Some of the cast members entering CBS’ spinoff The Challenge: USA aren’t very familiar with what the MTV show generally consists of or who has been on the competition series.
However, Big Brother winner Xavier Prather isn’t among those individuals, as he recently shared he watched The Challenge back in the day and is a fan of the show.
With that, he also listed off some of his all-time favorite cast members from MTV’s show and a few reality TV stars he’s connected with that may have given him some advice for the spinoff. He also explained why having numbers heading into The Challenge: USA was a tough situation for Big Brother.
Xavier Prather is a fan of The Challenge OGs
The Challenge has aired 37 seasons on MTV, and with that, the show has featured plenty of memorable individuals amongst the various casts of competitors. Some of them are true legends in the game, and Big Brother star Xavier Prather said he’s a fan of several of those OGs.
While speaking with US Weekly about his upcoming appearance in CBS’ The Challenge: USA, Prather indicated that he used to watch the show around the time certain Real World stars transitioned to the competition series. Those stars are now legends in the game.
“I was very familiar with The Challenge. Like I watched back when CT [Tamburello], Leroy [Garrett], Wes [Bergmann]- they were all coming straight from Real World, and then had done the first couple seasons of [the show]. Obviously, when I found out about [the spinoff], I started watching some of the more recent seasons,” he shared.
He shared that one of his favorite players is Leroy, who is from Michigan, just like himself. Xavier also listed off five-time champion CT Tamburello and Rivals II winner Emily Schromm as some of his favorites, adding that there are “a lot of legends in The Challenge.”
He said he’s also got some friends or contacts who competed on The Challenge after Big Brother. They include fellow BB winners Josh Martinez and Kaycee Clark, the latter of which won MTV’s recent Spies, Lies & Allies season of The Challenge with CT.
Quite possibly, he was able to shoot them a few text messages or call them up to get their thoughts on how to prepare for the intense competition show.
Xavier was hoping Big Brother could work together on the spinoff
With Xavier the winner of Big Brother 23 and six of his season’s castmates with him on The Challenge: USA, he said he knew that players from the other shows would see their numbers as a threat. However, he also felt they could be an effective alliance on the CBS spinoff.
“If we’re able to put aside what happened on Big Brother, I think we can all work together and work together very well, just because when you look at the people from season who were cast on The Challenge, they were some very strong players,” he said during the interview.
Those players include Alyssa Lopez, Derek Xiao, and four people from what Xavier called “the most successful alliance in Big Brother history.”
That’s none other than The Cookout alliance, a group that was polarizing with fans as they watched them dominate BB 23. Along with Xavier, Cookout members on The Challenge: USA will include Kyland Young, Tiffany Mitchell, and Azah Awasum.
“I think we definitely had some strength in the players we brought forth. The question was whether or not we’re going to be able to kind of see the bigger picture and realize that working together might be our best chance of finding success,” he said about The Challenge: USA.
Viewers will see if the Big Brother stars can get on the same page despite what happened in Season 23 in another game involving players getting cutthroat as they try to win major prize money.
The Challenge: USA premieres on Wednesday, July 6, at 9:30/8:30c on CBS.