WATCH: Quadir Copeland: “He lets me be Q and that’s the best part of everything”

Guard Quadir Copeland met with the media on Monday prior to NC State’s first 2025-26 Men’s Basketball practice. You can watch the video above, and read the transcript below.

Hearing Coach Wade talk about you, it seems like y’all have a unique relationship. Talk a little bit about the relationship. You were with him one year, but it seems like you made quite a relationship with the coach in just one year, and you even followed him here.

Yeah, I feel like the best relationship is when you and your friends always play fight, and the next thing you know, that’s your best friend. I feel like that was me and Coach Wade, you know.

In the beginning, our relationship was so rocky. We went through so much, and then once we were able to understand each other, going to all those dinners, going to all those meetings he had with me to make sure I’m level-headed, checking on me all the time, even when we were crashing on each other, it built our relationship to the point where nothing could break us.

He knows me as a person. He knows what I’ve been through. He knows my background. He knows my family, everything I struggle with, everything. He always find ways to help me. He never judges me for who I am. He never tries to change my character. All he ever tries to do is fix my game and help me get to the next level.

Talk about that rocky start. Talk about the beginning of the relationship. What made that rocky to start?

Just me not understanding him, and me also being away from home, and also him having an awful player like me, and him being an awful coach as it is.

I didn’t understand the game of basketball fully. I was coming in trying to be a Point Guard, turning the ball over, little things like that. He taught me structure. He taught me how to be a real basketball player, how to play the right way, make simple plays, make the right plays for your team, and how to keep you being a good player, you know. The flashes and stuff is good for the crowd, but that doesn’t get you nowhere.

Understanding that was amazing.

He talked about how you’ve instantly come in here and been a leader, because you know his system. How have you been able to help people that have never been in his system be able to adapt quickly?

It’s just being a magnet. Having conversations with all our coaches, having a bond and relationship with all our coaches, so I can learn everything. Just learning everything from last year, and never forgetting it.

He allows me to be that voice. At the end of the day, this is his program. He runs this program.

They allow me to be the voice to do that. Allowing me to do that is just letting me be myself. It makes my job so much easier, because I love talking to my teammates, because that just makes them trust me more. I’ve got to play 35 games with these guys, and play the tournament with these guys. At the end of the day, coach gotta coach it.

Allowing me to do that helps me gain more trust from them, helps them look at me as a leader. So it’s amazing. I’m able to be myself.

He talks about how he doesn’t want to change who Q is, that he appreciates that. How much does it mean to you that coach embraces who you are, doesn’t want to change you?

It’s the best part. That’s all I ask for. I only ask for a fair shot and to just be myself. He never judged me for my character.

I’m loud, I’m loud as hell sometimes. He never says nothing, never judges me. He might give me a ‘Shut up’ here and there, but it’s really rare.

He lets me be Q and that’s the best part of everything. I’m comfortable here. I think my whole team is comfortable and everybody lets me be myself.

I can smile. I can be the loudest person, goofy all the time, but I know when to flip that switch.