Why I Don’t Like Bucky McMillan

Plain and simple, the Samford head men’s basketball coach didn’t pay his dues

ETSU head men’s basketball coach Brooks Savage has paid his dues.

Samford head men’s basketball coach Brooks Savage is paid for.

I’ve repeated the above two sentences numerous times on my You Tube channel and X account over the last year.

And it stems from the fact Savage has become a Division I head basketball coach by working his way up the ladder, starting as a team manager of the Tennessee basketball program under Buzz Peterson a generation ago, working his way up to graduate assistant under Bruce Pearl, then taking on assistant coaching jobs at mid-major Division I programs, including with Steve Forbes at ETSU and later Wake Forest, before being asked to return to guide the Bucs out of ruin.

And doing a fairly decent job of it. ETSU isn’t the Southern Conference power they once were, but after leading the Bucs to the conference tournament final in his initial season and likely guiding the Bucs to their first winning season against Division I competition since 2020 in his second it’s hard to argue there isn’t slow but steady improvement.

Savage’s Buccaneers host Samford at 4 pm Saturday, Feb. 8.

McMillan, meanwhile, didn’t. He was a high school coach at a turnkey school in the Birmingham suburbs that won the state championship the year…