TRANSCRIPT: Everything Coach Beard said after Ole Miss men’s basketball falls to Vanderbilt

Ole Miss men’s basketball (19-8, 8-6 SEC) fell on the road at Vanderbilt 77-72, Saturday at Memorial Gymnasium. The Commodores (18-9, 6-8 SEC) were led by Chris Manon with 16 points. Ole Miss forward Malik Dia led all scorers with 22 points on 8-of-12 shooting.

After the game, head coach Chris Beard spoke with media. Here’s a transcript of all that he said. 

Chris Beard’s Opening Statement

“Just congratulate Vanderbilt on a good home win. I said it a couple of times this week in the required press conferences, I think (Vanderbilt) coach (Mark Byington) should be in consideration for national Coach of the Year — first year, eight transfers, one freshman literally kind of flipping the the field of Vanderbilt basketball. So, good team, only two losses at home, I think Mississippi State and Auburn, they’ve beat some really good teams on their home floor. And they added another one today.

“I thought the difference in the game was obviously our poor start. They were very aggressive out of the gates and we needed to take that first punch a little bit better than we did. I thought the free throw differential was obvious. You know, they didn’t foul much and they got to the free throw line. So we’ll have to look at that from the film. But I think you give Vanderbilt credit for being aggressive in terms of the overall free throw discrepancy. It’s something we’ll just have to look at. But it was obviously a factor in the game when they make more free throws than we shoot, two aggressive teams playing.

“And then lastly I thought No. 30 (Chris Manon) for them, don’t want to mispronounce his name. Man, I was really impressed with him this week in preparation. I think he’s one of the best players in the SEC that no one’s talking about. And obviously today he just filled up the stat sheet playing about half the game. So, again, congrats to Vanderbilt. Good home win in the SEC. We played well at times today, obviously to get back in the game. But the start of the game and the end of the game is where we didn’t play well enough to win on the road.”

Question: They’ve been known for their ability to force turnovers. And obviously you guys haven’t turned it over much throughout the year. What did you see that they did there? What worked for you guys? What did they do that disrupted you.

Chris Beard: Yeah I mean when our starting point guard has five turnovers in the game, it’s going to be very difficult for Ole Miss to win. And so I would give Vanderbilt’s defense credit for that.

Question: With Malik coming back here, did you sense any emotion from him that was extra. How did you kind of coach him through that?

Chris Beard: No, I know Dia started his career here. It was different coaching staff, different time. I know he has a lot of respect for the people here. I talked to him about that kind of during the recruiting process. But from my point of view, nothing going on different this week with Dia.