Everything Chris Beard said ahead of Ole Miss’ 10th all-time trip to the NCAA Tournament

Ole Miss basketball is off to the NCAA Tournament this week as a 6-seed in the South Region. 

The Rebels are playing in Milwaukee on Friday at approximately 3:05 CT on TNT. They’ll draw the play-in winner of San Diego State and North Carolina.

Second-year head coach Chris Beard met the media on Monday to preview. Ole Miss won 22 games this season, including 10 in the SEC. The Rebels are the fourth separate program Beard has led to March Madness. 

Here’s everything he had to say.

ON FRESHMAN EDUARDO KLAFKE

Beard: Klaf’s a good player. Shoots open shots, got a great career ahead of him. There’s only a few freshmen in the country that have played in the rotation all season long on a Top 25 team. We’ve got a lot of confidence in Klafke. We’ll need him to play well this weekend to have a chance to advance.

Klafke’s basically impacted every game we’ve had. Crowd favorite from Day 1 because of how hard he plays. He’s got a chance to be the face of the program moving forward. Just really proud of him. It’s really hard to do. Go back and look at the list of all the Top 100 freshmen, 4 or 5-stars, and how many of those guys have been in the rotation all year long on a Top 25, NCAA Tournament team. Klafke is in a rare crowd with that.

MORE ON KLAFKE

Beard: Obviously he’s got great positional size, he’s got basketball DNA all over him. His father was a real pro for a long time. 

Klafke cares about his craft. He’s going to be a really good player. I’m trying to get him to understand the moment right now. He did a great job in Nashville (at the SEC Tournament) impacting those games. We need him to play well. He’s in our rotation. 

RELATED: Chris Beard defends Ole Miss after being accused of being NCAA Tournament ‘frauds’

ON CBS ANALYST TIM DOYLE CALLING OLE MISS A FRAUD

Beard: I think we’ve got a good team. Just played in what people are calling the best conference in the history of college basketball today as the tournament starts. We’ll see how it plays out. 

Ten wins (in the SEC). We didn’t lose a game this year to a team that’s not in the NCAA Tournament. Road wins, non-conference, BYU’s in the NCAA Tournament. Colorado State, Louisville. Purdue we lost a one-possession game in overtime. In the conference, road wins at places like Alabama. Recent home wins over teams like Tennessee.

I think a lot of things could be said about our team both good and bad. But fraud would not be the word I would think about when I think about this year’s Ole Miss basketball team.  

ON THE NCAA TOURNAMENT MESSAGE

Beard: Just open dialogue with our players. Ultimately our jobs as coaches if you put it down to one sentence, a dictionary, it’s, like, do everything possible to help your guys be successful — whether that’s teaching, coaching, motivation, support, criticism, confidence-building. 

We’ve got a staff where every member has been a part of NCAA Tournament wins and runs. Trying to share our knowledge and our experience with our players — things as easy as logistics (and) how the practice times will work. How the kind of neutral crowds will fill the first and second rounds. The limited practice time we have in the game-day arena. The media responsibilities in the NCAA Tournament. 

“Confidence and calmness come from preparation.”

We try not to have any surprises this time of year — all the way down to the hotel, bus to practice and practice. When you’re really prepared is when you have a chance to be confident. 

With our players that have played in the NCAA Tournament — Sean (Pedulla), Juju (Murray) and (Davon) Barnes — leaning on those guys’ experience. Kind of registering their memory banks to what it was like. With our staff that’s one thing we’ll do. We already started that last night and continued it this morning. We’re just trying to make sure our guys are prepared and knowledgeable of what this tournament is. It’s a little bit different than the games we’ve been playing. The timeouts are a lot longer because of the TV contracts and stuff. Just things like that — preparing our guys so there’s no surprises.

ON DRAWING A PLAY-IN WINNER

Beard: I’ve never been in this situation before. Just spent some time last night kind of digesting it and thinking about it. Also talked to some coaches around the country that have been through similar situations playing the winner of the play-in games.

At the end of the day we’ll know who we’re playing on Tuesday night. We don’t play until Friday, so we’ll have a brief session Tuesday night and then we’ll have two full days of prep Wednesday and Thursday. So, not much different than past NCAA Tournaments where you get the Thursday draw. 

No matter what our schedule is we always try to get back to us. The NCAA Tournament is about matchups, no doubt about it. Scouting is always going to be a part of high-level basketball. But above all it’s about can you bring your identity? Matter of fact, the championship game is played on one-day prep. There’s games Saturday night and national championship Monday night. 

We’ve been in this situation before in the non-conference. We purposely schedule different times, different locations and different prep periods between games. Just reminding the guys we’ve been here before. This will be the schedule this week; that’s the way we look at it.

ON THE FIRST YEAR EVER WITH BOTH THE OLE MISS MEN AND WOMEN DANCING

Beard: Really excited for coach Yo (McPhee-McCuin) and the women’s team. That’s been really cool to watch in my almost two years now in Oxford. Just a lot of respect for what they do on a daily basis. They have a culture, they have an identity and a good spirit around the program. We’ll be pulling for them in Waco.

