They Said It: Western Carolina Postgame
Samford Scoop got the chance to talk with Samford head coach Bucky McMillan, Rylan Jones, Trey Fort, and Brody Boyer following the 93-79 win over Western Carolina on Senior Day. Fort led Samford with 24 points, 5 rebounds, and 5 steals. Jones had 16 points, 7 assists and 5 rebounds while Boyer finished with five points in four minutes of action.
Q: After Wednesday’s loss you mentioned that the first half shot selection should have been better. What kind of improvement did you see on that front today?
Bucky McMillan: "The faster we play, the better shots we’ll get. It’s how you get great shots is that you play faster. I think a lot of our shots aren't coming the way that people would would think which is we’re not necessarily moving the ball enough. Like number one you want to score early and score late. So if you don’t get what you want early, you must score late. But the best shots come in transition early, so we gotta get back to running and being us and our players playing free. Try to get great looks early and then be willing to get them late. I thought our shots that we got were all very good. They were very good shots. There were very few that I looked at and thought that was not a good shot. I really felt we could have scored about 110 points if we had a little better night shooting the basketball.”
“I think the way that we played offensively, the pace, some of the things we were doing, fits our best players. Fits our best scorers, you know and allow them to get loose. And if you look at the shot balance in the game. it's more indicative of the way that it probably should look in terms of who's getting the shots, where they’re getting the shots. And I think we’ll see some significant offensive improvement here. I think we're about to be back to be a really exciting basketball team to watch.”
Q: On Senior Day, what has been the impact of Rylan Jones on your basketball team and especially the way he scored and shared the basketball today?
McMillan: “I mean he’s all about winning. We looked at it when we recruited him here, we talked about what he would be able to do here. Like I mentioned when you look at the deal unbiasedly, he’s been on certainly the best team in the history of the school. Let’s just call it what it is. Right? We have to call it what it is from last year’s team. Then here is arguably the second best team right here for the season and he was the point guard who led the way. RJ, he’s one of these guys that doesn’t want to let anybody down and on senior night it’s the day to give thanks. I really appreciate what RJ done for this university and a lot of times, the player thanks the coach for what they do for you, for what a coach does for a player. I just wanna say when it comes to RJ, I appreciate everything he’s done for me personally. Think about that you know. So Samford has made an impact on people, but there are very few players that have that type of impact on the university and he’s certainly one of them.”
Q: You guys were able to play with much more pace and forcing 28 turnovers helps but was that a point of emphasis coming into today?
Rylan Jones: “Yeah that was basically the biggest point of emphasis we had the last two days is how can we get our offense going and how can we play like we’re down 15 from the start was basically the message going into today. Like Coach Bucky said that starts with being the most unselfish team you can be because we’re not to play as many minutes for how hard we have to play and try to give yourself up for 1-2 minutes and get the tempo going to where we wear teams down and use our depth and great players that we have to score 93 points. I mean we scored 93 points and we didn’t even shoot well at all really. So we just have to continue that and build that on into the next game and practice next week. Then continue to get better, keep playing our best basketball going forward now.”
Q: For each of you can you just reflect on what Samford has meant to you on senior day?
Brody Boyer: “The people, the whole organization, the teammates, the coaching staff, it means a lot to me since this is my first time away from home and they take me in as a family. I just like going to battle with these guys all the time in practice making these guys better, you know, encourage them. I love the coaching staff, I love my teammates.”
Trey Fort: “For me, I’ve definitely had a couple stops. Just ever since I got here, the people coming in and working the (summer) camps and being able to experience and have fun with the kids. Their parents see how you are with the kids and everybody is just having fun. Then to come to games and you see them on the sideline and they’re cheering you on and believe in you. They want to see you hit the three, get the dunk and all of that. Like he (Rylan) said, it’s from the top as well from the President, Coach Buck, all the assistant coaches, our managers, you guys, it just feels good to have love coming from everywhere around you. Even my teammate’s parents, that feels amazing so just being able to have that environment it just makes you want to go hard. They’ve made it to the tournament and have done great things in the past. I just want to make sure that we continue to progress and win as far as this year for the people that’s here supporting us.”
Jones: “Same here, obviously Samford was my last stop. You know I couldn’t be happier to be here and just the people. The Samford community, the people around Birmingham have taken us in and enjoyed the way we play and supported us since Bucky’s been here and me for the last two years. It’s an amazing feeling and I’m happy to be able to call this place my second home and a great stop on my journey. The teammates, the coaches, Coach Bucky, President Taylor, Martin Newton our athletic director, it starts from the top. Then it fills all the way down to the bottom to the people that work during our games that do the stuff behind the scenes, like ya’ll. It really means a lot, that these two years, my favorite two years of college basketball and I’m excited and proud to call myself a Bulldog and look forward to keep it going down the stretch.”
Samford is on the road for their final two games at VMI on Thursday and at UNCG on Saturday.
