Coming off the first losing season of his Division I coaching career, Chris Beard arrived at SEC Tipoff with a familiar message: expectations remain high at Ole Miss.
Beard outlined a roster built around a blend of returning contributors, highly regarded freshmen and nine newcomers, while expressing optimism about a team he believes benefited from a productive summer that included an international trip to Puerto Rico.
He also touched on the influence legendary coach Bob Knight had on his career, explained Ole Miss’ decision to face Alabama in a preseason exhibition, addressed ongoing eligibility questions surrounding Corey Stephenson and Micah Handlogten, and shared why he believes the Rebels are positioned to surprise people this season.
Here’s everything Beard said Tuesday at SEC Tipoff 2027.
Chris Beard, Head coach
Opening statement…
Chris Beard: Need to hang around Garth more, man. Feel better about myself after that intro. Always an exciting day, kind of the start of college basketball in a lot of ways. We’ve got a lot of optimism in Oxford right now. Our team, much like most other teams in college basketball, is kind of a melting pot. Three returners, two of those guys played major minutes and had some individual success in the SEC last year with Ilias and Patton. Three freshmen that have really impacted our program, kind of fearless guys, competitive guys. Of course, nine newcomers. In those nine newcomers, we stay committed to the build of Ole Miss basketball. So we have some sophomores in there that are, in my mind, kind of freshmen because they’ve got four years of eligibility left. We had a good summer in Oxford, seven weeks of practice. We took advantage of an NCAA rule that allowed us to take an international trip, an international rule that was kind of based on common sense, which we haven’t seen much of lately. But changing that rule to let us go take a trip every year makes a lot of sense. I never understood the once every four. We went to Puerto Rico with our team, kind of a dual-task trip. We got 80 minutes of good basketball against some good Puerto Rican pros, and then we were able to spend some time off the court after a summer of banging on each other. So expectations are high in Oxford. People ask me from time to time, it’s like a really cool time to be at Ole Miss. I think time means everything in life. What our football team’s doing, what our women’s basketball team is doing, a sustained baseball team back in Omaha, Olympic sports winning at a high level. We embrace the responsibility to build a competitive basketball program at Ole Miss. So we’re excited about this year’s opportunity, excited to be in the SEC. I tell the players almost on a daily basis, this is what you signed up for. When all you guys chose to play basketball at a young age, you wanted to play against the best. I know my illustrious career was no different. I vividly remember the Saturdays at Conflans Park or the Thursday nights at Northwest Rec, and you were always excited the nights that the best players were there and the gym was filled. On the nights where the best players weren’t there, you don’t have any stories or memories from those days. So this league allows you to have a story, a memory, every time you take the floor. We’re proud to be in the SEC at Ole Miss. We’re looking forward to this season’s opportunity and challenge.
On his experience working with Bob Knight and how Knight influenced his coaching philosophy…
Chris Beard: First of all, with Coach Knight, Knight School, I hadn’t heard that one in a while. To my knowledge, that was one of the first reality TV shows. So I could talk for a long time about that whole experience. Is that still on TV? I told my three daughters about it, and they didn’t understand. They were like, “You were on The Real World?” No, it wasn’t quite like that. I learned a lot from Coach Knight. It was like getting a Ph.D. in coaching every single day. Obviously, the tactics on the floor, the motion offense, the commitment to defense. I think what I learned most from Coach Knight was probably the idea of preparation. I had been a head coach before my time with Coach. I think our teams played hard. I think we recruited well. But I don’t think at a young age that I really understood the idea of preparing to win. Winning is a choice. I’ve even apologized to some of the players on those junior college teams years later. I wish I would have known then what I know now. I learned a lot of things from Coach Knight. Preparation was probably at the top of the list.
On the decision to play Alabama in an exhibition game despite already facing the Crimson Tide during the regular season…
Chris Beard: The Alabama game on Thursday brings a unique opportunity. To my knowledge, it’s the first, at least in modern history, SEC exhibition game. First thing I’d like to do is thank Nate. He didn’t have to think of us first. When we think about exhibition games, it’s very simple what we’re looking for. We’re looking for great competition. We’re looking to put our teams in tough situations. We’re looking for things to be revealed about our team. This game is obviously going to give all those objectives, as well as a chance to play what I think will be a true road game. The logistics, we have to do better. I literally just thought about this morning. We’re on a plane flying to Birmingham, and then I’m going home to practice and I’m busing back. If Nate gives us this opportunity, or maybe Steven next year, we’ll do a better job with our travel. It should be a great basketball experience for both teams. We’re going to learn a lot about our team Thursday night.
