Williams defends ‘diatribe’
Coach stands by rant with Aggies on cusp of going from slighted to invited
COLLEGE STATION — Buzz Williams is on a roll at Texas A&M, but he’s still best known in his role with the Aggies for what critics considered a verbal stagger nearly a year ago — what Williams himself dubs a “diatribe” that drew national attention.
“I was very aware of what that meant relative to the perception of my career, all of those things,” Williams recalled of his nearly eight-minute rant last March in a press conference after the Aggies were one of the last teams left out of the NCAA Tournament. “I said it because I believed it, I didn’t say it because of any other reason.”
Nearly a year later and with the No. 25 Aggies, who play at Mississippi State at 2:30 p.m. Saturday, surging toward the NCAA postseason, Williams said he has no regrets regarding the missive in which he said he had lost “all respect and faith in the system and those that are in it” — aka the NCAA Tournament selection committee.
Williams, who’s in his fourth season at A&M, this month described his players who just missed on the 2022 event as “scarred from what happened last year.”
“And just to be very transparent, the adults are just as scarred,” he said. “… I understand it’s not the politically correct thing to do. I know it gives the media more ammunition toward me or toward our program. But what happened, it transpired in real life.”
Last year the Aggies entered Selection Sunday with a 23-12 record, including winning seven of their final eight games against Southeastern Conference competition with upsets of top-15 teams in Auburn and Arkansas. That had followed an eight-game losing streak in league play, however, that ultimately kept them as one of the last teams out of the NCAA Tournament.
It’s all led to the Aggies (21-7, 13-2 SEC) storming to their best start in league play since joining the SEC in 2012.
“Our program, whether (the players) were here or not (last year), very much understand the value of today and the work required,” Williams said of the Aggies not looking past their next opponent.
A&M’s two previous NCAA Tournament teams in the last decade, 2016 and 2018 under then-coach Billy Kennedy, were 10-5 and 6-9 over their first 15 SEC games, respectively. Both those teams advanced to the NCAA Tournament’s Sweet 16.
ESPN’s latest NCAA Tournament projections have the Aggies as a No. 6 seed. They trail secondranked Alabama by a game in the SEC standings with three regular-season games to go. A&M follows Saturday’s game at Mississippi State, projected by ESPN as the last team in the field of 68 of the NCAA Tournament, with a Tuesday night contest at Mississippi for its final true road game of the season.
“We’re trying to go 1-0 in everything that we do,” said A&M guard Wade Taylor IV, the reigning SEC player of the week after averaging 20 points per game in the Aggies’ victories over Arkansas and Missouri last week. “To be where our feet are and see how the outcome comes out.”
The Aggies, who are the league’s hottest team with six consecutive wins, close out the regular season March 4 against Alabama in a showdown that might be for the SEC regular-season crown. The Crimson Tide (24-4, 14-1) host Arkansas and Auburn in their next two games before playing at A&M.
The SEC tournament in Nashville, Tenn., follows from March 8-12. A&M would appear to be a shooin for the NCAA Tournament, but the Aggies pledge they’re not taking anything for granted after 2022.
“I don’t think that we’re thinking about the future at all,” Williams said. “I don’t say that as the ‘say the right thing coach’ response. I believe that.”
The reason the Aggies, who lost by a point against Xavier in the title game of last year’s National Invitation Tournament, are even in question for the NCAA Tournament this time around stems from nonconference losses to Murray State, Colorado, Boise State and Wofford, before they got their act together in a big way against presumably tougher SEC foes.
“Every game it seems to be somebody different who has a superlative game relative to the box score,” Williams said. “But … in how we go about things on a daily basis there’s a genuine belief that we’re doing things for the right reasons, and there’s an anticipation, which is what feeds your energy, that good things are coming.”