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ATLANTIC COAST CONFERENCE BASKETBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE

January 17, 2011

Frank Haith

THE MODERATOR: Coach, a few comments about your team and then we'll open it for questions.
COACH HAITH: Obviously, we only had one game this week, so we had a lot of practice time. I thought our team really worked hard all week. We got better.
Obviously, we played well against a good Boston College team. I felt we just continue to get good performance out of Garrius Adams, and I thought it was important to see Julian Gamble. Obviously, his stats are not great, but there are things he did in that ball game that we needed to see out of had him to get production out of him.
But it was a hard-fought, good ACC win. One we needed in terms of protecting our home court as we move forward in the year.

Q. First of all, great win over Boston College this week. How do you keep your guys focused going into another tough week of conference opponents coming up?
COACH HAITH: There is no question, you can't get too high or get too low in this unforgiving league. We do have another tough opponent in Florida State. A team, I think, is the most talented, most athletic, and a very old team coming in here Wednesday.
You know, they were on a little bit of a roll. They won two in a row and have a lot of confidence, but we've got to continue to work hard. As we visit this morning, we're talking a little about the game against B.C.
But we're getting right into our preparation for Florida State, and it's a grind. Our guys understand this thing is a marathon. It's not a sprint. So it takes us getting ourselves prepared and getting focused on the next task at hand.

Q. Are there any weaknesses that you think your team will have an advantage of over Florida State or N.C. State coming up?
COACH HAITH: Well, they're both different teams. I think Florida State is a tremendous defensive team. They're very long and lanky. We've got to run a good offense against them. We can't jack up quick shots.
I think we've got to set our defense against Florida State. I think they're really good in transition. And Chris is a tremendous in getting in passing lanes and they get those buckets in transition and make it very difficult for you.
Then N.C. State, I haven't spent a lot of time worrying about right now, but that is a whole other different deal at the end of the week.
But I know Florida State is going to be a physical, hard fought game the way they play. We've had some really good games against those guys over the years, and I expect it will be another good one on Wednesday.

Q. I guess Florida State, what are the concerns you have? Of course, everybody's aware of Chris Singleton and the problems he causes, but what about Derwin Kitchen?
COACH HAITH: I think he is a problem. When he plays well, you go back and look at their success over the last two years. Derwin's a big part of it.
For example, in the Duke game, when he's on his game and he's playing the way he played against Duke and he's having that kind of performance, they're very difficult to beat. I think he's a key guy along with Chris. Chris has been pretty consistent all year. But I think Derwin is a valuable guy for their team. When he's on his game in terms of scoring a little bit and doing some things that way, he makes it very difficult for you.
We've got to do a good job on him. We've got to keep him out of the paint. But Chris plays very intelligent. He doesn't force shots. He kind of takes what the defense gives him. You look at his percentage. His three-point percentage is a very high percentage because he doesn't take any bad shots.
But we've got to do a good job on him. I think, he, too, is a really good defender. Both of those guys get a lot of buckets by the defense. They turn you over and they score in transition. So we've got to do a good job of taking care of the ball around both of those guys.

Q. Kitchen is a leading rebounder among guards in the league. What kind of problems does that cause in itself? Do you have to remind your guys, hey, we've got to make sure he's not crashing the boards on us?
COACH HAITH: No question. They're a great rebounding team. And a lot of it is because their guards are aggressive in going to the glass, and he being one of them. But one thing he does too is he's a tremendous defensive is rebounder, so he starts to break.
He gets in there and when your point guard is that good of a rebounder, you're able to initiate your offense really quickly on the other end.
I think that is the other thing of having a guard that is a good rebounder like Derwin is. We've got to have tremendous focus on all of their guys in terms of crashing their boards because they're a really good rebounding team.

Q. Everybody plays eight ACC home, and eight ACC away games. You started to schedule this year with two away games. I know it evens up, but is that a plus to get those out of the way? Or is it a negative to get off to a bad start because you're on the road? Or how does that work?
COACH HAITH: I don't know. I don't know if you really want to look at it like get them out of the way type thing. I know last year we started 6 of our first 9 on the road, and that is hard because you can't get any momentum.
But what we did at Duke, and at Clemson who, I don't know -- well, you know. That's one of the tough venues to play at too. Not only do we start on the road, but we start at two of the toughest places to play in the league.
I think with us we had played on the road earlier at Memphis and at some tough places, and I thought we played pretty well against Duke. We didn't play as well against Clemson. I thought we were a little tenuous going into the game against B.C., because we were 0-2. And that's what happens when you don't have a win.
But in the second half we played much better. Because in the first half the other night against Boston College, you could feel the tension and guys not being -- you know, we missed a lot of easy lay-ups and I thought that was the cause of just needing a win and guys fighting that a little bit.
So that's what happens if you start 0-2, and you start on the road, your guys are not as confident. I felt that the other night. But we got through it, got a win, and hopefully we can move forward.

Q. Is Reggie Johnson battling some kind of physical thing? I'm sere I'm out of the loop up here.
COACH HAITH: Yeah, he had a boot on all week against Clemson, he didn't practice all week, and he played in the game. He has bone spurs in his foot, had a bone spur. He practiced last week and was much better, obviously, against Boston College. So he's not quite 100%.
Julian Gamble was in the same boat a little bit, but they're both coming around and getting better. Like I said, I think Reggie was a lot better, obviously, this week.

Q. You were talking about Garrius a while ago. What has he improved in specifically?
COACH HAITH: You know, we really wanted him to just be more aggressive, because Garrius can do a lot of things. It's one thing with a young kid, a young player just going out there and believing in himself and playing and being more aggressive and attacking. He's very capable.
I think the last two ballgames we've seen him be more aggressive at Clemson. He had 14. The other night he had 12. But just because he can handle the ball.
I know we're a much better offensive team when he's out there because he takes a little bit of pressure off Durand and Malcolm in the sense that he can handle the ball a little bit too and free those guys up to score. So he can play make, but he also can score, which I like having a guy that size be able to do that at 6'6".

Q. Adrian Thomas is I think fourth on your team in minutes played, yet he's only started two games. What does he add coming off the bench for your team?
COACH HAITH: He's an offensive weapon. He's a guy that can score the ball. And that balance, having him come off the bench, I like in terms of giving us a guy that can come off and be a threat offensively.
He's bought into that role. That's been something that a guy, you've got to really want and buy into. But not being a starter -- and I don't put a lot of premium on starting -- he's the guy that's probably going to be the guy at the end of the game.
So he's going to play his minutes, doesn't matter when he gets them. I like having that good balance within our team. Having him come off the bench when he plays with some of our other guys coming off the bench and being able to score the basketball.

End of FastScripts

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