On the challenges of building chemistry with so many newcomers from the transfer portal…
Chris Beard: That’s a fair question that we all get, especially in today’s modern college basketball. To me personally, I know no different. When you build a junior college team, the team changes every year. Sometimes you even add players a semester. Division II and small college are very similar. Many examples. Our build at Little Rock was based on a completely new team. Our build at Texas Tech, we took advantage of the grad transfer rule and added Matt and Tariq that year. Me personally, I know no different. If I ever had the chance to coach a team where everybody returned, it would be like an out-of-body experience for me. Maybe one day. I think the way we’ve always kind of described it with our staffs and then ultimately with our players is that we’re fighting time. That’s our biggest challenge when you put together a team with new players. How do we combat that? What’s our plan? It’s to just try to get a lot done each day. Instead of just having a lunch that’s grab-and-go, maybe we have that lunch where everybody puts their cell phones in the golden bucket, and we invest 30 minutes with just some conversation at lunch. Maybe instead of ending practice after that hour-and-50 mark, we go eight more minutes just going over something one more time. We’re fighting time, so we try to max out each week and the hours we have. That’s always been kind of our first compass on how we put teams together with a bunch of new players. We recognize that we don’t have a lot of time here, so we better take advantage of every minute we have.
On whether being picked 13th in the SEC preseason poll provides motivation…
Chris Beard: What’s up, Neal? We could have done this at Funke’s, man. We probably should have done this at Funke’s. I do care what media thinks, if it’s media that I respect and know. So I value a lot of opinions, especially in this room today. Absolutely, it’s motivation. In our program, we don’t have a lot of bumper stickers, koozies. We don’t have a lot of slogans, but we do have a few that we believe in, and one of them is never lose your chip. We’re always trying to find motivation. We’ve been on the other side of the coin a few times over the years where maybe somebody picks you to win a league. We use that as fuel as well. So it doesn’t really matter where you are in the rankings. There’s an opportunity to find fuel, F-U-E-L. I think every great competitor that I’ve ever studied, known, met with, learned from, it always comes up early on. One example would be when I had a chance to spend some time with Coach Saban after our Monday night team [unclear]. I tried to get in there for years just to spend 20 minutes with him. When that opportunity finally kind of presented itself through Brett and Jimmy and those guys, you would think that maybe that wouldn’t come up in a Coach Saban talk. But in just some brief conversation with him, you could tell he was a highly motivated guy. So whether you’re on the top of the mountain or the bottom of the mountain looking up before the games begin, that’s why we play the games. You’ve got to find that fuel. So for us this season in Oxford, we don’t have to look far. A lot of you in this room aren’t expecting much from Ole Miss, but that’s why we play the games. So we’ll see. We’ve got a good team. We’ve got the right returners. We’ve got veterans. We’ve got experience. We’ve got young guys that have brought an energy into our program. We’ve got a good coaching staff, and I’m not talking about myself. I think one of the stories that nobody’s picked up on yet, but it will be told, is we added Petar Aleksić, one of the top 10 basketball coaches in the world. So for us to get out of our comfort zone a little bit and hire a sitting European head coach, one of the best players that ever came from Bosnia, one of the best coaches that ever coached in the world, to have him on our staff, it’s kind of a sneaky story in college basketball. Now we’ve got to win some games, and we’ve got to make the story worthy of being told. But that’s one example of some things we’re doing at Ole Miss that are kind of outside-the-box thinking. But no, having a chip on our shoulder and having some motivation going into each season is a big part of it, and I don’t shy away from that. What did you pick us, Neal?
On the eligibility situations involving Corey Stephenson and Micah Handlogten…
Chris Beard: I wish there was. Yeah, I wish there was. The 2021 guys get five years because of COVID. The 2023 guys get five years because of the new rule. We’re in a weird time where players have real options and stuff. So I’m not the expert on all that, but just hoping at some point common sense prevails. A part of common sense would be if a guy signed a pro contract, he’s on a pro team, of course. But most of these players, like our two you mentioned, Corey and Micah, are not pro players. They’re simply looking for the opportunity that the class before them and the class after them got. So the timing of the NCAA to come out with that rule, it’s very perplexing to me.
On the lessons learned from last season, his first losing season as a Division I head coach…
Chris Beard: Lots of lessons after each season, regardless of what your final win-loss record is. You reflect on things that worked for you, and you make sure you do them again. You reflect on some things that didn’t work for you, and you look for solutions. You look for answers. So obviously, a lot of reflection this offseason in Oxford. I would say about last year’s team, and I’ll say this whenever I have the opportunity, I was really proud of the way we finished the season playing our best basketball. We were a real factor in Nashville, in a lot of ways just a basket away from a 40-minute opportunity to make the Big Dance again. That’s kind of what college basketball is, right? Our sport’s very unique. You’ve got to get off to a good start. You’ve got to build an NCAA Tournament résumé. But ultimately, if you want to be one of those teams that has a chance to win six games in three weekends, you’ve got to be playing your best basketball when it matters most. We accomplished that last year. We just left a lot of unfinished business on the floor throughout the year where we didn’t have the résumé to get in. But I would argue at the end of the season, we were playing like a Sweet 16-type team. So this year, what worked for us late in the year, let’s repeat some of those things. Where we got ourselves into some trouble in the middle part of the season, we’re looking for solutions.
