First, for background read this from Adam Lucas and my own take here.
Secondly, put on your seat belt and read the whole interview with the N&O's Robbi Pickeral because it deals with McCants' relationship with Matt Doherty, Roy Williams, whether he really wanted to leave when the crap hit the fan in 2003 and did he have an intestinal disorder in 2005. In fact Pickeral must have felt like Barbara Walters by the time she was finished with this. I will toss out a couple of choice quotes for you to chew on but make sure you take in the whole thing.
Q: Is it true that Coach Doherty once took you to a psychologist when you were at UNC, and did you bump heads over that?
A: That is something that happened, and I think that’s just because Coach didn’t get to know me as a person – he never sat down and had a conversation with me, and I think that, with me, I’m not as easy to read as a lot of other people. Any mistakes I make, any facial expressions or body language I have is always toward myself, not anybody else. I’m a perfectionist, I like to do things right all the time, so anytime I’m wrong, I want to fix it, and I want to figure out why I’m doing what I’m doing. And that would be a [miscommunication] between me and Coach Doherty, because I would make a mistake, I would come out, he would think I was mad at him, when I was just mad at myself. There was never a conversation that I had, like with Coach Williams, where he could understand where I was coming from, so that’s where the psychologist came in. And I had a sit-down with him, and as a young guy, I didn’t understand it. I didn’t think I was crazy or anything, and that was my perception at the time, that you see a psychologist because you’re crazy, because you have a problem.
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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.
Regardless of Doherty taking McCants to a psychologist, both of them have a good relationship now and according to McCants their relationship never reached the vitriolic level people think it did. McCants' gave the interview as part of an effort to rehab his image. Exit question: Did it work?