we just ended up with drawing up
Speaker 1: some some type of play to to get into the
Speaker 1: ball and get a shot off and end up getting blocked. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, hindsight, it would have been and I wish
Speaker 1: we could have got a better look there, but they're
Speaker 1: a really good defensive team, and who knows what we
Speaker 1: would have gotten. Um what, what do you remember? What's
Speaker 1: that feeling like? Like I remember my last game and
Speaker 1: I just remember looking around in the locker room because
Speaker 1: I was I just assumed we were going to cut down.
Speaker 1: My mentality was a lot like yours, where I just
Speaker 1: assume we're gonna win, We're gonna cut down the nets,
Speaker 1: We're gonna Final four. Like you don't don't like Lucy
Speaker 1: doesn't even come into the equation. When you wake up
Speaker 1: that morning and then you look around, you're like, man,
Speaker 1: I fucking love these dudes, like they're my guys. I
Speaker 1: can't believe I never get to play basketball with them again.
Speaker 1: It's different, though, when you only done it for a year.
Speaker 1: Do you remember what that was like in the locker
Speaker 1: room afterwards? Devastation. Man, I mean you're talking like you
Speaker 1: got the Elite eight, Like you're almost there, we got
Speaker 1: the national championship. You know, you're like like right right
Speaker 1: there with the ball underneath your basket, tie game in regulation.
Speaker 1: So it's tough. You know. The only way I can
Speaker 1: really get past it is I can just focus on
Speaker 1: the positives and what I'm grateful for and like that
Speaker 1: we got that far. I could have gone to another school.
Speaker 1: We won't even went to the tournament, you know, and
Speaker 1: I got to experience that and make it all the
Speaker 1: way there. But you know, personally, I have a lot
Speaker 1: of regret, Like I wish I would have been more aggressive,
Speaker 1: and I still have dreams about it. Man, I have
Speaker 1: dreams and I wake up and I'm like, man, uh
Speaker 1: go dreams that I like, I make the game when
Speaker 1: he said, and I'm just like, man, I wish I
Speaker 1: would have been more aggressive and more assertive earlier in
Speaker 1: that game because it's like it's just another game. But
Speaker 1: it's not just another game. I know. I know. I
Speaker 1: would love to tell you that that goes away. Okay,
Speaker 1: it doesn't go away just like that. It's all right, man,
Speaker 1: life goes on the sun. The sun rises and it
Speaker 1: does totally okay, So you get done okay, and your
Speaker 1: thought process by now it's like, okay, now I can
Speaker 1: I know I can make the league, but it's harder
Speaker 1: than just that summer league was with who Atlanta. Okay,
Speaker 1: the draft comes and goes, you don't get picked. Did
Speaker 1: you watch the draft? I watched the draft because I
Speaker 1: had some good draft workouts, and you know, I got
Speaker 1: a really good agent, um, Chris Emmons, and I got
Speaker 1: a bunch of draft workouts, and obviously I don't get
Speaker 1: those workouts if we don't go to the final four
Speaker 1: and we don't get that exposure, and if I don't
Speaker 1: play well in in that Michigan State team, I probably
Speaker 1: don't get that many workouts. Um. So I watched the
Speaker 1: draft because there was possibility maybe I get picked second
Speaker 1: round later second round. But you're getting mad. I know
Speaker 1: it was a long no, no, not at all. I
Speaker 1: know it was a long shot. Um, but my agent
Speaker 1: is like, hey, there's a couple of teams that are
Speaker 1: considering you, and uh, the draft comes and goes and
Speaker 1: I get the call. It's like Hey, you to go
Speaker 1: to Atlanta for Summer League. We got to decide in
Speaker 1: like a minute because they're trying to fill Atlanta is
Speaker 1: trying to fill their roster summer league teams. So I said,
Speaker 1: if you think that's what we do, then we do it.
