A Super Talk Mississippi Media Production.

It is time.

We've been looking forward to this for a couple of weeks.

Chris Jans, the head basketball coach at Mississippi State, joins me now here on Thunder

and Lightning.

Coach, great to have you along with us.

I thought back to your first press conference at Mississippi State when you talked a lot about the transfer portal and you talked a lot about how it's

building a team year to year. And then you went and kept all five starters off of an NCAA tournament

team. Did you even think that something like that was still possible in this day and age of

college basketball? Hey, Brian.

Good to be back.

I haven't pondered that question very long, but I would say I don't know the facts,

but I can't imagine there's many teams across the country that have five starters back. I don't know of any

off the top of my head, but I certainly don't track all 363 Division I teams. But it is quite

remarkable. And we took great pride in the fact that those folks made the decision to come back and be bulldogs.

And when I first arrived, certainly a part of, you know, getting a new job is players

you inherit.

And, you know, it's the same old, same old, hey, you didn't sign up to play for us, give

us a chance.

And for the most part, you know, we've got the kids to stay that we wanted to after we did

a brief evaluation of video, getting to know them, et cetera.

But it was a lot of blind faith.

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