Porter Moser Oklahoma Men's Basketball SEC Tipoff Press Conference

THE MODERATOR: Porter Moser became a household name in March of 2018 when he led the Loyola Chicago Ramblers to the Final Four. But his career could have taken a much different path. After Porter's college career at Creighton, Porter's father, a prominent businessman in Naperville, Illinois, asked Porter to come back home to work for the family business. This isn't just any family business. Porter's father was a distinguished businessman, credited for building much of Naperville, Illinois, one of Chicago's biggest suburbs.

Instead, with his father's blessing, Porter entered the coaching profession. Now entering his 23rd season as a Division I head coach, he has amassed 388 career wins. That's an official NCAA statistic, but we like to do some deep diving here at the SEC, and I also have a statistic from Porter's wife, and according your wife Megan, you also throughout your coaching career have sung the seventh inning stretch, at Wrigley Field for a Cubs game nine times. That's your wife's statistic.

Early in Porter's career as a young assistant coach at Texas A&M, he met Megan while the two were both living in College Station. Porter and Megan recently celebrated their 29th wedding anniversary, and they have four children, Jordan, Jake, Ben, and Max. Two of their children are currently following in their dad's footsteps as college basketball coaches, daughter Jordan is an assistant coach for the women's team at San Jose State. Son Jake is a graduate assistant at Georgetown. And son Ben recently joined Oklahoma's basketball team as a walk-on.

In just one generation's time the definition of the family business in the Moser family has changed.

Please welcome Porter Moser.

PORTER MOSER: Thank you. Excited to be here. You get nervous. You never know with Garth. He's going to throw out statistics. When he opens saying he had a statistic from my wife, my eyes went up. I didn't know where that was going.

Excited to stand here before you and talk the word "retention." Obviously everyone in our profession is dealing with the uncertainty of the transfer portal -- and I've for sure had my share in my five years at Oklahoma being able to retain guys. I'll start off by saying, excited to have our point guard back for the first time in my tenure to have a back-to-back point guard. We've lost a point guard every year. Xzayvier Brown. To have another starter back, Derrion Reed.

I think to lean into that part of it, there's nothing like having guys that have been in your program. For us, two of our key subs, we were able to retain. It's the key. It gives me the vision for the future is that we can retain people at Oklahoma with our new leadership, and that's where we're excited we're moving on to.

THE MODERATOR: Questions.

Q. Obviously you guys ended the season last year on a really hot streak. Just ended up on the wrong side of the bubble, but still played in postseason basketball when a lot of teams in that position decided not to. I guess just looking back on that decision, what do you feel you guys got out of that that you can take going into this new year?

PORTER MOSER: Well, I think it was part of -- we went through a well-documented, really tough stretch. We lost some heartbreakers to some really good teams on some last-second shots, and we fought through it. That was a sign of the culture we had in our locker room, that when you go on a losing streak in January and February, that we didn't fracture. We were staying together.

We were playing as good of basketball as anybody down the stretch, and we just didn't want it to end. Didn't want to stop playing. We were heartbroken, gut-wrenched that we were the last team out. It's not the expectations of where we wanted to be. It's why we fought so hard to turn it, is to playing the basketball we did down the stretch.

When it didn't go our way on that Selection Sunday, the group was crushed. It was one of those things where we just didn't want to stop playing.

What we got out of it a big thing was a guy named Kai Rogers. Kai Rogers played behind Mo Wague last year, and there were games that he didn't get a lot of minutes. We just said, we're going to try to get him double-figure minutes. I thought he did -- he had some really good games there, and it was someone, where we absolutely want to be someone that we want to retain and really pour into, and he's had a great offseason.

I'm excited about what Kai Rogers has done this offseason. He's a guy people probably don't know much about, but he's a guy that's going to play for us this year, and that was another big benefit of playing some guys than just not playing at all in that tournament.

Q. Like you said, this is your first season where you got your starting point guard back. What did you do to keep him with this new age of the transfer portal?

PORTER MOSER: Well, it was a handful of things. Obviously, one, you have the ability to do the business side of it. Let's call it what it is. To retain people, you have to have the NIL to retain them. I lost some really good players the last three, four, five years. Guys that I've hugged in a handshake line and understood that.

