On Wednesday this week (Oct. 24), hoards of the college basketball media contingent descended upon Uptown Charlotte for ACC Operation Basketball. The Spectrum Center — home of the Charlotte Hornets — was the site for a day’s worth of interviews and hoops talk.
A big part of that media machine is radio row; the league’s coaches and two player representatives from each team go through the car wash — joining different shows to talk basketball and answer questions.
One of our own, David Glenn, is a grizzled veteran of the process; he’s been doing this for decades now. However, on the other end of our spectrum, we have Josh Graham — the relatively newly-minted afternoon host of The Drive (3-6 p.m., Monday-Friday) on WSJS, The Sports Hub. (David Glenn can be heard here, too, from 12-3 p.m., Monday-Friday.)
Josh is no radio rookie, and but this was his first experience doing his show live from Operation Basketball. From one former Piedmont Triad denizen (myself) to a now current Triad denizen, I asked Josh a few quick questions about his experience from ACC Operation Basketball — basically, what his day was like on Wednesday.
[Also: Make sure to read the ACC Football Power Rankings DG, JG and I (BG) do every week.]
Question Time
BG: In basketball, teams like to use screen-the-screener action to create some advantage and score on offense; let’s apply that here: I’ll question the questioner. What was the highlight of the day — something from one of the interviews or running into me in the hallways of Spectrum Center? Perhaps something else?
JG: The highlight for me was Cam Johnson wanting to spend nearly a half hour talking about video games with an intern on our set. He was so energetic, bright and willing to have fun with us, and that’s a rare combination to find in a coach or player.
BG: Cool, no love for me. I see how it is, Josh. But so, you got to talk with multiple Hall of Fame coaches — was that surreal? Or is that just part of the job now?
JG: It’s not surreal, and it is part of the job. However, it’s not lost on me all how fortunate I am to get to talk to Coach K, Roy Williams, Jim Boeheim and even Tony Bennett. They understand how passionate their fans are and I appreciate them using us as a vehicle to talk to them about their teams.
BG: Did you ask any Halloween questions? Or, are we too far out from that holiday to go that route? (I know I enjoyed the Hornets-colored M&M’s in the media room.)
JG: I didn’t ask one Halloween question all day. However, Fortnite and the NBA 2K video games were certainly fair game. My unofficial straw poll has Fortnite edging 2K and the FIFA soccer games as the most popular game in college basketball locker rooms.
BG: Fortnite, man. I’m just so out on cool things these days. OK, so I know you’re still locked in on football, but I’m a basketball geek, so I gotta ask: Scale of 1-10, how ready for the 2019 ACC Tournament are you?
JG: 10. It’s hard not to be ready for games to be played after being court-side at an NBA basketball arena while talking to some of the greatest coaches in the history of the sport.
Josh Graham: Best Of
Worth checking out, too: Here’s a compilation of several interview from Josh at Operation Basketball, including Tony Bennett, Coach K, Roy Williams, Chris Mack and Kevin Keatts.