Catching up with Buzz
Buzz Williams has plenty on his mind these days.
As he watches Jerel McNeal, Wesley Matthews and Dominic James move on to the next stage of their lives, he's making sure his returnees next season finish out the spring semester on a strong note, while at the same time trying to pave the way for his seven-player recruiting class that will arrive on campus in the coming months.
Williams continues to recruit, he's aiming to improve the basketball camp that bears his name and also trying to play catch-up on some things that fell by the wayside a bit during this past season -- his fitness level being one, with strength and conditioning coach Todd Smith putting MU's head man through strenuous daily workouts.
Oh, and he's also on the verge of becoming a father for the fourth time, with his wife, Corey due to give birth any day now.
"I think that it’s within the next 5-6 days," he said on Wednesday. "She’s had three children naturally and we’ve never found out the gender; allowed that to be God’s surprise to us. Just pray for its health."
Williams said he and Corey have already chosen possible names.
“We’re straight on names," said Williams. "If it’s a boy, it’ll be Nolan, as in Nolan Ryan, and then his middle name would be Orr, as in Coach (Lewis) Orr. Then if it’s a girl it’s Addyson Reese. We’ll call her Addy. And if it’s Nolan Orr, we’ll call him Coach."
While this birth will be a little different in that it's the first the couple will have had during the basketball off-season, Williams has nonetheless become an old hand in the process.
“I can probably tell you as much about childbirth and labor as I can about coaching. I get into it," he said. "Trying to be very supportive, as much as she sacrifices throughout the year. I try to be very involved. I study, I read those books. I know what’s going on."
Williams also touched on what's going on with regard to a number of different topics with the Golden Eagles during a wide-ranging interview in his office at the Al McGuire Center on Wednesday.
The following is what he had to say on all things MU, as school gears down at the end of the spring semester:
Do you have any update on the search for Dale Layer’s replacement on your staff? “No. We’ve signed seven kids. There’s always the chance we’ll sign another one. I don’t ever say that for grief; that’s always our mentality from a recruiting perspective. We’ve signed seven kids, and I want to get them through wherever they’re at academically. They’ve all been admitted into school here for summer school, but anybody can be admitted to summer school. So they’ve got to finish up their requirements as it relates to the Clearinghouse, just as every other kid does. Our current guys are finishing up finals this week, and so we’re trying to get them lined up for summer school. Where they’re at percentage-wise, where they’re at cum-GPA, all those things kind of factor in to what classes they should take. Maurice, Cooby and Lazar are all on track academically, so what they take in the summer depends upon what is available in the fall and the spring.
“Honestly, my entire focus over the last 30 days has been to kind of do some housecleaning things that I never have an opportunity to do during the season. Somewhat get organized. I study a person every month of the year, and then during the off-season I continue to study a person every month, but then I study a segment, a sector, something within the game. Obviously I can get more in-depth with who I study, that person, and then do the same with the game. I want to get all of the guys we’ve signed completely straight, and all of the people that are involved with him – their parents, their coaches. That’s really important to me, that we finish up the right way before they get here. And then kind of the same thing with our current guys.
“I’ve had thoughts about the position, and of course I’ve fielded millions of calls. But my answer to all of those calls has been the same answer that I’ve had to you: I want to finish our recruiting, I want to make sure our current guys are where they’re supposed to be academically. I want to have a distinct plan for every single person that’s going to be here this summer, because this summer is so important with the change. Todd’s got to be on point with those guys. Ernest’s got to be on point. Adrienne’s got to be on point. Because those are the only people that can have hands-on contact with them. So I’ve spent a lot of time with those three people. I want to be the husband and father that God intends for me to be with my wife, whenever she has the baby. This is the first time that she’s ever had a child that I’ve been able to control my schedule, so I’m looking forward to that. I want our camps to be really good.
“I thought our camps were good last year; I want them to be great this year. This time last year, I was just trying to hang in there, still trying to hire people, figuring out our recruiting not only for the ’08 class, but the ’09 class. I think that camp is a way for our program and for us as coaches to give back to the game. I don’t look at it as a money-making opportunity; we lost money last year at camp. And I don’t care about the money. I want camp to begin to be something that people in the city, parents in the state, want to to send kids to. And so once we kind of get all that figured out, then I’ll probably begin to be serious about who I’m going to hire. It’s kind of like recruiting: always be honest with everyone. But three is equal to one. Three average equals one good, three good equals one great. I want the great one. I want the great players, and I want the great coaches, and I don’t think you hurry up to do anything.
