Buzz Williams Addresses Lengthy Postgame Meeting Following West Virginia Loss

Following Virginia Tech's 88-63 loss to West Virginia on Wednesday, head coach Buzz Williams made himself available to the media roughly an hour and forty-five minutes after the game had concluded due to a postgame meeting with his players. After today's 73-68 victory over NC State, Williams candidly addressed the issue with the media. Williams' complete statement is as follows:

"I think this will be the first time in my career as a head coach, this is my ninth year and I've never said anything before you guys pigeon-hole me on the questions you have pre-arranged. But I do want to say this, I mean this as genuine as possible. The buttons on Twitter, I don't know what they all are. So every morning after I get through working out, I send a tweet. And I know how to go to compose it. I know how to send it. And then I let my wife hit the button that has all of those mentions. So, this is maybe not the right thing to say. I took the job because of Whit (Babcock). And I met Whit in Chicago. And then the next day, Whit was in Milwaukee. And maybe it's because I grew up in the country, but where I grew up, when people hired you to haul hay, you were responsible to the man that hired you to haul hay. And so I know that being on time with the media is a portion of my job. I mean that respectfully. But I want to tell you that to some level, what you say and what you think, has no impact on me because my responsibility are to the children and to the families represented in the locker room first. And second my responsibility is to Whit, my boss. And so for those of you that I found out that were talking in a very negative way about me, that really is offensive to me. And I want to say that I try to be as accessible and blunt and transparent with the media as I can. The reason I was late was not because I was having a meltdown with our team. If I was having a meltdown with our team, I would have said, 'I had a meltdown with our team.' So I apologize for being late and I mean that genuinely. But if you ever think that being here (with the media) is more important than me talking to our children or my responsibility to the guy that offered me the job, unequivocally, the answer is no. And I hope that doesn't offend you or the other media around the world that are watching this. But it's just in my heart what I believe to be right. Now I'll answer any questions you have."