Speaker 1: And I went to Atlanta. What was that like? Well, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, every step of the way for me, it's
Speaker 1: just pressure. You know, you gotta perform and because if
Speaker 1: I feel if I don't perform, then that's like it's
Speaker 1: like it's probably over limited opportunities. But I got to
Speaker 1: play twenty minutes a game with Atlanta in Summer League,
Speaker 1: and uh, I played okay, But I realized, like I
Speaker 1: got to develop as a point guard. In college, I
Speaker 1: was like a tambo, and summer league I was like,
Speaker 1: I I really got to own in on my point
Speaker 1: guard skills and if I'm gonna play in the league,
Speaker 1: I gotta be a point guard probably six three white guy,
Speaker 1: not the most athletic. Um. I would be a tough
Speaker 1: point guard and make the right reads, but also, you know,
Speaker 1: make some plays here and there like not just you know,
Speaker 1: that's the thing. I Kirk Heinrich actually lives in South
Speaker 1: Dakota and I would be working out with him sometimes.
Speaker 1: He's I grew up watching him with the Bulls. He
Speaker 1: was he was a great player, a really good player,
Speaker 1: playing the league for a while. And I remember him
Speaker 1: telling me like, hey, because at first I was like,
Speaker 1: all right, I just gotta be sold. You look at
Speaker 1: like white Cards that played in the league, and they
Speaker 1: were just super tough, gritty, solid guys, make open shots,
Speaker 1: make their free throws, make their teammates better type of thing.
Speaker 1: And I remember, you know, I'm trying to do that,
Speaker 1: but Kirk's like, look, you still gotta when you get
Speaker 1: in there, you gotta show like that you can hoop
Speaker 1: you you you you gotta still be aggressive and uh
Speaker 1: because otherwise you're just out there. So you know, he
Speaker 1: really uh you know, he was in my ear and
Speaker 1: helped me out with some things too. Okay, So then
Speaker 1: well and then then Memphis for training camp. Okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: what what was that? Like? Great experience? I love, I
Speaker 1: love I love Memphis and staff and everybody there. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, the first time being in the NBA facility
Speaker 1: and being around NBA guys and playing and uh, you know,
Speaker 1: that was kind of like John Morant was there and
Speaker 1: you know, he's young and super talented, and I was like,
Speaker 1: you know, I saw a firsthand like how good that
Speaker 1: guy was gonna be? Saw competing with all these guys,
Speaker 1: and that was the first time Like that gave me
Speaker 1: a lot of confidence playing with those guys and knowing
Speaker 1: that I'm you know, and I was playing well. We
Speaker 1: played pick up playing well. Um, that gave me a
Speaker 1: lot of confidence. But it's like, once you get to
Speaker 1: the NBA level, you gotta remind yourself. You can't defer,
Speaker 1: you know, you gotta remind like I had a constant
Speaker 1: re mydself, I belong here, you know, go out and
Speaker 1: be aggressive, be a killer, you know that type of thing.
Speaker 1: You talked about your relationship with God. It's not it's
Speaker 1: not uh like from a book. It's not true religion.
Speaker 1: It's more kind of your relationship and spirituality to it.
Speaker 1: How How did how does that helped you? Because it's
Speaker 1: not easy, right, Like you're going place and you think
Speaker 1: you play well, and then now you're off to the
Speaker 1: G League and you're with new guys and your confidence
Speaker 1: is tested, Like, how does that play a part in
Speaker 1: what you've been able to do? In terms sustaining kind
Speaker 1: of your will. Yeah, great question. I'm really I'm really
Speaker 1: glad you asked me that. Um, you know, I found
Speaker 1: I was in college in South Dakota. I was searching
Speaker 1: for answers. You know, I grew up Catholic, but I
Speaker 1: was just like, is this you know, because everybody grows
Speaker 1: up believe in different things? So like, am I right
Speaker 1: because I grew up this way and they grew up
Speaker 1: that way? And what they believe that they're right? You know,
Speaker 1: somebody grows up half across the country or across the world.
Speaker 1: Everybody believes different things. So I just started searching for truth,
Speaker 1: and you know, I found that that Jesus was the truth. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, son of God rose from the dead, and
Speaker 1: so then I started just looking at what he said
Speaker 1: and how he lived and he showed us how to live.