With Xzayvier Brown, we were able to shrink the gap of what we could do for him, but also, he recognized that we were a culture of him getting better. He got better, you know, throughout the year. The relationship piece, the piece of the trusting him as a point guard, you know, with him and I, our relationship because I inherently feel that the business side, you know, everyone talks right now about recruiting is transactional, and it is. It is, but it doesn't mean that your coaching has to be transactional.

Once the business side is done, once the signatures are done and the business side is done, there becomes this element that you have to lean into of being able to -- guys want to be a part of something bigger. They want to be developed. Am I getting better in this environment? All those checked with Xzayvier.

The same thing with Derrion Reid. How were we able to keep another guy? Derrion averaged 12.5 in the SEC. He got better, all his numbers. He saw his development. The relationship was real, and we were able to do the business side of retaining.

I think that's the biggest reason why we've been able to retain some guys is that we have shrunk the gap on how far we were away at the end of the season to be able to match the business side.

Q. Last year John Calipari pretty public just endorsing the job that you were doing. I guess what did that mean in such a difficult stretch to have somebody like that outspoken for what he believes you were building at Oklahoma?

PORTER MOSER: Well, I tell you, you know, you can listen to a lot of things. Your parents teach you things on don't ever listen to -- don't ever listen to all the noise from someone you wouldn't get advice from, because there's a lot of voices coming at you. Cal, I've known Cal for many years. I respect him so much when he says that.

But truly you have to keep fighting through hard. You have to still have a vision on where you're going. I stand here before you not saying I don't want -- I want more memories than what Garth just talked about. I didn't take this Oklahoma job to be the last one out three out of five years and getting in one time. But we are shrinking the gap of where we can go. You do need players to be in this league.

I love that our administration -- now we have a GM. I haven't had a GM. I've had to wear many hats. I'm a ball coach. I love to coach ball. I love the relationship-building of that. You have to lean into that.

But the business side of everything, you know, expectations isn't to fall short. I appreciate that. I appreciate my AD Roger Denny coming out and saying that. The expectations they have and the resources they've given. Those are some people that you really appreciate.

But I know where I'm going. I'm confident in my faith in the Lord of where we're going with this. I'm confident with the group we have, but Cal is one of those guys that he's a coaching friend, man, to a lot of people, to the ones he knows and ones that he doesn't because he's just -- everybody gets a call when things are going great. Cal is one of those guys that will text or call you and check on you when you're not.

Q. Porter, you already had Derrion Reid who, of course, had been in the league at Alabama. Now you bring in Pop Isaacs. How valuable is that not just experience but SEC experience when you bring in transfers? Were you glad to see that the proposed idea to make those guys sit out a year was tabled?

PORTER MOSER: Yeah. I think one of the things that you go into when you are in a league like this, and I hold the great distinction of being the only -- I stand in front of you, the only head coach in college basketball currently that has had five straight years in the No. 1 college basketball conference. Three years in the Big 12; two years in the SEC. I've done it five straight years.

Unequivocally you see the difference between when you're the top league, there's no really bottom. But you got to have players. You got to have experience. That's the thing.

Pop Isaacs played over 100 games. B.J. Edwards has played over 100 games. Duke Brennan has played over 100 games. Xzayvier Brown. Derrion Reid now is in his third year in the SEC. So we've gone after some guys that have played a lot and had experience, and that's the thing you take away.

When you're in the best league in the country, the bottom is so strong, and you have the experience of that and the level. That's what we kind of targeted with that, along with still trying to bring in young guys to develop. Our two freshmen have been really, really impressive, Quincy Wadley and Gage Mayfield. We signed two freshman to keep developing that.

The year before that, we had Kai Rogers. He's still in our program. The year before that we had Jeremiah Fears and Dayton Forsythe. Dayton Forsythe is still in our program. Jeremiah was a lottery pick.

So we are trending being able to retain guys and still go after some young guys, but adding some experience. I think that's what we did is added a guy like Pop Isaacs, who has seen a lot. He's as healthy as I've seen him. He'll tell you the same thing. He's here. He's as strong and as healthy as he's been, because he's battled some injuries. I love that he's been in a lot of venues, in a lot of situations.

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