Top player Miller, McNeilly leaving
COLLEGE STATION — Entering his third season of a below par tenure to date, Buzz Williams now must rebuild his rebuild at Texas A&M.
The Aggies’ best player, forward Emanuel Miller, is leaving the program after playing two seasons for Williams, first reported by ESPN. So is guard Cashius McNeilly, after not playing his first two years because of injury and opting out.
Both are from Ontario. Miller was easily the Aggies’ top performer in 2020-21, averaging 16.1 points and 8.2 rebounds per game. He was one of the few bright spots of the Aggies’ 8-10 season, including 2-8 in SEC play during a condensed year because of COVID-19 issues within the program.
The Aggies’ winning percentage in league play (.200) was their worst since then-coach Melvin Watkins finished 0-16 in the Big 12 in 2003-04, leading to his firing.
Meantime, the Aggies have added forward Ethan Henderson, who averaged 1.3 points and 1.6 rebounds over three seasons at Arkansas, and junior-college shooting guard Aaron Cash.
Williams, a former A&M assistant under Watkins’ successor, Billy Gillispie, turned around a sad-sack Virginia Tech program entering his third season in Blacksburg, Va.
The Hokies made the NCAA Tournament in three consecutive seasons before Williams exited Virginia
Tech for A&M in his home state.
Williams now will count on incoming freshmen Manny Obaseki and Wade Taylor, two highly touted guards, to do much of the heavy lifting for the Aggies starting this fall.
Three other scholarship players from this past season, Savion Flagg, Jay Jay Chandler and Kevin Marfo, also have elected to play their “bonus” senior seasons elsewhere. The NCAA did not count a year of eligibility for athletes in 2020-21 because of the global pandemic.
Flagg and Chandler were recruits of previous A&M coach Billy Kennedy, while Miller, McNeilly and Marfo all were Williams recruits. In addition, forward Jonathan Aku, another Williams recruit, also is exiting the program, one more example of how different the Aggies will look in Williams’ third season, one in which he was expected to have the Aggies back in the NCAA Tournament.
They last made the tournament in 2018 under Kennedy, in losing in the Sweet 16 to Michigan. He was fired a year later after missing the NCAA Tournament in six of his eight seasons at A&M.
Williams, easily the highest paid A&M basketball coach in program history, is entering the third year of a six-year contract that started at $3.8 million annually in 2019-2020 and increases by $100,000 each year.