In terms of our program, you know, seen a lot of growth. We talked about it before, but the increase in attendance, both student section and season-ticket holders and game-day fans, that’s been awesome. Obviously to be in the NCAA Tournament is cool. We can talk about all this stuff after the fact, but there’s no denying, I think 115 years of Ole Miss basketball, it’s the 10th NCAA Tournament bid. That’s cool.

I’m proud of the players and coaches and everybody in our program putting us back on this stage where this program needs to be on a consistent basis.

ON THE DIFFICULTY OF ROUND 1

Beard: I mean, Captain Obvious, but you’ve got to win your first one to get to the second one. But there’s something about the first game. The feeling, the nerves, the newness, the expectations. NCAA Tournament officiating is different. Tournament timeouts and game plan and game setup is different. The venues are different. 

In the SEC we’ve been playing in front of great home crowds or very challenging road crowds. Now you get into a much more neutral feel. Both fan bases will have a section and then most of the arena will be filled with fans from other teams just watching the game. There’s a lot of things that go in the NCAA Tournament that’s a little bit different that we’ll try to prepare for.

We’ve always set it up kind of as a four-team tournament. Most important game is the first one. You’re trying to win two games each weekend to get to Monday night. We spent a lot of time with our guys on that. Consistent with our philosophy. Always is don’t look back and don’t look forward. Just kind of where your feet are. For us it’s today’s practice and preparation. Ultimately it’ll be Friday’s game at 3:05.

RELATED: When Ole Miss takes the court in Milwaukee it will be a reunion of sorts for Chris Beard and Sean Pedulla

ON HAVING PLAYED TOURNAMENT GAMES IN MILWAUKEE BEFORE

Beard: It just gives me and Sean a chance to go back and forth a little bit this week. He had a great individual game but we won the game, so I consider that a victory for me.

I don’t know so much. I remember Milwaukee being a nice downtown. The year we played the weather was a little bit better. Encouraging the guys to get out of their rooms and move around a little bit. Somebody mentioned this morning the weather’s pretty cool there this week. Great city for basketball obviously with the Bucks being there. It’s an NBA town. With Shaka (Smart) and those guys being at Marquette it’s a college town. We’re excited. 

Hope our fans can get there. Just encourage everybody to get there. All the Ole Miss fans, kind of a myth that NCAA Tournament tickets are hard to get. Not true. Those tickets will be available on all third-party sites and there’ll be tickets on the streets for sure. You get to San Antonio (site of the title game), that’s a little bit different deal. 

I’ve always thought the first two weekends of the NCAA Tournament are not an impossible ticket to get. Any Ole Miss fans out there that are willing and excited to make that trip, tickets can be found. 

ON THE STATUS OF MIKEAL BROWN-JONES

Beard: Kind of day-to-day with Mikeal. 

ON THE TRANSFER PORTAL

Beard: It’s a tough one. Last year it was even more challenging. It opened up even earlier than that. I think the idea with the coaches association and ultimately the people that made those decisions was you don’t want to start it too early and don’t want to start it too late either. I guess it’s the Monday of the Sweet 16. The teams that are still playing, challenge for those 16 teams, but kind of hard to feel sorry for somebody that’s in the Sweet 16. Be a great problem to have. 

The portal is alive and well right now, though, with the coaching changes and different rules and stuff. Players are already actively in the portal, But it officially opens, I think, that Monday of the Sweet 16. I haven’t spent much time thinking about it, but it’s hard to coach your team while that’s going on. It’s also really hard in the landscape of college basketball to wait ’til the whole thing’s over ‘cause now you’re in April. 

“It’s just like the wild, wild West right now with no sheriffs.”

Watched a lot of those shows in the last year like 1883 and Yellowstone. There’s another one in there, sneaky other one, 1923. I was actually watching those shows. 

Just really interesting the history of our country and law enforcement towns and all that. I actually did think about the portal a few times when I was watching those ‘cause again we’ve got some rules but not sure who the sheriff is.

ON HITTING THE PORTAL HARD AGAIN

Beard: I would think so. You look at our roster, a lot of guys with that senior next to them. But, no, I think the program’s in good shape. We’ve got a chance to return a couple really good players. Signed two really good high school players early. We’re in no different position than everybody else. College basketball is roster management now. I’ve always been a guy that thinks about the opportunity. I don’t spend a lot of time thinking about the challenges; I don’t set the rules. 

I was proud of our first-year team here. We were pretty good first year. We’ve obviously taken the next step in Year 2. Think we can be a real factor in this tournament. It’s going to go nowhere other than the right direction. We’re going to keep building this thing. Excited about this week in Milwaukee and about the future of Ole Miss basketball as well.

ON MALIK DIA POTENTIALLY RETURNING

Beard: I’m confident Dia will get himself prepared and play well in Milwaukee. Malik’s had a good year. Proud of him. Now it’s time for all these guys to shine. Matt (Murrell) and (Jaemyn Brakefield) have had great careers. Dre (Davis) had a great career. Sean. Dia had a great season. Now it’s time to bring your ‘A’ game on this stage. That’s what March is.