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Former Panthers HC Matt Rhule: Proud I never lost the locker room

anthony rizzuti
·2 min read
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Matt Rhule may have lost his job as head coach of the Carolina Panthers, but at least he never lost that locker room—at least according to Matt Rhule.

In the second appearance of his media reemergence—just one day after his interview with The 33rd Team and Vic Carucci was released—Rhule hopped on Tuesday’s episode of Good Morning Football and reflected upon his tenure in Carolina. The 47-year-old said that although he wishes he had a better chance to build relationships within the organization, he can still hang his hat on maintaining the support of his players.

“I think when I look back on my time in Carolina—I look back on it fondly, I’ll say that first,” he said. “I think I’ll always take away from it that no matter what level you coach—when I’ve coached at FCS, I’ve coached at Division III, I’ve coached at Group of Five, Power Five and then the NFL—it always comes down to relationships. And if I could go back, I wish I would’ve done a better job in year one and year two of having really strong relationships with the players.

“And I can blame COVID and masks and all those things. But last year—at the end of last year—I got together with Shaq Thompson, I got together with Christian McCaffrey. And, ya know, I went back to just being Coach Matt. The guy that was coaching at Temple, the guy that was running around in a t-shirt and shorts, having fun with it. And it didn’t end the way I wanted it to, but I’m proud I never lost the locker room. I’m proud those guys fought and stood up for me ’til the very end.”

The very (bitter) end, which came on Oct. 10, left the Panthers at 11-27 under Rhule.

Regardless, Rhule continued by stating that he hopes to get another chance to coach football. But, at least for now, he’s having fun coaching up his daughter’s jump shot during his time away from the game.

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Story originally appeared on Panthers Wire