Coach Mack, 'We're Lucky Bubba is Standing Up and Doing Right By These Kids'
COVID-19 is more than just not being able to attend classes and social distancing; there are bigger problems at hand. Student-athletes from low-income families are a major concern for UNC Football staff; Staff want to ensure that not only are families taken care of but maintaining their athletic needs.
Coach Mack Brown is worried about more than just an update football schedule; his concerns are with the families of his athletes. Unfortunately, not every kid is coming to UNC from well off families; if you ever heard stories of former athletes, they're coming from low-income families, and the weight of their family getting out of those dire situations to rely on them succeeding far beyond collegiate expectations. But what happens when a global pandemic forces those kids to not only train on their own but eat healthy and maintain collegiate academics? It's a tough road.
UNC has been incredibly vocal the past few weeks in making sure student-athletes are receiving all benefits under their power. Coach Mack Brown gave acknowledgment to AD Bubba Cunningham and chancellor, Kevin Guskiewicz, for the efforts in ensuring that every student-athlete is prepared for success during their time at home.
"There hasn't been through the NCAA, as far as I know, but Kevin Guskiewicz, Bubba Cunningham, our compliance office, Rick Steinbacher, Corey Holliday, they've been superstars. I will say that the number one concern of all of those people has been the health and well-being of our student-athletes. Period. So we were able to get their scholarship checks to them immediately. Their rooms have already been paid for, but they get money for their meals, and they're not here, so we had to get those checks to them immediately. That's a hard thing to do to find them where they are. The campus asked that anyone living in the dorm come back and get their stuff out of the dorm. Some of them were able to come back and pick up their checks, but others had to have their checks sent to them."
Brown also detailed the struggle in staying on top of kids; with a short leash on communication, the staff can only contribute but so much, but he does highlight the dedication of his team in making sure kids are helped out in every financial, health, and mental aspect.
"So helping them find a place to work out, helping them try to find nutritional food, and what to eat. Coach Hess and his whole strength staff are doing online workouts this afternoon with the whole team and they're going to do two workouts. They're going to do one with weights and one without. So I think, more than anything else, I'm really, really proud of the way our staff and the university has stepped up to try to help these kids. It's been more about them than even money right now because the financial situation for athletic directors and athletic programs are going to change through all this. It's going to put a tremendous burden on a lot of them. We're lucky to be at a place where Bubba is still standing up and doing what's right by these kids. I'm very, very proud of him for that."
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