STARKVILLE — Mississippi State Director of Athletics Scott Stricklin is adamant he didn’t hire a resumé as the school’s new men’s basketball coach. He hired a man.
Instead of wondering about Rick Ray’s past qualifications, Stricklin would prefer fans and players introduce themselves and be drawn to Rick Ray, the man.
Ray was introduced to the public Monday morning in front of a crowd of roughly 200 people at Humphrey Coliseum. The longtime assistant and associate head coach said the only thing he knows how to do is to win basketball games.
“I don’t know how to lose,” Ray said. “All I have known is winning my whole life.”
Ray has accepted a four-year contract to be MSU’s 19th men’s basketball coach in school history. His contract will pay $1 million per year. The hiring confused some MSU fans and reportedly upset some high-paying boosters of the program, who expected a more well-known candidate to be offered the job. Stricklin and Ray acknowledged the hesitation about the hire.
“I get that, and everybody wants a sexy hire,” Stricklin said. “When we sat down a couple of weeks ago, I was not looking at a label. I wanted a person who fits our qualities the best.”
Stricklin laid out those qualities March 15 when he spoke to the media following a news conference to announce Rick Stansbury’s retirement as MSU head men’s basketball coach.
“Smart, competitive, intelligent, hard-working people who understand how to attract and sell what we have here at Mississippi State University, attract people to it,” Stricklin said when asked what he’s looking for in a candidate.
Stansbury, who retired as the school’s all-time wins leader after 14 seasons as head coach, averaged 21 wins a season. He won one Southeastern Conference title and two SEC tournament championships.
Ray emphasized the importance of seeking out the help of Stansbury, who didn’t attend Ray’s news conference, as he begins his first stint as a head coach.
“(Stansbury) laid a great foundation, and I want to acknowledge him for his great job,” Ray said. “I am definitely going to reach out to him because he knows about basketball in Mississippi, and it would be foolish for me to not reach out to him.”
Ray, 40, spent the past two years as associate head coach at Clemson University. He also spent time as an assistant coach at Purdue University, Northern Illinois University, and Indiana State University.
Ray touted his experience at hard-nosed programs — especially Purdue and Indiana State — as an indicator of how he plans to run his program at MSU.
“The program I want to run will allow players the chance to flourish,” Ray said. “I believe in individual development. The game is played through the players, and this is going to be a players’ program.”
Ray addressed the fact he never has been a head men’s basketball coach, but he doesn’t feel the move from assistant to associate to head coach will be daunting.
“I don’t think it will be a problem because I was given a lot of room in my previous jobs,” Ray said. “It could be daunting for other people, but I do not think it will be a problem. I relish the opportunity. I do not believe I will be nervous at all.”
While working for Clemson coach Brad Brownell, Ray was responsible for game planning and scouting opponents. He also was given freedom to offer input on game nights.
“Brownell’s system gives assistants on rotation a chance to do everything a head coach does from receive scouting reports to formulate game plans and then present them to the team,” Greenville (S.C.) News sports editor Bart Wright said. “His approach will be to make it built to last. He has a great shot to be a good hire, assuming they support him at Mississippi State.”
Ray promised a “physically (and) mentally tough” style of play that will push the ball up the floor. The statistics of the teams he helped coach at Clemson and Purdue suggest otherwise. In his past four seasons with the Tigers and Boilermakers, no team averaged more than 70 points per game or were in the top 200 in the country in creating turnovers.
“One team came to me with three or four of the so-called leaders of the program and they said, ‘Coach we want to play faster and we want to fast break more,’ ” Ray said. “I looked at them straight in the eye and said, ‘Why the hell don’t you?’ ”
In the past two seasons, suspensions and discipline issues have been prevalent at MSU. The program also had to deal with a highly publicized fight in the stands between Renardo Sidney and Elgin Bailey in the stands during a tournament in 2010 in Hawaii. Stricklin and Ray said those issues would be addressed in the Bulldogs’ locker room. Ray said he would do it early in his tenure.
“I think we’ve got really good kids in our program,” Stricklin said. “I don’t think the kids we have are discipline issues. They’re hard-working kids.”
Ray agreed and stressed improving the perception of the men’s basketball program has to start with the season-ticket holders and the people in the Magnolia state.
“The system we will run is based on integrity,” Ray said. “I believe you win by doing things the right way. I want to make sure we put a team on this court that you guys are proud of.”
You can help your community
Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 38 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.