CELTIC-NATION
You were born on June 4th, 1963 in Columbia, South Carolina.  Take me back in time – what was it like to be Xavier McDaniel as a child?

XAVIER MCDANIEL
I’m the oldest of six kids.  I have four sisters and one brother – Berline, Tracey, Wendy, Marva, and Carnlius.  I’ve always been interested in basketball.  When I was young I always played it, although I didn’t play organized basketball until about the seventh grade.  Up until then it was always in the street.  In the seventh grade I played for the Ben Arnold Boys Club in Columbia, South Carolina.  That same year I got cut from the eighth grade team – the coach didn’t take seventh graders.  You could go out, but he would tell you, ‘You’re probably gonna get cut if you’re a seventh grader, but if you want to go out for the team, then I gotta let you go out because those are the rules.’ [Laughs].  So he cut me, and I tried out with the Boys Club.  That’s when I got my first MVP trophy – that was in 1976 – and I started playing from there.

I played organized baseball and football from the age of eight years old.  Back then, basketball to me was just a hobby, because you either played baseball or football in the State of South Carolina.  Basketball was just something to do in my spare time.  When I was in the eighth grade I was only 5’10”, but I ended up growing from 5’10” to 6”7”.

CELTIC-NATION
You played high school ball at A.C. Flora.  The school had one of the best records in the state during your senior season, with three players going on to play Division I college basketball.  What stands out most about your high school career at A.C. Flora?

XAVIER MCDANIEL
I went through some hard times in high school.  I wasn’t doing my schoolwork, and I wasn’t doing the things necessary to be a student-athlete.  I had a very good coach, and I thank God that I had him as a coach, because he could have been one of those coaches who kept his players eligible just to win basketball games.  He told me that if I wanted to play on his team, then I had to do my schoolwork.

Basically I was on the team as a freshman, just playing scrub minutes, and then I was a starter as a sophomore.  I didn’t play during my junior year because of my grades.  I came back for my senior year mad, because I knew that I should have been a starter.  I knew that I should have been on the All-Area Team, because at fifteen years old I was already a star in Columbia, South Carolina.  Not being able to play my junior year motivated me, and was probably the reason I was able to have a senior season equal to any player in the state.  I could match my stats up with anyone my senior year.  I didn’t average a lot of points, but we had a lot of blowouts.  We had Tyrone Corbin, who I think you’re probably familiar with.  We always used to say that we wanted the game over in the first quarter, so a lot of times we would only play the first and third quarter.  My stats were a little misleading because of all the blowouts.  I averaged 18.8 points-per-game, and 14.4 rebounds-per-game, but, like I said, those numbers were only over two quarters.

We went on to win the state championship that season, and I was the MVP of the All-Star Game.  I didn’t win the MVP award from the city – they gave that to another guy.  He went to USC.  He ended up being a good friend of mine, and whenever I see him I ask him if he still has my trophy [laughs].

We had a bunch of players go on to play Division I basketball.  James Hillabran went to the University of Wisconsin.  Robert Brannon played at Kent State.  Tyrone went to DePaul.  I went to Wichita State.  Tony Ashley went to South Carolina State, and Tony Snooks went to Southern Illinois.  Me, Snooks and Tyrone won it all during our senior season – as a matter of fact, Snooks is Troy Hudson’s stepfather.  Troy played at Southern Illinois in the mid-90s, and now plays guard for the Minnesota Timberwolves.  But we didn’t win the state championship my junior year.  That’s the year we should have won it easily; we had a lot of blowouts, but the point guard got hurt and we only had one other point guard on the team.  We didn’t have anybody to distribute the basketball.  Same thing happened a year later.  We started my senior season 0-3, basically because we were playing point guard by committee.  That’s when we went and got one of my other friends from the neighborhood, and we said, ‘Look man, we need you.’  And after he joined the team, I think we ended up going 22-0.  We only lost one more game after that 0-3 start, and we won the state championship.

CELTIC-NATION
Growing up, you idolized players such as Dr. J., Bob "Greyhound" Dandridge, Wes Unseld, Elvin Hayes and Bobby Jones.  Please tell me a little about each of these men – what parts of their game did you admire most?

XAVIER MCDANIEL
You must have been doing your homework, because those are my men right there!  As a player, I took a little something from all of those guys.  Dr. J – I just wanted his jumping ability.  Bobby Dandridge had the turnaround jump shot.  Bobby and Big E [Elvin Hayes] both had that turnaround jumper.  I started studying that shot, and I decided that I was going to master it.  Bobby Dandridge used to shoot it when he was with the Washington Bullets and Milwaukee Bucks.  The Big E – he used to get on that box, and then turn around and shoot on it.  It was unstoppable.  Wes Unseld was the rebounder.  Him, and my man Moses Malone.  Those were my guys as far as rebounding the basketball.  They were the ones I idolized in high school and college.  I can remember Moses telling everyone that all he did was rebound.  That’s all he wanted to talk about.  Wes Unseld was known equally for his rebounding, but he was also the master of the outlet pass.  He would start the fast break.  A lot of people don’t believe me, but if you go back and look, I was probably the second best outlet passer in the history of college basketball.  I think Wes Unseld was the best, and I think I rank second best behind him.  I could throw the two-hand outlet, or I could throw the one-hand baseball pass.  And I could throw it on the money.  Guys would break out, and I would hit them on the money.  As for Bobby Jones, I admired his defense.  I didn’t get a lot of credit for my defense, but I feel that I was a very good defensive player over the course of my career.  For some reason I just didn’t get credit for my defense.

Like I said, you must have done your homework, because those are the guys that I’ve talked about.  When it came to basketball, I just didn’t play it; I tried to sit back and study the game, too, and pick up as much as possible.  And I tell people, my game is patterned after a whole lot of players.  When Michael Jordan started shooting that turnaround jumper, people made a big deal out of it.  But I was shooting that shot in college, and during my rookie year in the pros.  Mike didn’t start shooting the turnaround jump shot until late in his career.  He was a dunker first.  Today, the Big Dog – Glen Robinson – uses it a little bit.  Believe it or not, I first started shooting that shot as a kid.  Over time, I was able to watch guys like Bobby Dandridge, and I was able to perfect it.  I still tell people today, that if I have a chance to warm up, I can still make eight out of ten shots like that – as long as there’s no defense [laughs].

Another person who I borrowed from, but haven’t really talked about a lot, is Mike Mitchell.  If you watch some of my moves, when I start one way and then step back, I picked that up from Mike.  In college I just used to turn and shoot, but when I first entered the league I watched the way Mike Mitchell moved – and not only when I was guarding him on the court.  I studied him from the bench.  That was when he played for the San Antonio Spurs.  And he just blew me away.  He’d go right, and then they’d bump him and he’d stop, turn and go the other way.  So one day I just went out and worked on that shot.  That became a patented shot of mine.  Before, I would just get it and then turn and shoot.  Or maybe fade away.  That’s what Bobby Dandridge and the Big E used to do.  And then one day we just happened to be playing against San Antonio, and I was just blown away by what Mike Mitchell could do.  So he helped take my game to a new level.  From then on I was able to face up, and then have another move ready when my opponent started crowding me.  I could act like I was going to drive, and then when they cut me off I could stop and take the shot.  If you go back and watch some of the tapes of Mike Mitchell, and his turnaround jump shot, the way he would drive one way and spin back…if you cut him off going to the right, he would come back toward the lane and shoot the fade away jumper.  If he was driving left and you cut him off, he would come back toward the baseline and shoot it.  So I picked up that part of my game from Sam Mitchell.

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