Buzz Williams has Ags poised to #GetBetter in fourth season as coach

Texas A&M basketball played more games than anybody in the country in 2021-22 as the Aggies advanced to the NIT Championship in New York. With another year under his belt, Buzz Williams has the Maroon & White primed for success in his fourth season at the helm.

Key notes from Buzz Williams interview

• Everything is good. I’m really excited to go to Media Day and see all of the media. I’ve been waiting. This is media day with Logan? I can’t wait to see Olin. The last time I’ve seen Olin was in New York. I didn’t see him at TexAgs Preseason Kickoff.
   
• Our last game when we played in New York was the last day of March. We traveled back on April 1, which was the day before the semifinals of the NCAA Tournament. I thought our whole program was tired, but in a good way. We played more games than any team in the country. There are certain rules relative to what you can’t do in the offseason with regard to working with your team, such as you can’t work the week of finals or the week before finals. It was April 1, and we had been going non-stop since Labor Day. I told them not to come to the gym or the weight room and to take 10 days off. I told them on Day 11 that we’d get together and figure out what’s best. I always go see the parents following our season, so I went to see our returning players’ parents during the dead period before the recruiting period opened up. Our staff was gone in April, and we signed two players early in Erik Pratt‍ and Solomon Washington‍. We signed four players from the transfer portal in the spring. When we met on Day 11, I told them to do what they think is best because it was only a short window before we could not do anything. I think that was probably right, and then we got back the week of Memorial Day because that’s when the summer session starts. You can work for eight weeks until the end of summer school. We had a calendar for everyone in the program. Not every summer has been the same since we got here, but it was a good ebb and flow.
   
• In the summer, we work mostly on skill development and work with our guys and specifically on their individual game. Every player has an individual plan that is almost like a business plan. We meld what they think they need to work on and what I think they need to work on to develop that plan.
   
• The last week in August, we had OTAs: Organized Team Activities. That was where we taught our defense, which we call Seattle Three. We ran that last year, and in the offseason, we watched very possession vs. high-major competition to find out what we learned from Seattle Three in regards to how it was attacked, how we can do better and what we can do better so that we knew what we needed to teach in OTAs. This was the first time since we’ve been here that school started on a Wednesday, so we did OTAs for offense on the first day of school. We typically give them the first full week of school off. We start Individuals with Buzz the day after Labor Day, and this was the first time they didn’t have school on Labor Day. We did 10 Individuals with Buzz, and that bled into Boot Camp. It is a week of Boot Camp that leads to training camp. During training camp, we practice five times. We’re now off on Wednesdays and off on Sundays. In the 42 days before your first game, you can only work 30 times. We’ve learned that we’d rather have the same weekly itinerary. We’re starting our third week of that. We’re in a good grove right now.
   
• When we came to Texas A&M in April of 2019, the program had already booked a foreign trip, so that summer, we had 10 practices. We started terribly in non-conference and won five of seven to close conference play. We were scheduled to play Missouri in the SEC Tournament, and that’s when the world shut down. From that moment, for the next 15 months, many things that we could control, many things that happened to people within the program that couldn’t be controlled, and many things that happened to the program that we couldn’t control. It was a very volatile time, as it was for everybody. We played less games than any Power 5 in the country, didn’t play in February and finished in last place. We lost in the play-in game, and then saw a mass exodus of players, none of which ended in a bad way. It was just a bad experience for a number of young people. None of us had experienced a global pandemic. There were no visits, no campus visits, and we couldn’t go see players or recruits. That summer, last summer, was a complete reset. It was almost like Year 1. We threw away the offense and defense. We had a new team. We had to decide how we wanted to build this as if we were starting over. In some respects, it was fun because it was a new day, every day. We started 15-2 and 4-0 in the SEC. It was like, “Oh, I guess we’re doing some good things.” Then we lost eight games in a row. Four of those were by one possession. We finished by winning 12 out of 14. It was almost three different seasons in different ways. Going into Year 4, we have had players that were important to what we’re doing that are returning. From a recruiting standpoint, it was the first time we could be more specific to what we needed on the floor and more specific on what was important to us from a character and player standpoint. Our staff has been superb with respect to the world changing and our motto having to change. We can decide what to adapt and what to keep.
   
• Our “old” guys, many of which are still young, have done a really good job in regard to their spirit. For the first time, there is real competition every day. That’s hard. I have great respect for how our returning players have welcomed our new players. Like anything else in life, your pace and habits when you’re brand new help you realize what is important. You can get on that train or not. If you don’t get on that train, you’re probably not going to have much success. It’s a balancing act, but our staff, returning players and new players have done a good job of pulling in the same direction.
   
• In Year 1, nobody knew what Boot Camps was. During COVID-19, it was abbreviated, and it wasn’t really Boot Camp because of the protocols. Last year was a brand new Boot Camp. Finally, the returners know what is expected. I can give them the practice plan, and they know what is expected. They know what we’re going to do tomorrow and get to figure out how we’re going to win that game. We did a little bit of that in Individuals with Buzz. Every day was a game. What I am trying to be cognizant of is how to give them ownership and, within that ownership, see them figure out who needs to do what. We’re trying to figure out how to give them ownership along the way so they can understand how difficult those decisions can be and also hope they realize that if they join forces, the team can be even better. I respect both levels of experience for realizing that the best way is to do it together. They’ve done it better this year than ever before. It forces guys that know how to win to make decisions specific to winning, and it forces guys to listen to the coach on how to win to perform their role to be successful.
   
