McCants: ‘It has everything to do with the system’

In a report by ESPN’s Outside the Lines, Rashad McCants is the latest former UNC athlete to make allegations involving the school’s academic scandal. McCants, who was the starting shooting guard on North Carolina’s 2005 national championship team, claimed tutors wrote papers for him and stated that he believes coach Roy Williams was aware of it.

“I think [Williams] knew 100 percent,” McCants told OTL. “It’s hard for anybody not to know about the fact that we’re taking African American studies courses and we don’t have to go to class.”

The former NBA player also said that it’s a system-wide problem.

“This has nothing to do with the Carolina fans or the Carolina program,” he said in the report. “It has everything to do with the system, and Carolina just so happened to be a part of the system and they participated in the system.” 

McCants isn’t the only former Tar Heel athlete to speak out about the academic scandal. Football players Deunta Williams and Michael McAdoo, who both faced NCAA issues while at North Carolina, have also expressed feelings of being short-changed as students during their experience in college.

McCants’ comments represent just another chapter in a scandal that came to light four years ago when the NCAA began investigating the Tar Heels’ football program for players receiving illicit benefits. During the investigation, a history of academic fraud was discovered, which eventually led to former UNC learning specialist Mary Willingham stating publicly that 60 percent of 183 student-athletes she worked with read between a fourth- and eighth-grade reading level. A trio of experts hired by the university to look into Willingham’s research later said that her data did not support her claims.