For NC State women’s basketball guard Grace Hunter, a redshirt junior, basketball is a family affair.

“I grew up in a big family and everyone played basketball,” Hunter said.

A big family might be an understatement, as she grew up with a whopping 12 brothers and sisters. Her parents homeschooled most of them in Raleigh, but found that their backyard basketball games had created some quite impressive talent.

After her oldest brother went on to play at Louisburg Junior College after never having played organized basketball, Hunter’s parents started sending their children to high school for exposure.

This led to seven of her older siblings playing at least one season of college basketball. With Hunter being the youngest girl, and third youngest overall, playing against these older siblings and great competition helped her immensely basketball wise, but also did a lot for her socially.

“As a person, it definitely helped me be a lot more social than a lot of people,” Hunter said. “I know how to have a good time because we were always playing family games, so I’m always the person that’s like, ‘Let’s play this game.’”

Her teammates and coaches see that impact too, as Hunter is known to have a fun demeanor and keep everyone laughing.

“She’s got a lot of personality, very outgoing,” head coach Wes Moore said. “The players think she’s funny and get a lot of laughs off of her. High energy on the court and off the court.”

What she brings on the court though is intensity and an aggressive play style. Coming out of Athens Drive Magnet High School, Hunter was the 100th overall player in her class after averaging 30.8 points and 7.9 rebounds per game as a senior despite only measuring 5-foot-9.

Before enrolling at NC State, Hunter attended UNC-Charlotte for two years, where she lead the team in points and rebounds her sophomore year, with averages of 17.2 points and 8.6 rebounds. During her time there, she was named to the Conference USA All-Freshman Team and All-Conference USA first team.

Even though she received all those accolades, she still had a “Mamba mentality,” the moniker of her favorite player Kobe Bryant, that helped her move forward.

Disappointed with Charlotte’s overall performance, she wanted to strive to be better and reach higher goals.

“I just wanted to go to the tournament,” Hunter said. “I didn’t want to settle. I’m the type of person that always wants to play against the best.”

With that, she decided to transfer and started looking at NC State as a possible location due to its prowess in the ACC and its proximity to her family.

Moore wasn’t aware of Hunter at first, but after finding out that there was a player trying to come back to Raleigh he was intrigued.

“When we looked up video and stats, it was pretty impressive what she had accomplished at Charlotte her first two years,” Moore said. “And she was definitely interested in coming back to the Raleigh area.”

Playing in the Raleigh area means a lot to Hunter. Getting to play in front of her family, while being reunited with old Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) teammate and fellow Raleigh native Kaila Ealey, is something that she enjoys.

“Now my family can go to some away games because the conference is so close, playing UNC, Duke, Wake Forest and they can go to all the home games,” Hunter said.

Ealey and Hunter go way back to their high school days and still have a friendship that hasn’t changed.

“We were at Carmichael [Gymnasium] almost every day [this summer] playing against randoms and so that was fun,” Ealey said. “Going out with her is always fun and playing AAU together.”

Adjusting to the ACC is going to be quite the task for Hunter, but the hardest part is over for her after she had to sit out all of last season due to the transfer rules.

“Going hard, knowing that you’re not fighting for a spot, you’re just there to practice, that was the hardest part mentally,” Hunter said. “I took it really good though and thought of it as a year to get better.”

Ealey echoed this sentiment when talking about how Hunter still had an impact when sitting out.

“She was still vocal and for scout team she would act as their best player and that helped a lot with trying to scout other teams,” Ealey said. “She contributed a lot even though she sat out.”

Moore says that Hunter handled the situation well, knowing that for any athlete taking a year off is a tough task.

“It was tough on her, she loves to play,” Moore said. “It was tough practicing everyday but not playing in the games. But I think she handled it well. It was good to have her there on the scout team as we prepared for opponents. I like her a lot better in this role playing for us instead of just helping us prepare.”

As the season gets underway, Hunter will look to provide the Wolfpack with the much needed scoring and rebounding lost through the departures of Akela Maize and Chelsea Nelson as well as an injury to Ealey.

“She is definitely going to be someone that is going to play a very important role for us and will have her games where she puts up numbers.” Moore said.

“Energetic, crazy and hard-working” is how Ealey describes Hunter, who will use her pre-game snack of half a Snickers bar to become the dominant force she knows she is, because “you’re not you when you’re hungry.”