Charlie Scott

Y'all ladies got to be careful because number one, y'all are going up against college football and pro football.

Y'all are expanding your season to go against more college football and pro football going forward.

And y'all need to get together and say, hey, we're going to stop self-sabotaging each other and things like that.

Because, man, you know, they were going to like this thing with the national anthem.

And I'm really looking forward to this next chapter.

And it's given me uninterrupted, unhurried time and present time with my family.

But also, I'm just really excited about to start this season with TNT and spending time with good people.

You know, you talk about your family and family.

yeah.

And he recruited Charlie Scott as UNC's first African-American scholarship athlete.

Oh, wow.

Yeah.

I was telling him the story.

If you remember the basketball player, Charlie Scott, he played for the Suns and the Celtics.

He was the first black scholarship player at UNC.

And Charlie told the story that in practice, if you acted up or you didn't run the right play or you were late or whatever it was, Coach Smith would have you put on a weighted vest and tell you to go run the stairs at Carmichael Auditorium, which was the building they played in before the Dean Dome was built.

The Suns just want to run you out of the gym, and I think they did that.

When I was a kid, it was Dick Van Arzo and Charlie Scott.

fast break as much as they could.

Then you had Walter Davis and Paul Westphal and Alvin Adams running guys on the ground.

But, uh, uh, just the fact that, uh, the, the Colonels had just, uh, gotten new ownership, um, and, uh, the ABA was kind of coming out of the minor leagues into the major leagues at that time.

The, the consensus All-America team in 1970 was, uh, Bob Lanier, uh, Calvin Murphy, uh, Pete Maravich, Rick Mount, Charlie Scott, and me.

And, um, three of us went to the ABA and, and three went to the NBA.

So it was, it was the beginning of, uh, of, of the coming out, I think, for, for the ABA.

So that, it, it, it all kind of aligned.

And it seemed like your transition was an easy one.

You mentioned Charlie Scott.

You and him were, were Rookie of the Year, you know, shared that.

[laughs]

Michael Jordan, for example, Larry Brown, Billy Cunningham, Phil Ford, Kenny Smith, James Worthy, Brad Daugherty, Jerry Stackhouse, Charlie Scott, Vince Carter, Sam Perkins.

Dean Smith was smart, shrewd, and masterful, and he was so beloved at North Carolina that they built a gym and they named it after him.

Which is what they should've done, Tony.

And the one thing we've been telling the players that we're recruiting, the only thing we'll ever ask of you is to come back and continue to pay it forward.

And I remember being there that night and having a chance to meet Charlie Scott, having a chance to see Jimmy Black, legendary New York City point guard.

And then I was sitting down eating and somebody comes over to me.

They tap me on the shoulder.