‘Morphed into something more’: Marcus Ginyard returns to UNC under new role

Marcus Ginyard has done it all at the University of North Carolina. Slam dunks, three’s, a national championship and knowing what it’s like to be the big man on campus. But he wanted more, and the university wanted more with him.

Just announced on Tuesday, Ginyard has been named the University’s Director of Special Projects and will work in the Chancellor’s office.

“This originally started with the possibility to join the University in a real estate role coming from the private sector,” Ginyard said. “That’s where the conversations started, and it kind of morphed into something more.”

UNC-Chapel Hill just welcomed its largest freshman class ever, with plans on getting bigger. Ginyard is helping to plan that expansion.

“One of the things I’m going to be working on is ‘Carolina North'”, Ginyard told WRAL. “As we think about how we are going to physically expand our University. I’m getting involved with Athletics and getting involved with Public Affairs. Just a wide variety of different things which keep me super busy, but I’m very excited.”

Ginyard is in a unique position of once being a UNC student athlete and now getting to help plan for the university’s future expansion. He has a different perspective on how to make the future work better for students and the University itself.

“That new perspective and fresh set of eyes is exactly what the University needs right now,” Ginyard said. “There’s a lot of things that’s changing and it’s going to take a lot of creativity and a lot of different perspectives to come together to make the best decisions for this University moving forward. I’m grateful and excited to bring that perspective to the school for the (betterment) of the University.”

Ginyard will be working in the Chancellor’s office, which means he’ll work closely with Chancellor Lee Roberts. It was Chancellor Roberts who took the big swing to hire Bill Belichick as the school’s next head football coach after Mack Brown was fired.

Even though the early returns on Belichick’s tenure at UNC haven’t delivered, Ginyard believes now is the time for UNC’s leadership to rally behind Coach Belichick.

“We haven’t gotten the results that we’ve wanted up until this point, but anybody that’s been around sports understands that it’s not all smooth sailing,” Ginyard said. “I think this is a great opportunity right now to come together as a University and support Coach Belichick and the program. (We know) All great programs have to get through adversity. This is something that takes time.”

Ginyard has been in this position for about two months, even though it was just publicly announced on Tuesday