Andy wanted passionately to be here. |
Andy was passionately talking about being at Ole Miss, and John Hartwell handed him my compensation list, and he said, 'I'm not interested in that,' and turned it over. I liked that. |
Because Rod means so much to the Ole Miss family, this was a difficult decision. However, due to our lack of success in the Southeastern Conference, I felt a change needed to be made. |
Coach Vaught took Ole Miss football, and to a certain extent the University of Mississippi, into the national spotlight. |
Fans, being what they are, sent names and stuff in, but we're not even focused on that right now. When the season's going good, or bad, there are always coaches that you're watching, because you never know. But I wouldn't want that to be an indication we're doing that this season. ADs always do that. |
From a recruiting and academic standpoint, trying to practice on the same court poses some problems. They are not monumental problems, and we've been able to overcome them for some time. |
He had three or four years of experience in his one year. If you go and look at the things he had to do ... he had to dismiss players, had to dismiss a coach. So many of the things he had to do, a lot of coaches go two or three years without having to do. I think he has done an admirable job in growing at such a fast rate. |
He wanted to be here. He knows that he can be a success here. He's been a success before. He knows what it takes. |
He won't be our coach next year. I'm not sure how all of that works out, the terminology of that. I just don't know. We hadn't spent a whole lot of time talking about that. |
I didn't know Andy Kennedy. There are a lot of folks who just like their names in the newspaper and want to be perceived as being part of the search for their own reasons. We wanted to see how wide a net we could cast, then start filtering out the ones who didn't fit. |
I do think that he's got several folks he's talking to. I talked to Ed (Saturday) morning. I think he's still looking for the best fit for Ole Miss. |
I talked to him right before tip-off and told him that he was our man. I told him that you're the guy that we want to lead Ole Miss basketball for 10 years and he said, 'I really appreciate that.' I told him, why don't we talk after the game and he said that would be great. |
I think all you can really do (attending games) is see how they conduct themselves, their mannerisms, how the players respond to them and how they talk to the other coaches on the bench. I don't know if any of those in particular are earth-shattering pieces of information, but it's another piece to the puzzle. |
I think that, when it all boiled down, production of the offense was a major factor. |
I think you weigh all of the issues together, including the interview. It still may be close, but you've got to have all of the components. |