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Everything Coach Yo said after Ole Miss’ third consecutive opening-round win

Ben Garrettby:Ben Garrett•03/21/25•

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The No. 5 seed Ole Miss women’s basketball team on Friday advanced out of the first round of the NCAA Tournament for the third consecutive season with an 83-65 win over 12-seed Ball State. 

The Rebels (21-10) comfortably handled the Cardinals (27-8). Kennedy Todd-Williams and Star Jacobs each had a double-double and Ole Miss led for 34 minutes of the game. The 18-point win is the fifth-largest in an NCAA Tournament game in program history.

Todd-Williams and Jacobs had 11 rebounds apiece. Jacobs scored a team-high 18 points. Madison Scott chipped in 15 points. The all-time Rebel great has now scored in double figures in the NCAA Tournament five times in her four career trips thus far. Todd-Williams finished with 14.

Ole Miss faces No. 14 Baylor on Sunday at a time yet to be announced. Here’s everything seventh-year Ole Miss head coach Yolett McPhee-McCuin said afterwards.

RELATED: Ole Miss misses out on a host seed on way to earning fourth-straight NCAA Tournament bid

OPENING STATEMENT

McPHEE-McCUIN: Just incredibly grateful for the win. We don’t take any win for granted, and we respect anybody, we just don’t fear anybody. So, we came out with the intent to respect our opponent and play until the buzzer ended. I was really happy that I was able to almost play everybody on the roster. I thought that the seniors were locked in, and it showed on the court. We’re one of the 32 teams that will be moving on, and that means something to me, these players and this program.

ON GETTING A WIN IN HER RETURN TO WACOY

McPHEE-McCUIN: Well, I’ll tell you this, once we found out — once I realized that we wouldn’t be playing in the same building, I felt like the juju was lifted. It’s funny that you said that because I just told Maddy, it feels like a huge weight off our shoulders because she was here with me.

But I didn’t really allow it to affect the game plan because we’re just such a different team now, and that was our first time going to the tournament, and I think it was only like three of us in the whole room that had been to the tournament.

The only people that hadn’t experienced NCAA Tournament on this team are the freshmen. And four of the players had experienced Sweet 16.

We feel confident and more prepared. But it was a sigh of relief. It was in the back of my mind.

ON JOY IN HER PROGRAM

McPHEE-McCUIN: Well, for me, I think I’ve learned more than anything just to stay — to have a level of humility, to always look at things half glass full. Did we want to host? Of course. But I couldn’t even bring myself to complain when the first two years, we won like four conference games. I’m just not going to ever forget that.

So for me, I count it all joy, seriously. I think the humility that it took to understand where we were and where we’re trying to go, and we haven’t looked back. This is our fourth consecutive year in the NCAA Tournament, and I just think I’m always going to be grateful for the opportunity to lead this team, grateful for my administration for sticking by me because people don’t do that now, and it’s paid off, and grateful for the players that decide to come and join us at Ole Miss.

ON THE REBELS’ 12-0 RUN IN THE FIRST QUARTER

McPHEE-McCUIN: Well, we had been off almost two weeks, so it’s a long time. We just had to get some anxiety, some rust off. And I can tell because they were incredibly winded, and I don’t know how because we’ve been like on vacation for two weeks. I just started really subbing and getting bodies in so that we could just — I felt like we had more depth, and we were able to just get bodies in and keep the whole team fresh.

We just needed time to settle in. Hopefully, we don’t have to settle in on Sunday. It’s go time, playing Baylor at home.

ON THE REBELS’ DEFENSIVE KEYS AGAINST BALL STATE

McPHEE-McCUIN: You know what? I don’t know how much you’ve looked into us, but that’s what we do. We haven’t been playing — like our strength of schedule is a 3. Our last loss was against the No. 1 team in the country. So, we’re no strangers to playing elite-level talent and dictating and disrupting. We weren’t going to change anything for Ball State. Like I said, we respect everybody.

We just came in and instilled our defensive system, which is to dictate and disrupt, and then offensively, it’s to rebound, run and share the ball.

We had a letdown, honestly, in the fourth quarter, but I played some people that usually don’t get minutes, and for me, it’s about creating moments for everybody. I’m not quite happy that they scored 65 points, but like I said, half glass full, right? It was more important to give some people some opportunities to create a memory for themselves and create moments for themselves.

But that’s what we do. That is our identity. We just kind of imposed our will on them.

ON BEING ABLE TO LIMIT THE MINUTES OF THE STARTERS

McPHEE-McCUIN: Yeah, it’s huge. Here’s the thing, a day in between is big for us. In the SEC, it was like every day.

But again, I want to play as many people as possible, honestly. If I could play 10, I would play 10 on a consistent basis just because of how hard we defend and how hard we run on offense. We try to control the pace.

I don’t think you can control the pace if you can’t go into your bench.

But I was very proud that we were able to give a lot of players an opportunity today to get that experience. It would have kinda sucked if some of these kids never had the chance to get out and play and their parents watch them and stuff like that. I’m a mom of two; I know what it feels like. So if I can get them in, that’s important for me, for them to be able to play in front of friends and family.

ON THE OLE MISS DEFENSE TRAVELING

McPHEE-McCUIN: Yeah, absolutely our defense, that is our identity. If you look at our packing list when we distribute it to our players and you say like socks and stuff like that, on top, it says defense. So, we pack our defense in our suitcase and we travel with it. Like today, uncharacteristically, KK went 0 for 6, but she was guarding. She was defending and able to impact the game. We don’t really allow our offense to dictate how we’re going to play.

As far as Baylor is concerned, I need to watch a little bit more film on them. I don’t like to get ahead. My assistants will have the scout ready. I didn’t really watch them, but I do watch a lot of basketball, and I know that they’re a really good team. And so schematically, we’ll have to make sure we are on the same page defensively, but we’re going to do what we do.

Hey, we play in the Southeastern Conference, all right. We play against Madison Bookers and Flau’jae Johnson. We play against pros, Mikayla Blakes, every single night. This will be no different. We’ll be ready.

ON THE OLE MISS MEN AND WOMEN WINNING ON THE SAME DAY

McPHEE-McCUIN: Yeah, the other day, I tweeted everything school. It would be selfish of me just to talk about men and women’s basketball, but I was elated that Coach Beard and his crew pulled out — a lot of people were talking a lot of trash, so we represented today on both ends. But our rifle team just won big. Our softball team, they may be undefeated. If not, I know they won a bunch of games, baseball, track just won a championship. We’re an everything school, and that is a testament to, first of all, our chancellor, Chancellor Boyce, and then our AD and our administration. Keith, Jen, the whole crew, they support us.

We do operate like a small market NBA team, but we know how to make it work because there are a certain type of kids that fit at Ole Miss, certain type of people that fit at Ole Miss, and all of the coaches have done an excellent job going out there and identifying that.

So, I think we’re an everything school. But I’m super pumped for our men’s team, as well.

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