• I think we’re further along in any category. Individuals with Buzz and Boot Camp have low percentages to do with basketball. Not a lot of technical strategy is going on. Those have to do more with who are you and who are you as a competitor. Can you lead, or are you just talking? Is your leadership impactful? We give away the month of September on what I believe gives you your best chance in February and March. Over my career, that probably means we win one less game in non-conference than we should, according to Vegas, but we win two more than we should after Valentine’s Day. The reason I say that is because there is no confusion within the program with who you are competitively. There is no confusion about who is the leader and who is following the right leader. Everybody is on the same page in regard to the intangibles because of how much time we give to the intangibles in September.
   
• We have an annual review. I meet with our guys after recruiting is done because I want a non-emotional discussion because I want them to have ownership in what they need to improve on and why. I partner with them in those discussions. In 2022, you have to create as much ownership in the program as possible, and each student-athlete has to feel as if you’re in support of what they own as it allows them to support what you’re trying to do as a team. Similar to the NBA, we do shot analytics of every shot you take against high-major teams. It’s very in-depth. I give them data and go slow to walk through it. I show them clips from 27 different games, but it’s not every shot. We do the same thing with turnovers because everybody turns it over. What category were your turnovers? Regardless of position, we want to take their body of work and break it down to where they realize what they’re good at and what they need to be better at. I’m not selling them on anything. In those instances, I’m just an outside basketball analytics guy to tell them what smart basketball people think of their game. All of the skill work we design comes from those discussions.
   
• I’ve known Tyrece Radford since he was in high school, and he got here following the pandemic year. He shot 12 percent from 3-point range as a freshman and 24 percent as a sophomore. If he was ever going to be a player, we had to be committed to him shooting 1,000 shots a day or else teams were never going to guard him. He shot 41 percent from 3. We had to figure out how to get his diet right, and now he’s at the lowest body-fat percentage that he has ever had.
   
• With the new guys, you can say you know their game because you see clips, but you don’t really know their game. We do Shooting with Buzz, and it’s just with me. It’s literally just shooting. We play a game depending on shooting ability. We record every shot they take, time it and look at the analytics. I don’t want to judge a player based on what I saw when they were coached by someone else. The evaluation of new guys takes time. I have a pretty good idea of what I think, but I want to create ownership.
   
• If you’re talking about the four transfers, each of them has a different story of why they came to Texas A&M. They have a different story of why they entered the portal. During Shooting with Buzz, it’s a good opportunity to get to know them. It’s a way for me to build relationship equity and allow them to get to know me before I holler and scream. I want to help everybody, and I want to coach everybody. Right now, I’m coaching everybody, and I need to see how they respond when I’m coaching them. We need reps of that before we have officials at Reed Arena.
   
• Dexter Dennis is the best listener I’ve ever coached, other than Nickeil Alexander-Walker. Dexter did not do anything this summer because he had an internship. He has grown in every respect: How he listens, speaks, learns. He’s very mature. Athletically, he’s a two-time Defensive Player of the Year in the Missouri Valley. He competes on every bounce defensively. Every day, he gets better and better in our system. I’m a huge fan because it’s rare to find somebody that has eligibility left that processes information as fast and mature as he does. He’s very even-keeled.
   
• Julius Marble II could, in time, be our best back-to-the-basket guy that we can throw it to. He has really good touch. He’s also very comfortable on the perimeter with the ball. When he has the ball, I have peace. He makes good reads and decisions. I love his physicality. He is not afraid to hit, and he’s not scared to be hit. I think he likes it here, and I really like him. He’s quick-witted and very intelligent. We play differently than Michigan State, but his role gives us something similar to what we had with Josh Nebo towards the end of Nebo’s senior year.
   
• Every quote shirt has a story. I only wear a quote shirt in postgame. I have a quilt made for every year that we’ve been doing it. “BYOE” is something the team likes because of the colors and the fabric. A lot of guys remember the story: It was our first Power 5 road game with last year’s group, and it was in Corvallis, OR, which is on the other side of the earth. When you get to Corvallis, it’s the end of the earth. “BYOE” was what I talked about in pregame there. Normally in pregame, I don’t say much. I’m ready to play, prepared and not overly emotional. I was overly emotional that day. I thought it was a big step for our program at that time. “BYOE” is “Bring Your Own Energy.” I told them if they didn’t have the energy that I coach with then they probably wouldn’t be able to play that night. From start to finish, we won that game because of our energy. In the second half, we were so good. When the game was over, the kids were saying “BYOE.” That’s how it turned into a quote shirt. Every quote shirt has a story behind it, and every shirt has a lesson behind it. The only people that get quote shirts are the guys who get on Team Bus 1, except for my wife and kids. They get mad because I’ll store them on my dresser, and when they ask if they can have a shirt, I say I have to teach them the lesson first. My wife is somewhat disengaged from quote shirt lessons.
   
• I’ll do better with the media on Wednesday than everybody thinks, especially with Olin.