An introduction to 'Bucky Ball' with the Mean Streets Podcast guys

Co-hosts of the Mean Streets Podcast, Britton Johnson and William Galloway, have known Bucky McMillan since his days at Mountain Brook High School. The duo joined Monday's edition of TexAgs Live to discuss what kind of head coach Aggieland is getting.

Key notes from Britton Johnson interview

• Growing up in Mountain Brook, we were going to “Bucky Ball” camps when we were eight years old. I played for him all the way through high school. I went to Alabama and played there for four years. I played three years for Nate Oats and won an SEC title there. I transferred for my COVID-19 year and played for Bucky McMillan. It was his third year at Samford, and I wanted to be a part of that journey because I knew he would win titles there.
   
• McMillan plays the most unique brand of basketball you are going to see in college basketball. It's a marriage between Oats’ fast-paced, up-tempo offense with a lot of 3-pointers and layups. He has been doing that since he got the Mountain Brook job in 2008. When Oats got the job at Alabama, it was a smooth transition because I had played that style my whole life. Defensively is where it’s unique from anything else. You are pressing the whole game. You press off of makes and misses. It’s so unique.
   
• The clips of Houston practices are circulating, guys, are all over the floor? That was every single day. That was every day in high school and every day in college under McMillan. It’s a style that almost tricks people into thinking that is why he is successful. In reality, he gets so much buy-in from his guys. I don't know if I've ever had to work as hard as I did at some of those practices. You combine that with the fact he is the most detail-oriented coach I have ever been around. He is Nick Saban-like in his approach to basketball. He is so process-oriented.
   
• I’ve never seen him more upset when we were up 30 and gave up a transition layup for no reason. It’s the gritty details that are why he's had so much success everywhere he’s been.
   
• We live in such a different day and age in the transfer portal era. The John Calipari clip where he said he was going to meet with the team at Arkansas, but he says “There is no team.” That seems to be the feel at A&M right now. McMillan is trying to build a program and get his guys in there. He will get the right program fits.
   
• Samford is a fantastic example of how he flipped that. They were one of the worst programs in the country. The first year was a culture flip. The second year was a big improvement year. My year, we won the regular season.
   
• One thing for me, going from a top-tier SEC school then to playing at Samford, I was so impressed by the skill level of some of these Southern Conference guys. There will be some that follow him that can absolutely compete at that level.

Key notes from William Galloway interview

• I went to McMillan's camp as a young kid. I grew up as a water boy in elementary school, went to his camp and followed him all the way through. I was never the athlete, but I did everything else except play and coach for McMillan.
   
• For McMillan's selection process, I think the first word that comes to mind is resources. He has always succeeded because of the people around him. It's his assistant coaches, his players, and oftentimes, guys who showed up to try out for the program, and they look like Britton and I.
   
• McMillan won five state championships, appeared in seven and was kind of dealt the cards that showed up for tryouts. He took those pieces and molded them together. So he took all of the pieces around him. I think about resources. He has that community buy-in, and then you go, he puts his name in the hat for a couple of different jobs, and maybe it's not the right fit, or maybe the resources are similar or parallel to Samford. You're thinking, "Why would I go and restart and make a jump somewhere if it's the same as what I have here in Birmingham? Why move? Why leave my hometown and my home people?"
   
• You look at A&M, and I think he talked about this in high school, but he said, "If I had talked about the guys that showed up at tryouts, and if you looked around the state, there were teams with a lot more talent, but maybe a little bit less discipline.” Maybe a little bit more athleticism, but if they had McMillan's coaching, if they had the resources that McMillan had, McMillan could have taken them to be the IMG of high school.
   
• He was able to develop those resources and build that culture at Samford, and I think he was waiting on the right fit for getting the support on and off the court, and you look at a place that's hungry to win. They're hungry to win fast, and they're willing to support and do what it takes to get to that level of being at the top of the SEC, which is the top basketball conference. I think when this opportunity came about, and he saw everything and everybody that could get behind him to really go up and make Texas A&M a premier basketball program in the SEC, he said, "This is a place I can do it."
   
• McMillan didn't see his roster on campus and in person until August, and all of a sudden, he won six games. Well, look at the next four years. You exclude COVID-19 and all of the circumstances where you had guys that got ruled ineligible because of the COVID-19 test at halftime of a game. You look at the next four years, and he was No. 1 in the SoCon, over Bob Riche, who beat a team like Virginia. He was 93-38. Everyone looks at those 99 wins but really look at the last four years and look at that 93-38 record. Three Coach of the Year awards. Three conference titles. An NCAA tournament appearance. All of those things.
   
• It's about the players and their buy-in and how much they're willing to buy in. You look at Samford, and Samford didn't have all of the best pieces, and even some of those guys weren't three, four or five-star guys, but they bought in, and they worked together. McMillan, even since Britton was in high school, talked about the games that matter. In the SEC, it's the conference games. You build that non-conference schedule to make yourself competitive in the SEC. I think if the players are buying in, regardless of their stars, regardless of their talent level, if they have that right buy-in, it doesn't matter who's there.