Archdeacon: For Flyers’ Grant, friendship with UMass coach ‘bigger than basketball’

More than rival A-10 coaches, Grant and McCall are longtime friends going back to their days at the of University of Florida. Grant was an assistant on Billy Donovan’s staff when McCall was taken on as a student manager.

“I’ve known Matt since he was 18 or 19 years old, just a freshman in college, and he became part of our basketball there,” Grant said. “I’ve watched him grow up and become an integral part of what Coach Donovan was able to do at Florida… and then (I watched him) go out on his own.

“I’m just proud of what he’s grown into.”

Grant said he’s never been more impressed in McCall than he’s been in the past 10 days and especially Friday night when he got his Minutemen – who were beaten by the Flyers by 21 points just two weeks earlier at UD Arena – to play some of their best basketball of the season.

UMass held the lead for nearly three quarters of the game and still had a one-point advantage with less than a minute left.

“Sometimes you can’t tell the true character until a guy goes through adversity,” Grant said. “And I think Matt has shown the world what type of a guy he is. Not just as a coach – though he’s a heck of a coach and belongs in the game – but he’s even a better person.”

Eleven days ago McCall was fired as the UMass head coach because he hadn’t been winning enough games. There were still two regular season contests left – including Senior Night – and then there was the A-10 Tournament.

Most guys, when they get the axe, walk away from the program immediately, look for their buyout money and have few kind words to say about the place.

That’s not how the 40-year-old McCall has done it and he said he owes much of that to Grant, who has been his mentor and confidante his whole career.

McCall asked to stay on and guide his UMass players through their final games and athletics director Ryan Bamford, the guy who gave him his pink slip, agreed. He trusted McCall wouldn’t do anything to hurt or sabotage the program. He was right.

In fact, since the firing was announced, the UMass players had rallied around their coach and had won three straight, including their first round tournament game with George Washington here on Thursday night.

And they would have beaten the Flyers were it not for DaRon Holmes, the 6-foot-10 freshman wonder kid in the post, who made 12 of 15 shots and finished with a game-high 28 points while blocking three Minutemen shots and altering many more.

After the game, Grant saluted UMass and McCall:

“What impresses me is the way his team rallied around him. It just as well could have gone the other way.

“And I think the team gave him strength. They gave him something to look forward to during a tough time.”

McCall said he drew real strength from Grant and Donovan.

He said Grant was in touch with him several times over the past 10 days and Donovan even called the locker room right after Friday night’s game.

When asked at the press conference what he’d said to McCall during their embrace, Grant declined: “I’ll keep my response to him personal.”

Later, though, in private, Grant touched on the moment.

“I’ve been there myself,” he said in a reference to his firing as the Alabama head coach seven years ago. “It’s tough when it ends. He put his heart and soul into that program for five years.

“I just wanted to make sure he was OK and that his family was good. It wasn’t about basketball. This is bigger than basketball.

“This was about his wife, his kids. He’s got young kids. He’s got a family. His mom and dad are back in Ocala, Florida and they’re really good people. That’s what matters most.”

When he was asked about Grant’s postgame embrace, McCall didn’t hesitate:

“Anthony is everything that’s right with college basketball. There’s been a lot of wrong over the past few years. A lot of it has really come to fruition.

“But that’s not Anthony Grant.

“There might not be a better human being in all of college basketball. He’s taught me so much. I know I didn’t get to the level I did without learning from Anthony.”

After he was a manger with the Gators, McCall held other support positions and said Grant always treated him well.

When Grant left to take the head coaching job at VCU, he offered McCall the Rams’ director of operations job. But five minutes later Donovan called and offered him the same job and was able to keep him in Gainesville.

McCall eventually became an assistant at Florida Atlantic and then came back to Florida as an assistant before getting his first head coaching job at Chattanooga. In his initial season there, he was named the Southern Conference Coach of the Year as he led the Mocs to a 29-6 record and a berth in the NCAA Tournament.

Within two years he was hired at UMass, though he had just one winning season – last year’s COVID-shortened 8-7 campaign.

McCall watched how Grant handled his departure from Alabama and five years later at UD became the Naismith National Coach of the Year.

And now he’s tried to take the high road, too.

“I’m grateful for the opportunity Ryan Bamford gave me. I’m not walking away from UMass bitter. I’m not angry or upset. I want them to be successful going forward. I even think in the last 10 days I’ve learned a lot about myself. I’ve gotten better. I’ve grown. I’ve even improved over the last 10 days as a coach.”

He said he feels badly that the daily relationships with support staff and coaches and everyone else connected to the program will end. He’ll said he’ll miss the players, especially coaching the talented junior guard Noah Fernandes, who had 26 points agent the Flyers.

“And I think moving is hard, especially when you have an eight-year-old and a six-year-old at home. And my man. Maverick, who’s just eight months, he’ll pack up and move and be fine.”

He was think about his wife, Allison, and the kids as the press conference ended:

“Right now I’m gonna go home and hug my wife and hug my kids. I’m tired.

“But I’m indebted to the University of Massachusetts and the opportunity it provided a former student manager that worked his way up to become an Atlantic 10 coach.

“This isn’t the end for me. I’m excited for what’s ahead. I know I’m going to be OK.”

Anthony Grant will do all he can to make sure of that.