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ATLANTIC COAST CONFERENCE BASKETBALL MEDIA CONFERENCEFebruary 18, 2013James JohnsonJAMES JOHNSON: Coming off a tough heart‑breaking loss down at NC State, where we went into overtime with a very good basketball team on the road. Saw some bright spots out of it, but again, was not able to finish the game off. Got the Blue Devils coming in here coming off a tough loss at Maryland. As far as the team is concerned, we took a day off and we've got to get back to work, get ready for Duke. Q. I wanted to ask you a little bit more about Jarell. He didn't start the last game, didn't play a whole lot of minutes until later on. What was the plan with him and what made you go with him and go to him when you did? JAMES JOHNSON: The plan was that Will Johnson has been more productive than him. He just hasn't been playing up to my expectations for him, and Will has come in and is playing by my standards a little better than Eddie. I've got to play the guy who I think is giving us the productivity we need at that certain time. Needed another guy that could possibly make a shot on the floor and put him in the game. He did a great job of being over on the sidelines and keeping his head in the game and being ready to play, which we talk about all the time with all those kids when you're sitting over there, be ready to go when your name is called, and he answered the bell. Q. Obviously you hope this, but do you think that the way he played is going to kind of give him a little momentum to maybe get back to what he was in those first seven or eight games? JAMES JOHNSON: Well, you hope that's going to happen. You hope that's going to happen, but you never know. Hopefully that gave him a little bit of confidence and will boost his morale a little bit. He can see the basketball go in and see a big basket. Hopefully that will get his confidence going. But I'm not sure. He's had a couple games where he's done that and then has come out and not played particularly great after that. So I'm not sure. Hopefully he can do that, and that's part of the reason that I need him to be a little bit more consistent. He's a junior, and he shouldn't have to have a game here, game there, should be a little bit more consistent, and that's what I'm looking for out of him, consistency. Q. How is your relationship with him? Did it put any kind of a strain that you sat him down? JAMES JOHNSON: No, this is coaching basketball, and he's a player, he understands the deal. If it would have put a strain on it, he wouldn't have responded the way he responded. He knows he's got to play better for the team, and that's just the bottom line. That's how it is. Q. You mentioned bright spots. In Raleigh, Marshall was clearly one of them if not the brightest. Did you see a performance like that coming? JAMES JOHNSON: Didn't see a performance like that coming, but did see him performing well. He has been having some really good practices and showing signs in the games here and there, but Marshall is getting his‑‑ we've been doing extra work with him after practice and just working on getting his wind back, getting his legs back and just getting some extra shots because he had out so long. Then when he came back, we were not able to practice a whole lot anyway, and then he gets in the game and plays seven, eight minutes, so we've been doing some extra stuff with him. He's getting his legs back now, his confidence is coming, and he's playing with a lot of confidence and playing very energetic, getting on the glass for us. We missed him those six weeks he was out, because I think had he not got hurt, we would have seen this early in the season. Q. You mentioned getting on the glass. That was the most striking number, at least to those of us who weren't there. 16 rebounds, I'm guessing that's probably a high for a freshman in the league this year. JAMES JOHNSON: I got to think so, yeah. Q. Does he have a knack for that, because he's not a real strong‑looking young man. JAMES JOHNSON: Yeah, he's got a knack for being around the ball. He wants to rebound. It's an effort thing, just going and get it sometimes is just going to get it, and he likes to rebound, got a knack for it, got a nose for it, got good hands, and he's a fairly good athlete, too. Q. Looking ahead to the Duke game here on Thursday, what do you see as kind of the keys to hanging with Duke, and do you look at that Maryland game and say let's copy this and this, or is that not relevant? JAMES JOHNSON: Yeah, we can't go to the blueprint of what those guys did. We've got to try to play to what we have and the guys that we have, so we've got to come up with our game plan here. I think the key is going to be sharp and execute and try to get certain guys the ball in the right area. They're a very good defensive team, they're going to try to pressure us and take us out of our offense, so we've got to do a good job of controlling our offense, and we've got to control Plumlee and control the three‑point shooting. Q. Do you think about guarding Eddie, starting Marshall Wood maybe, or is the match‑up for Duke staking with CJ or sticking with Will? JAMES JOHNSON: Well, I think that the match‑ups, because we need guys that can handle the ball out there on the floor, so there's definitely going to be a lineup change, and it may not be because of performance, it just may be because of what we need in this particular game. Q. There are some players in this league that have gotten a lot of attention. Joe Harris seems to be flying under the radar. What is it about him that makes him so effective and makes him the guy that should be considered the first team all‑conference? JAMES JOHNSON: Well, he does a lot of different things. He can score in multiple ways, he's mentally and physically tough, he can shoot the three, he can handle the ball, he posts up, he offensive rebounds. All he does is play the game. He's not a guy out there talking and getting caught up in other distractions or other things, he just plays basketball. And I'm not sure why he's not being talked about, but that young man is certainly‑‑ is an all‑league type caliber player. Q. On Erick Green, your guy, I thought with Carolina, the way he tried to get his teammates involved in that game was the kind of game that the scouts at the next level would really like to see. Because a lot of players that had his reputation going into the game were leading the nation in scoring, you would think would try to go into that stage and try to light it up, but he didn't. JAMES JOHNSON: He's a point guard, he's a true point guard. He plays with point guard instincts. He's not trying to be the leading scorer in the nation, he's not trying to be the leading scorer. He wants to win, and he makes the right basketball play out there. If he drives to the hole and a couple guys come, he can dump it down or kick it out, and he's just making the right basketball play because he's a basketball player and a point guard, not necessarily because he's trying to show anybody anything. But that's just the type of player he is and the type of person he is. Q. Is that what makes what he's achieved so far this season so amazing? JAMES JOHNSON: No, no doubt about it, it makes it amazing. You look at his percentages, he's shooting 45 percent in ACC play, 45 percent from the floor, 43, 44 percent from the three‑point line along with four rebounds and just about four assists a game. If our guys‑‑ like Saturday he had eight assists, and if guys are hitting shots, he's still averaging the points he's averaging, and his assists are probably around eight a game. That's pretty doggone good, and I think his assist numbers would have been there had the guys been shooting the ball a little better throughout the season around him. Q. In that same vein about Erick, what do you think it would mean for the program if he were to finish this year as the nation's leading scorer? Have you already started using it on the recruiting trail at all? JAMES JOHNSON: No, no, that's not something that we want to‑‑ I mean, it's a good accolade for the young man, but we've got to go‑‑ we want to win. We want to win. Our goal is to be the best in the conference, and we need a lot of guys to be able to put the ball in the hole like Erick, maybe not at that number, but we need a lot of guys. And as the program goes forward, guys are going to have opportunities the way we want to play and get up and down the floor, and guys are going to have opportunities to play and play freed up on the offensive end. But that's not something that we went into the season thinking. That's not something that we're going to hang our hat on. It's something that happened, that's happening positive for this young man and just this particular incident. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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