Speaker 1: And you know, I started developing my relationship with God.
Speaker 1: I realized it wasn't about you know, rules and traditions,
Speaker 1: but more about um, you know, just having my heart
Speaker 1: being posture towards him, Like do I love others the
Speaker 1: way he loves me? Sort of? That's what it all
Speaker 1: comes down to, the Bible, It all comes down to love.
Speaker 1: Love others as yourself, right. But you know, with with
Speaker 1: the game of basketball, and halfway through the season I
Speaker 1: told you that one year in South Dakota, my game
Speaker 1: kind of took off. What I didn't tell you is,
Speaker 1: you know, my my relationship with God kind of took off.
Speaker 1: And I realized, like I talked a lot about pressure,
Speaker 1: you know, there's constant pressure with the line of work
Speaker 1: I'm in, and you know, you've you've lived and played
Speaker 1: at a really high level. And uh, A lot of
Speaker 1: guys struggle dealing with that, and I struggle dealing with
Speaker 1: it and for a long time. And if I if
Speaker 1: I played bad, I felt like this big you know,
Speaker 1: I felt like I was I was worthless in a way.
Speaker 1: And that's not what God tells us, you know, he
Speaker 1: tells us what our worth is based on, you know,
Speaker 1: are how we treat other people. So what I'm getting
Speaker 1: at is my relationship with God. It made me realize
Speaker 1: if I play poorly or if I play great, God's
Speaker 1: love for me doesn't change. And then in my game
Speaker 1: of golf, because I just had this piece in me
Speaker 1: and like I knew, no matter how I played, his
Speaker 1: love for me wasn't going to change. You know, I
Speaker 1: still had salvation through Jesus, and I just started killing.
Speaker 1: It wasn't because I was. I was. You know a
Speaker 1: lot of people think that prayer like Lord, help me
Speaker 1: play my best, and that was me. I do that.
Speaker 1: I still do that, but it's like he doesn't really
Speaker 1: care how we play. It cares how we treat other people.
Speaker 1: But I just I had this piece inside me once
Speaker 1: in my relationship with him, and I just I started
Speaker 1: playing way better. Um, you're in Canon, right, and where
Speaker 1: were you when you got the call that you get
Speaker 1: to go play for the Caps. I was in Memphis. Actually,
Speaker 1: I was in Memphis. I was walking to because I
Speaker 1: was with the G League team in Memphis and we
Speaker 1: get tickets to the Grizzlies games. It was a Grizzlies
Speaker 1: Rockets game. I remember it like it was yesterday. And
Speaker 1: I get called to uh called by my agent. I'm
Speaker 1: on the side of the street and he calls. The
Speaker 1: first thing he says is this. He says, hey, man,
Speaker 1: I regret to inform you you're no longer with the
Speaker 1: Memphis Hustle. So I'm just like, I'm like okay. He's like,
Speaker 1: pack your bags are going to Cleveland. You got a
Speaker 1: two way contract with the cast So, like, you know
Speaker 1: that that feeling we talked about earlier where I always
Speaker 1: felt like I could play in the league, but I
Speaker 1: knew it was gonna be tough, and I didn't know
Speaker 1: like it was ever gonna happen, but I believed it
Speaker 1: could you know, it was happening. And uh, you know,
Speaker 1: I sat there on the on the curb and I
Speaker 1: just you know, I thank God. And the first person
Speaker 1: I called, um it was my dad. And not to
Speaker 1: put a damper on the mood at all, but my
Speaker 1: dad's you know, currently only got a couple of months
Speaker 1: to live. You know, he's got h he's got a
Speaker 1: disease in his brain, and only given him a couple
Speaker 1: of months left. And but but I say that because
Speaker 1: you know, before my dad, before I got that call
Speaker 1: from my agent, I got a call from my dad.