“When I look back to who I hired this year, I think our staff was the perfect example to our team without it ever having to be spoken that every day is a work day, and that everybody has to be a part of the team. That’s the most important thing to me: you hire someone with great character, and you hire someone that understands that they’re going to work every day, and they want to work every day, and that they’re going to be a part of something bigger than themselves. In this business, because of Marquette, the league, there’s a lot of people that have interest. I always trend toward those underdog-type guys. And I don’t want an egotistical person, a selfish person. I don’t want a selfish player, and I don’t want a selfish coach. And I think it takes time to think, and to spend time talking to a lot of different people to figure out who’s the absolute best.”
Do you have any update on Liam McMorrow’s situation at this point? “No, but it’s almost come to a close. It’s close.”
Are the seven incoming recruits all where they’re supposed to be academically at this point in the year? “They’re all, as of today, exactly where they’re supposed to be, with over half of them ahead of where they’re supposed to be. Our staff’s done a great job throughout the year of being consistent in dealing with all the people involved, and they’re right where they need to be. I mean, I can break it down to you to the point. But considering the size of the class, it bodes very well for who we’ve signed, and speaks very highly of our assistants because that’s a lot of stuff. A lot of time. We’re right where we need to be. Right where we need to be. Which is good.”
That’s a lot of legwork for everyone to do, is it not? “It’s the same every year, everywhere. But when you’re dealing with seven? That’s an army. Your whole group has got to be on point with that, and that’s what those guys have done a great job of. When Tony’s not there, Aki goes in there. And then in April, Monarch went in there. Because everybody knows exactly what the deal is, and when you only have one guy that knows the deal, that’s not good. Of course, I’ve done it for so long, I know exactly where we’re at.”
Is it safe to assume that the prep work with regard to the signing of Youssoupha Mbao was the most involved? “I think the amateurism part. He’s really smart. He’s done really well academically. He was excellent before he came here. Any time you’re an international kid, you’re going through a different segment of the Clearinghouse. But because you’re international, their amateurism is different than that in the United States. Again, we’ve been completely on top of that from the beginning.”
You mentioned the seven-player class you have coming in. Are you excited from the standpoint that you’ll now have a full roster, and one comprised mostly of players that you’ve recruited and signed? “I think we’re definitely trending in the right direction. Ideally, you’d like to sign four guys a year. If you’re signing four guys a year, that probably means that your classes are balanced accordingly, and that probably means that if you’re consistent in signing good players every year that you can withstand anything that would possibly go wrong that you don’t know – somebody gets hurt, somebody gets homesick, somebody doesn’t like you. You can withstand that. All of us knew it was going to be a large class when we came here. I like who we’ve signed. I think that they fit ideally, as we begin to build, the direction that we’re going in. Hopefully next year, the next year, the next year, we can begin to kind of settle in with regards to not having to sign as many. But I’m definitely excited. I think that all of them give our team something in a lot of different ways not just on the court, but off the court. Any time you’re dealing with seven new guys, Lazar is extremely stable, as is Cooby, as is Mo. There hasn’t been a lot of change within those guys’ careers, so their role will have to expand just because they’re going to have to help those seven new guys.
“Chris and Joe, neither one really played much. If I would have known how much they would have missed, and then the time it would have taken after their injuries to even get to the point where they could help us, I possibly could have redshirted both of them. But if we’d have redshirted Joe, we wouldn’t have won at Providence. I think that each of those guys have continued to get better, but they have to have a really good year for us in their own way. They don’t have to be All-Stars, but they have to have a presence on the court daily – not just on game day, but in practice. I think Jimmy Butler, like I told him, I knew he had a high ceiling when I recruited him, but I’m not sure with where that ceiling is any more. If he levels off, then he’s an OK player. If he continues to keep growing, and he stays hungry, and his game continues to evolve, he may end up being better than anybody had ever thought. I love who he is, and I love his demeanor. I love his demeanor off the court and on the court, because he does exactly what you say, and he wants to do it the right way for the right reasons. And it’s hard to find kids who have that pureness in their heart in regards to they’re hungry to do right, and hungry to do right for the right reasons.
“So yeah, I’m excited. It’s a long time we have until we lace them up, and I don’t want to get so excited that we forget the impact that this summer can have – because this summer’s really important. Everybody can pass six hours, everybody can be in the weight room every day, and everybody can bond every day. And that’s just as important maybe as anything else at this time of the year, with seven new guys.”
Speaking of Joe, how is his knee doing? He suffered a pretty unusual injury, by all accounts. “I think he has confidence with where he’s at physically for the first time since he got hurt. He’s not going home at all this summer. He’s been working out twice a day, and I think his confidence level in his body is where it needs to be. I think it’s been since Nov. 1, when he tore up his leg. I think he was probably confident in what he was doing in April in individual workouts, but he completed all of it. That’s all over, now he’s kind of on his own with Todd. Even the same with Chris. The last couple weeks of individual workouts, I think Chris may have turned the corner. Now, whether he’s going in the right direction, this summer will tell.”
