Thursday, March 26, 2015

Xavier's Matt Stainbrook drives an Uber to make up for scholarship he gave away

Matt Stainbrook does more a lot more driving than what your typical college basketball center usually does. At least off the court.

You see, Stainbrook, a fifth-year player enrolled in grad school and currently leading Xavier into the Sweet 16 this weekend, also drives an Uber car to help pay his bills.



Stainbrook was on The Dan Patrick Show on Tuesday and explained how he gave up his scholarship to his little brother, a walk-on for Xavier basketball. 

"My little brother's a walk-on on the team, and he's doing undergrad classes right now while I'm doing my grad school in my fifth year," he said. "Grad school costs about $14,000 a year while undergrad costs about $43,000 a year. So, for me to be on scholarship and only using it for $14,000 didn't make sense to me. So, I talked to the compliance people, and they said I'd be able to switch my scholarship with my little brother, so I ended up doing that.

"And in order to pay my bills, I needed a flexible job, something to do to make some money, and I saw someone Uber-ing one day, and I said, 'Hey, you know, that's probably something I can do. I have a car, I can drive.'"



Stainbrook also joked that he drove a 2004 Buick Rendezvous, which he said was "the most typical old-person car you can have."

And could actually accommodate his 6-foot-10-inch frame.

In December, ESPN produced a video of Stainbrook driving for Uber in his time off.

In the video, Stainbrook explained that he has fun meeting and driving strangers, though he doesn’t plan to drive a taxi for much longer. He wants to take basketball as far as he possibly can, and when his basketball career is up, go into corporate finance. He would like to own a restaurant one day.

“I think a year from now I probably won’t be driving a taxi,” Stainbrook said. “I’m hoping not.”

For now, it's all about that drive to the Final Four.

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