OSU Players Excited to Get to Work for Boynton

It’s no surprise that an incumbent coach’s players love him dearly. This happens almost universally. Travis Ford was beloved among many of his players. Doesn’t mean he was the guy for the job. But it does feel like with Mike Boynton and his relationship with his guys that something is a little bit different. It’s clear there is a brotherly bond there that doesn’t always exist.

In fact, that was the exact verbiage Boynton used when describing Oklahoma State’s roster on Monday at his opening press conference.

“I didn’t have a brother, but I’ve always had brothers,” said Boynton as he looked at his team. Jeffrey Carroll, Davon Dillard, Lindy Waters and Mitch Solomon all confirmed their new head coach’s sentiments afterward.

“(He’s) a guy who’s been here for year, and he knows the system and we know him and how he rolls,” said Carroll who confirmed the hiring will influence his decision about whether to go to the NBA or return to college. “It’s great for him to stick around for it to be smoother for us next year. I still have some time to think about this and see where I really want to go.”

#OKState players react to Mike Boynton's hiring. pic.twitter.com/MrqiV6RkkI

— Scott Pfeil (@scottpfeil) March 28, 2017

“We got a great coach out of this,” said Davon Dillard who also thanked Mike Holder for listening to the players in this process. “(Boynton is a) great friend of mine. A great role model. I look up to him. I have so much trust in that guy. That’s the best thing our program could have done — keeping it within the program.

“I’m excited for him and his family,” added Dillard. “He deserves it more than anybody. He built a strong relationship with our freshmen. Those guys love him.”

What freshman Lindy Waters said was maybe the most interesting to me. I’ve long been a proponent of treating players and those you manage differently on an individual basis. I think Mike Gundy has done a pretty good job of this in his tenure so it excites me to hear the same about Boynton.

“I was excited,” said Lindy Waters. “Throughout the whole year he really pushed everyone on the team. He really brought out the best in everyone and he really knew how to connect with each and every person differently.”

And finally Mitch Solomon said he wanted Boynton to get the gig and was elated that Evans stayed as well as associate head coach.

“It’s huge,” said Solomon. “Both of those coaches are some of my favorite coaches that I’ve had in a long time. Having them on the staff, they know us, they’re going to already be ready to know what we need to work on, what we do well, stuff like that. I’m super excited. I can’t be any more thrilled start workouts again with coach and hit the ground running this summer.

“I was hoping he was going to get the job. So it’s a huge weight off my shoulders just to have a coach again so we can start getting ready for next season. Me and Jeff have both been here for a long time, so I think we’ll definitely have some more in-depth conversations with him than in the past. Just about how our team is doing and different things, so I think we’ll definitely have good relationship and be able to bounce things off each other and go from here.”

Maybe this all of this doesn’t matter. Maybe Tom Crean or Doug Gottlieb or Tim Jankovich or whoever would have galvanized the players on Day 1 as well, but it became clear to me as everyone was talking on Monday that Boynton has a bench full of guys who will do anything he says. That matters in the thick of the Big 12. That matters in recruiting.

“They know that I care about them and I love them, they know that I will push them as hard as I can to make them better and they respect that about me,” said Boynton. “They let me coach them hard because they know that I care. Ten at night, six in the morning, they can call me for anything. Really, that’s how we got here.”

Common coach speak? Maybe. And it doesn’t guarantee loyalty to a university. But it does seem like Boynton will be able to ask anything he wants of a group of guys next school year which is great, because he’s going to be asking a lot.