The Rundown Take
New Lease on Life: Randaysha Hinson McCreary on Chasing the Crown and the Mental Health Behind It
With Larry Frank Jr. on the road, Devin held down a special Tuesday edition of U Talk: Winning at the Game of Life solo, welcoming a young woman he'd watched grow up — Randaysha "Randy" Hinson McCreary, a 24-year-old University of Alabama graduate set to compete for Miss Alabama USA as Miss Huntsville in January 2023. The conversation moved past pageant prep fast, landing on family, faith, rejection and the mental health platform she's built her run around.
Key Takeaways
- Randy is competing for Miss Alabama USA in January 2023, with Miss USA and eventually Miss Universe as the stated long-term goal.
- Her platform, "A New Lease on Life," is built entirely around mental health — normalizing therapy and other outlets in the Black community and treating any form of self-expression as valid, from art to journaling to singing off-key.
- She graduated from Alabama with a degree in criminology and criminal justice plus African American studies, and named it her proudest accomplishment to date.
- Her father Jeff called in live from Columbia, South Carolina, and her mother Tanya Alexander closed the show with her own on-air message — both visibly emotional with pride.
- Her favorite book, The Alchemist, doubles as her personal philosophy on setbacks: she says she treats every rejection as a redirect rather than a loss.
Family as the Foundation
Asked who she looks up to, Randy named her parents first — her father for his quiet, steady work ethic, her mother for refusing to let her doubt herself — along with her sister Kenisha, whose own pageant runs first put the dream in her head as a kid. Two live callers reinforced it in real time: her father Jeff, who told her he was proud and that she and her stepmother Michelle had his full support, and her mother Tanya, who described her as a go-getter from a small town who comes from a family of engineers and medical professionals.
Rejection, Faith and the Mental Health Message
Pressed by a caller on how she handles rejection, Randy said she faces it daily and has trained herself to hear "no" as "not yet" rather than a verdict on her worth. She tied that directly back to her platform, arguing the Black community in particular needs to destigmatize therapy and other mental health resources, and that comparison culture on social media makes the problem worse by hiding everyone's private struggles behind a curated feed.
"Chase your dreams — don't even chase your dreams, because the need is running from you. Turn your dreams into reality. Be true to yourself."
The show closed on a somber note, with Devin sending condolences to Kane Nation regular Dexter Sigler on the loss of his father, before confirming U Talk would run one more recruiting-focused show the following Friday and then take its usual two-month hiatus — with Randy's audience left the number to support her run directly.