Roy Williams is the coach of the North Carolina men’s basketball team. The Tar Heels are in the semifinals of the ACC Tournament, which is being played at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn for the first time after it was held at Verizon Center in Washington last year and in Greensboro, N.C. before that.
So with the tournament being played in the biggest media market in the world — or so we assume — Williams was asked about how that could help recruiting and wandered off into a shot against Donald Trump’s inability to prevent himself from tweeting nonsense.
From the transcript at ASAP Sports:
Q. Any advantages media-wise or recruiting-wise to have it in the big city?
COACH WILLIAMS: It used to be much more so than I think it is now. Now everybody’s has got social media, and we don’t need “The New York Times” to find out what in the dickens is going on in the country. You know, our president tweets out more bullshit than anybody I’ve ever seen. We’ve got social media.In the old days, there’s no question it was the media capital of the world, but I’m not sure it is right now. Media capital of the world is sitting right there, right there, right there.
But it has value. I’m not saying it doesn’t. I don’t think we have to go overboard. If you guys have questions for the players, let them answer them so they can get out of there.
Williams gave a much better answer than Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim, who took a shot at Greensboro, a city that clapped back hard.
https://twitter.com/greensborocity/status/839563546518294530
Williams also used “dickens,” which should be required of all old coaches to say in every answer to every question.
Williams is right though. It’s 2017. Anyone who wants to watch the ACC Tournament is going to watch the ACC Tournament. And let’s be clear — this is being held at Barclays Center, not Madison Square Garden, so it’s not even really in the media capital of the world but maybe a suburb of it. It’s like people who live in Connecticut that tell people they live “in the city.”
Also, who cares? What recruit is deciding on if he’ll play in Chapel Hill based on the location of a conference tournament that has moved from Greensboro to DC to Brooklyn and then to Charlotte in two years? Who wants to read that story? Where’s the follow-up question about Trump?
Anyway, Williams thinks Trump tweets a lot of crap and social media minimizes the impact of playing in a big city. He’s right on all accounts! Way to go Roy!