Speaker 1: And my dad has lived in Cleveland for about five
Speaker 1: years now, so he's been in Cleveland. Wow. And he
Speaker 1: called me about an hour before that and he said,
Speaker 1: you know, he got bad news from the doctor. His
Speaker 1: cancer was spread. Okay, Well, an hour later I got
Speaker 1: a call from my agent telling me I was going
Speaker 1: to Cleveland and so I called him and he just said,
Speaker 1: you know, you just one of the worst days in
Speaker 1: my life just became one of the best. And it's
Speaker 1: given me a lot of time to be with him.
Speaker 1: And uh, you know, he was at the first game,
Speaker 1: and it was really cool to have him there. So
Speaker 1: that was the moment that I called my brother, my
Speaker 1: mom and people who have helped me get to this point,
Speaker 1: you know, back home, my coaches and stuff. Uh, that's
Speaker 1: why I'm special because so many people have helped me
Speaker 1: get here. Right. Nobody does it alone, so you share
Speaker 1: it with them. You know, I got, I got, I
Speaker 1: got two more things that I'm tight on time. I
Speaker 1: apologize because it's it's so good. The first game he
Speaker 1: played was against the nixt Yeah, what was the shot?
Speaker 1: You said, Floater? I mean, I mean, I don't shoot
Speaker 1: that side a whole lot um, but pump fake right
Speaker 1: foot right float. It look kind of awkward, but it's
Speaker 1: just it went down and it felt pretty good. That's
Speaker 1: my only bucket at this point because I only played
Speaker 1: a couple of games so so so that that leads
Speaker 1: me into my second question to the to the six
Speaker 1: ft two to five eleven white dudes out there, that
Speaker 1: everybody's like, you ain't got no shot, dude. You can
Speaker 1: go and pay your check and playing an a U team,
Speaker 1: maybe playing college. You're a guy that I'm sure people
Speaker 1: are like, you're not playing right. One scholarship offer to
Speaker 1: the Air Force out of high school. You don't even
Speaker 1: go to the Air Force to go to their prep,
Speaker 1: and you play when you're there in the South Dakota,
Speaker 1: then the Tech. Okay, then you've scratched and clawed and
Speaker 1: you've made it. You have whatever you do the rest
Speaker 1: of your life. You have done what only four people
Speaker 1: get to do a year out of eight billion people
Speaker 1: on Earth. How do you persevere through the hard times? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Good question. Um, I don't think I've made it, you know,
Speaker 1: I put on that jersey, but I'm still constantly pursuing,
Speaker 1: you know, make a career out of it and be better,
Speaker 1: um every day. But how do you persevere through the
Speaker 1: hard time? For me, it was my faith, you know, um.
Speaker 1: And for those five eleven and six two guys are
Speaker 1: those guys who are underrated, it's just chase your dreams, man,
Speaker 1: Like everybody's gonna tell you what you can and can't
Speaker 1: do or what you should do do what you love
Speaker 1: and go after it as hard as you can go
Speaker 1: after it. And if you don't make it, you don't
Speaker 1: make it. But you gotta go for it. And that's
Speaker 1: how I felt, and that's why I made the decisions
Speaker 1: I made. And UM, you know, here I am and
Speaker 1: hopefully I'll keep on going. Hey man, this is an
Speaker 1: awesome talk. Um. I'm so sorry to hear that your
Speaker 1: dad's struggles, but I gotta run and I really appreciate it. Yeah, no,
Speaker 1: I really enjoyed it. Doug. Good to talk to you, man.
Speaker 1: Thanks man. All right, all right, Uh quick reminder, The
Speaker 1: Doug Gottlieb Show is daily daily on Fox Worts Radio
Speaker 1: dot com. You can stream us anywhere you go. You
Speaker 1: can download the podcast as well, and you can listen
Speaker 1: to us live three or six Eastern twelve three Pacific
Speaker 1: Fox Sports Radio dot Com stream the show. We've got
Speaker 1: great interviews football, baseball, basketball as well. Anyway, by thanks
Speaker 1: to Matt Mooney and to you for joining us. I'm
Speaker 1: Doug gotlib In. This is all ball