Buzz Williams shares thoughts on Texas A&M's focus in Kentucky win

Texas A&M was locked in from start to finish during its 97-92 win over Kentucky on Saturday. After the win, Aggies head coach Buzz Williams discussed his team’s focus in the massive triumph.

“We’ve done all of the right things,” Williams said. ” We did the right things yesterday. I thought shoot around this morning was really good. They’re so fast that you have to start real fast because they can overwhelm you immediately and you never have a chance. I told our guys that. They knew.

“We practiced differently at the start of practice. Basically, we flipped the practice plan. We just flipped it upside down. How we normally start practice, is how we ended practice. How we normally end practice, is how we started practice, just in hopes that the change would bring awareness to our mentality.”

Texas A&M’s change paid off. The Aggies connected on 12-32 (38%) of their attempts from -point range. For reference, Texas A&M is only shooting 27% from deep this season. Beyond the arc wasn’t the only place Texas A&M was particularly efficient.

In the win, Texas A&M only committed nine turnovers while squeezing 11 out of the Wildcats. Wade Taylor IV and Tyrece Radford were particularly spectacular. The pair combined for a whopping 59 points and 15 rebounds.

A long time in the making for Texas A&M

Radford’s 28-point performance was a season-high. Texas A&M’s stunning performance wasn’t an overnight success. In fact, Williams claimed it started early last week.

“When I walked in the locker room Tuesday night after the game I said, ‘I feel completely different than I did Saturday night after the game. Do you guys?’ ‘Yes.’ I said the results say that we’re 0-2, but I think that what we did tonight is dramatically different than what we did on Saturday.”

Texas A&M began conference play with back-to-back losses. The Aggies’ first defeat was 15-point blowout at the hands of LSU. Only three days later, Texas A&M fell again, this time by 11 points to Auburn.

While the final score was similar, the feeling was different. Obviously, the Aggies carried that momentum into their victory on Saturday. It is the first time Williams has defeated Kentucky in his four matchups against the Wildcats since taking over at Texas A&M.

Buzz Williams and Co. will look to carry their rhythm into Tuesday when they face off against Arkansas. The two teams will square off at 9 p.m. ET. The game will be broadcast on the SEC Network.