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BIG 12 CONFERENCE MEN'S BASKETBALL MEDIA DAY

October 24, 2017

Jamie Dixon

Kansas City, Missouri

THE MODERATOR: Okay, we're now joined by TCU Coach, Jamie Dixon. Coach, welcome and your thoughts about the upcoming season?

JAMIE DIXON: Thank you. It's great to be here and great to be back in Kansas City. What I know about this conference is that it's really good. I have been in some good ones and I'm excited to be a part of this conference again. I love the round Robin, I love -- after going through the tournament, the Big 12 Tournament, I think Kansas City is an awesome place to have it. Atmosphere is great and hopefully we can get to the a point where we're getting great crowds in here to watch us from Fort Worth. So got a great team, some guys out now, but I think they will be back by the time the season starts, working hard and doing the right things on and off the floor. Excited about them.

Q. What was your reaction to being picked higher in a preseason poll than the football team?
JAMIE DIXON: There have been a few jokes thrown around about that throughout the summer, I guess. Gary was giving me a hard time at some points, but I guess he's getting the last laugh right now. They're fourth in the country and we're proud of what they're doing.

I would like to be the guy like him that goes from 6-7 to 7-0 that quickly. I thought we had a nice team and we were young last year, we got guys returning. I think we kinda recognize that had we would be picked higher. I think it's actually -- it speaks to more of the -- I guess we've been picked last every year in the Big 12, so I guess it's a little bit of a change for us. But as I told our guys beforehand, it doesn't mean anything. We've got a lot of work to do and we've still got a lot to prove that we have to do for us and for our fans and throughout this league. So it's nice but it doesn't mean a thing to us.

Q. Jamie, just curious, that being said about still have a lot to prove, at the same time are you ahead of where you thought you might be after your first season at TCU coming in there?
JAMIE DIXON: I mean, I know from the outside and going in you never think you're going to go tenth to first, but that was our belief. That was our goal last year. We thought we could. I mean, obviously some would say it's unrealistic, but it can't happen unless you do believe in it. I know everybody talks about rebuilding plans and how long it's going to take and once I get my guys in there and I've never been that guy.

I haven't had to do it a lot. I've done it as an assistant. But I wanted to embrace the guys that are there and say thew they're our guys. They were well-coached. Trent left us good players and coached 'em hard and got 'em ready. I thought there were some things there in place.

We were, about halfway through the conference, we were in a good spot. We just didn't get it done. Maybe you had to go through that process at some point, maybe not in the first year, it happens in year three, four, that's usually what I've seen in rebuilds that I've been a part of, but we didn't look at it as a rebuild because our history hasn't been good enough to talk about the past. But we look at it as a start-up. That's what I told the guys, it's a start-up, this is the first time we've been in a conference like this with the resources, with the new arena, with you guys as players.

So everything was new and good and nothing had anything to do with the past. So that was our mentality. I know -- I've had coaching buddies that have said you're winning too quick or you're changing too quick. I had a few guys giving me a hard time this summer, but it's -- I guess we've, you know, give me time. I never was the guy that was saying it's going to take some time. We never said that. We expected to win and we expected to win now and that was our mentality. It was great for us. We won 24 games, nobody every thought, but in my mind we should have won more, so I wasn't satisfied.

Q. News about Jaylen's injury came at a weird time, during the summer.
JAMIE DIXON: Right.

Q. Mid to late August. Where is he with that and do you expect him to be good to play?
JAMIE DIXON: We will practice later today when we gets back. He's been doing 5-0 shooting skill work and he's on the verge of doing 5 on 5 stuff. So I guess throw that in there you think he's probably going to be ready about the start of the season, November 10. So we feel like it's -- he looks fine. I mean, watching him do skill work and watching him run through our 5 and 0, someone would say why be didn't he practice when you see him on the floor. He looks fine. He goes extremely hard, always has, always does. The injury happened on our ninth practice the next to last one before we went to Australia and it was one of the last plays of practice. We weren't doing a lot of live stuff, 5 on 5 stuff, and we were very short that day in that area. But it was something that had already been there from a previous injury and we're lucky, really, the timing of it because we think he will be ready and in pretty good shape to start the year. You would like some game situations under his belt, but that may come in the regular season to get him ready. So he's in good shape. Kouat has been out with a concussion for a couple of days. He didn't play in our scrimmage on the weekend, but he should be practicing here in a couple days as well. Everybody else is in pretty good shape.

Q. Winning too quick, huh? You were accused of too much too soon?
JAMIE DIXON: Well, I mean, you know, it's -- I've heard people say that, coaches have said that. Coaches speak, doesn't always mean it's accurate. We do have to be realistic and look at our past. It's not great. So that's probably where it comes from. We had good players there, and I knew some of them -- Alex Robinson we recruited at Pitt. He visited us. I knew he was sitting out, that was a big help. I heard Kenrich Williams was good, better than I was told, better than we thought. Now he's as good as anybody in the league, I believe.

So Vlad was -- he just kept getting better because he works. There were some pieces there and like I said. Trent won a lot of games, coached a lot of people, coached a lot of pros. He developed some guys and made 'em tougher. So there were some good situations as far as the improvement in the facilities, resources, commitment, all those things that came about with it. So I think there was a lot of things in play there, but, you know, we felt we could win right away and they believed in it and we tried to convince them and we went through a tough stretch and maybe we didn't believe enough or we hadn't been through it, but as the year progressed we got better for it.

Q. I'm wondering if there is an NIT bounce?
JAMIE DIXON: You hope! That's the plan. I think that's why we're picked where we are picked and you see a lot of things that have us in the Tournament and winning some games and doing that. That's the plan and we have all our guys coming back, that helps, 5 of our top-6 leading scorers, you have a guy sitting out that would have played a lot of minutes for us in Kouat. So there are a lot of guys, I think we added the right piece. I think Ahmed is going to give us some great minutes inside as well. There are eight guys I feel really good about once we get Kouat and Jaylen out there, we have got to get a couple other guys to give us some minutes as well, get a little more comfortable out there as well, two new guys. But it's a good group and good balance and I think we're playing in the best league in the country so we need to be ready.

Q. Wondering, you spent all those years at Pitt in the Big East, big, physical, strong league. How much of an adjustment was it going through the Big 12, playing styles, that kind of thing? Was it an adjustment for you? Just a different style of play I imagine.
JAMIE DIXON: To me, the biggest thing was playing everybody twice. Smaller league with nine teams there was more familiarity. You know you're going to play them again home and home, and I think the game has changed, more so than the league. Every rule that changed, that they make is to help the offense, scoring more. So that's more what we're dealing with I think than maybe the change in conference. I have changed conferences as we have changed these rules. So going from the Big East to the ACC there are no more physical leagues, it's not allowed to the degree -- I mean, some teams are more physical than others. But I think you still need to be physical to some degree defensively and it's playing the right way and being just as physical, but doing it without getting fouls called on you, without putting your guys in foul trouble and without putting them at the free throw line. That's what we're working for and trying to develop that reputation.

I think that's important, too, because as a program we were -- our reputation was being last. We've got to develop a reputation of being a great defensive team, sound, fundamentally consistent and efficient at the same time.

THE MODERATOR: Coach, thank you for your time.

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