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ATLANTIC COAST CONFERENCE BASKETBALL MEDIA CONFERENCEFebruary 27, 2012Brad BrownellBRAD BROWNELL: Well, we're coming off a great win against NC State obviously in overtime over the weekend. We're playing at Virginia Tech team. I think Seth has done a good job of keeping those guys going. I know we've dealt with it, as well; when we lost some close games, it's hard to always keep the spirits of your team moving in the right direction, and they played their tails off at Duke and had a great chance to win. First time we played them, we didn't play very well and they had a lot to do with that, rallied back, but they were able to beat us at their place, so we know we're going to have a good challenge in Virginia Tech here. Q. You mentioned those losses that Tech has had. As you watch particularly the Duke game, what's allowed them to kind of hang around in games where on paper they were the underdog? BRAD BROWNELL: I think a couple things. I think specifically in the Duke, I think their defense has been good. We had a hard time scoring against them in the first half especially, beginning of the game, didn't feel like we could score at all. And then the second thing is I think they do a good job of using the clock on offense at times in games. They run a lot of different actions that sometimes have multiple plays involved, and they get the shot clock down there, so I thought they shortened the game very well against Duke. I think they're very patient.  And then defensively they don't give up a lot of easy baskets, so I think it gives them an opportunity to always be in games. I think they've been‑‑ they've lost some games, but man, they've been in a ton of them. So they're a very dangerous team, and will be through the ACC tournament. Q. Do you see development, changes in their young players since the year has progressed? BRAD BROWNELL: Certainly. I think like a lot of guys, I think their younger guys are playing with much more confidence. In fact, Dorian Finney‑Smith was in a real shooting slump until he played us and then he made a couple threes at their place. Marquis Rankin is think is playing much better. Robert Brown has had a good year. C.J. Barksdale is going to be a good player. They've got a good group of young kids there, and certainly through the course of the year I think you've seen them all mature and getting more comfortable playing at the level and starting to have more and more success. Q. They've been playing without Victor Davila, and they're somewhat thin up in the front court. How does that seem to affect them? BRAD BROWNELL: Oh, I'm sure there's a wearing effect occasionally. I think Raines has done a good job, and I think he's a pretty good player. He might be one of those players where he might be better than you think at times and then all of a sudden he gets a bunch of minutes and he shows what he can do. So I think in terms of plugging him in, he's done more than a capable job. But I think maybe at times just there can be a wearing effect with not having as many big bodies to put on teams that are really big and strong. I don't know that we're maybe as big and strong as some of the teams in the league, and it might not affect them as much against us as it does against other teams, but when you're playing Duke, North Carolina and Florida State, even NC State seems to have some really big and athletic front court players, I think at times that can probably hurt them a little bit. Q. When you look back at the first meeting, obviously you made a nice run there at the end. What are you going to do differently in the rematch to get a win this time? BRAD BROWNELL: Oh, we've got to do a lot of things better. We've got to be much more efficient offensively, and you just have to get better shots on offense, and we can't turn the ball over for points. I think we had some turnovers that led to easy baskets for them, and I think we got beat a little bit on the boards in terms of some put‑backs and just gave them some baskets that you can't give them, especially we're not the most potent offensive team, so when we start giving teams points it's problematic. Again, I thought they played very well that day, and our guys really struggled for a while. We've just got to play with more confidence. We've got to be more efficient offensively so that we can be better and set our defense a little bit better. Q. What do you like about how your team is playing of late? BRAD BROWNELL: I think we have, we've improved.  Milt Jennings is coming back from suspension, has been better. I think that's helped us a little bit, just being a little more consistent. I think our guys have gotten a little more comfortable in their own skin and the roles that we've asked them to do, and some of our guys like Andre and Tanner are much more comfortable now than they were earlier in the year with trying to make plays and being more aggressive, especially late in games when you need somebody to be a play‑maker or make something happen. Just general growth that a lot of our guys‑‑ Devin Booker is a little more comfortable and been a little more consistent, and the same with our freshmen. Our freshmen have gotten a little bit better, same to be playing a little bit better than they were earlier in the year. It's kind of normal growth. I don't know if there's any one thing that we've done exceptionally well, I think we've just played a little bit better as a group. Q. You mentioned Andre and Tanner. Is part of their progress here of late a function of they know that this is the closing stretch of the last time? BRAD BROWNELL: Yeah, I think so. Yeah, I think there's a point in every kid's senior year when they kind of start looking around, and it gets to February and guys realize they've only got three or more four games and only got two or three more games, whatever it is. There's a sense of urgency that comes with that, I think, if your team is competitive at all. And these guys are really good people. They're not just good, solid players; they're good students, they come from great families. They're really hard‑working guys and they try to do the right thing, and they've done a good job of keeping our spirits as a team going in the right direction when some things have gone against us, and they both had plays at end of games where they weren't successful, and in all honesty I think that's part of the reason they were able to make those plays in the NC State game is they've been through the ebbs and flows of success and failure and long seasons and are more comfortable with who they are and what's expected of them in their roles here. Q. And you've been around the senior night routine. Do you have any tricks of the trade just in terms of keeping the emotion at a reasonable‑‑ BRAD BROWNELL: Yeah, it's a really hard deal because it seems like it goes either really well or it can almost backfire. And some kids handle it really well and are inspired and loose and can still almost manage all the emotion with it, and other guys kind of struggle with that. And I'm worried about our guys a little bit, you know, just hope that they can settle themselves down enough that when the game is going on that they're not thinking about other things. But it's hard because it's all week of kind of a week‑long deal of answering questions about it, being interviewed about it, making plans with your family for it. And I'll certainly talk to our team about it and our seniors about it, you know, make sure they understand they've just got to go play a basketball game first and try to worry about the other things that go along with it. But it can be difficult for some guys. Q. Tanner Smith is one of those guys that obviously is a stat sheet stuffer. He fills up a lot of columns doing a lot of things. What are some of the things he does that don't show up in the box score, some of the little things that coaches really like? BRAD BROWNELL: Well, little things like inbounding the ball against presses, against pressure, underneath out of bounds, you know, in difficult situations. Telling other guys on the court what to do and when they're in the wrong spot, where to be to get in the right spot, and then just all those huddles that you have and free throws and that players kind of have throughout the course of a game, the guy talking the most in our huddle is Tanner Smith, and he's settling guys down, every once in a while probably getting in a guy's face. He's telling guys what they need to hear. Those are things that are hard to measure in terms of significance until all of a sudden a kid is gone and you start looking at your huddle and things like that and they're just different and they're not as good and not as productive and wondering why, and there are more mistakes, and it's because you miss a guy like that. You know, I've been fortunate to have several guys like that to coach, but Tanner is as good as any of them at maintaining composure and understanding what needs to be done and communicating that to other guys on the team during a game. Q. Inbounding the ball is one of those things that most people just take for granted. What makes somebody especially good at that? BRAD BROWNELL: Well, you can inbound the ball and just get it in, or you can be a good enough passer like on an underneath out‑of‑bounds to fake a pass to a guy in one area and draw another guy's man and get a guy an open three, or you can see two actions going on at once, where maybe there's a screen where a guy is trying to break open for the basket and there's another guy coming off a screen for a shot and you can read which one to throw it to at the right time and get it inbounds, having the presence of mind to call time‑out before there's a second call, let alone the skill of just inbounding the ball under duress. There's a lot of teams, and Virginia Tech is actually one of them, that they start putting bigger guys, four and five men on the ball, regardless of who takes the ball out of bounds and do a lot of switching and things behind the ball, so it's making getting the ball inbounds more difficult underneath. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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