But there don’t appear to be any long-term ramifications as far as Joe’s knee? “I’ve never heard of it, like we’ve talked about, but he has been fine. He has treatment every day with Ernest. I think Ernest has done a great job of being proactive with regards to this type of injury, how to prevent it from ever happening again. I think like any other injury, you overcompensate within the rest of your body, and I think that’s probably what Ernest is most talented at – being proactive that once a kid gets hurt, making sure the initial injury doesn’t cause another injury. That takes a lot of time with the kid, studying his body, the things that he needs to do in order for that not to happen. Both Joe and Chris have done fine.”
Is the plan to have Junior Cadougan, Dwight Buycks and Darius Johnson-Odom on campus for the early summer session? “We’re running into some issues there within relation to when they finish school versus when we start school. That’s just kind of part of it. I think Dwight could be here early; I don’t know that Junior or DJ will be here early. DJ still has a chance; I would say Junior has a real outside chance. It’s going to be tight on Junior. I think Dwight’s going to work out OK. DJ still has a legitimate chance. And I don’t really care; I just want them to finish up. That’s more of a priority than them rushing and coming up short and then not being able to be here all summer. There’s a lot of kids that have to go to summer school all summer, and never get to be on campus until the fall. They’re all on point to be here this summer. Which summer session they’ll be a part of is relative to when they get out of school.”
Your newest signee, Youssoupha Mbao, seems to have generated a pretty positive reaction because of the fact he’s 7-2, athletic and with a big upside. What do you foresee for him in his first year at MU? “He’s 7-2, he can run, he’s extremely long, he’s much more mobile than you would anticipate a 7-2 player being. He needs loads of strength, he needs loads of weight. But I don’t know that you want him being 7-2 and 280 pounds like you would want a pro to be. He’s a senior in high school, really intelligent, very similar to one of the kids that I coached at New Orleans who was from Central Africa Republic. His spirit is infectious. Just a beautiful human being who’s as interested in academics as he is basketball. His decision was based just as much on the value of a diploma from Marquette as it was to play in the Big East. His uncle is a world-renowned author, and he doesn’t want to talk about basketball at all. He wants to know academically what we have to offer and why this is best. He speaks four languages, but in his home they only speak English. They will not allow Yous to use his native tongue because his parents think it’s important to use the language where he currently lives. He has great pride – he’s similar to Cooby in regards to the pride that he takes in where he’s from and how this opportunity can not only help him, but how it can change the lives of his family. You can’t put a price on that. I think he has a high ceiling. Obviously that’s kind of a pun intended, but he understands the game probably better than you’d think. I think sometimes because of the nuances of how we play, he hasn’t played enough to completely understand those. But he’s very in tune with, ‘I need to pick that up. I need to learn that. I need to watch that.’ And I respect that.”
Offensively it appears as though he’s a project. But on the flip side of the coin, you’d figure he can block shots and can cover up a lot of defensive mistakes by his teammates. Is that accurate? “Yeah, and I think he’s a lot better passer than most guys at his size that I’ve seen at his age. He passes out of the post really well. Yeah, he’s got to get better offensively, but I also think he can offensive-rebound and score putbacks, and I’m OK with that. And I think that he can run well enough that either he will create an easy basket for himself, or because of his size he will create an easy basket for one of his teammates. I’m anxious to coach him. What will happen is he’ll make Chris Otule better, and he will make our guards better. I’m excited to coach him, but I think the guys that have signed to be a part of the same class, they’re just as excited to play with him. He makes everybody better. Kind of like Junior – Junior makes everybody better because he’s a run-your-team point guard that knows how to play. He’ll deliver the ball on time and on target, and he’s got a great pace to what he does. Junior’s not necessarily a guy that’s going to score 30 a game, but he can get 30 a game for his team. I think Yous has that in him too – because of his size, he can indirectly help your team.”
What’s going on with Jerel, Wesley and Dominic? “I talk to them all the time. I typically text Jerel at about 5 o’clock in the morning when I’m on my way to the office and tell him that in Europe it’s 5 o’clock in the afternoon and somebody’s working on their game. Those guys have been very accountable as soon as the season was over in regards to finishing up academically, to graduate, and then also they have handled their quest to find the right agent and to work on their games absolutely perfectly. There’s nothing or mis-managed or mis-handled. They’ve been very mature. They’re around here every day – open gym, lifting with Todd. I still think that it’s early to determine where those guys are going to go. They’ll have workouts over the next couple of weeks.”
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