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NCAA MEN'S FIRST ROUND: DAYTONMarch 18, 2015Beau BeechMatthew DriscollDallas MooreDAYTON, OHIO ROBERT MORRIS - 81 COACH DRISCOLL: God has truly honored me to be at the University of North Florida. In an odd way when you put dots on the map you never know what's going to transpire. When in 1997 I went to Wyoming and coach Moon was the athletic director there. The players he's presented us with and allowed us to coach has been an absolute blessing to my family and myself. I'm honored that these young men represented our conference and most importantly our school and they represented them right and they represented them well. These young men obviously are very, very disappointed. They're not happy with our results as all of us are, but in life sometimes those things occur. Sometimes those things happen. But it's what you do next and how you handle the next right thing that's critical. I thought throughout that run that they made when we missed six shots, had five turnovers, weren't able to extend the 13-point lead, I probably should have done a better job, maybe called a couple timeouts, maybe run a couple special plays or special whatevers to try to get us back in the flow. I'm not sure how our looks were, I know the turnovers were the most we've ever had. We led the league in assist-turnover ratio. Looking back on it now, maybe call, do something different as a coach and that's my fault. Then we got it back up to eight and kind of weathered the storm so to speak and again we went on another drought, which is unlike us. Giving up 52 points in a half is unlike us, not close to what we've been playing during this eight-game winning streak 16 out of 18. So you gotta give Robert Morris a ton of credit for turning those into 21 points which was the difference in the game. They had 12 steals. They lead their league in steals. I made a comment about that, about what they do with the ball and how they get so many steals out of their zone and to their credit they were able to turn those into buckets. And you gotta give them credit. And it is what it is. I'm proud of the season these guys have been able to achieve. And I'm really looking forward to the offseason and into our next right thing. THE MODERATOR: Questions for the student-athletes. Q. Beau, a little under four minutes to go, you launched a 3, and the thing was going down and it came back out and the game was tied at that point. Could you just talk a little bit about -- I know that didn't decide the game, but it certainly -- how you felt when you saw that ball come out? BEAU BEECH: Well, we had drawn up a play, I think, in the timeout before and we had gone over the play in scout. And Jalen was running on the baseline. I didn't look. I missed him. I missed Jalen wide open, he had a layup. So we kind of got into a scramble mode because I missed that pass. And I just took the shot and it felt good. Sometimes balls don't drop. Can't make every one. That happened. And we couldn't close the game out from there. Q. Beau, how difficult was it in the second half in particular to get a shot off? I know you hit the first two, but after that there wasn't a whole lot taking place behind the arc. They seemed to really press you out that far. I'm wondering how difficult it was for you. BEAU BEECH: Yeah, they kind of switched to a matchup zone, man-to-man kind of. It limited my 3 attempts at least from that standpoint. But we had clean looks the whole second half. I didn't think it was that difficult to get a shot. It was turnovers that killed us the most, because we were getting buckets, and we just couldn't take care of the ball when we needed to. Q. Will you remember more of the season or will you remember more how it ended? DALLAS MOORE: Both. We had a historic season winning regular season championship and winning conference championship and advancing to our first NCAA Tournament. It didn't end the way we wanted it to. I thought turnovers killed us. I thought we beat ourselves. But we'll regroup in the offseason and listen to Coach and do what we have to do work hard in practice every day and we'll be back. Q. What has this season done for UNF basketball? What has this season done just for you guys, you've been here building the program? BEAU BEECH: It's been the most fun season I've ever had playing basketball at any level. I love every one of my teammates, my coaches, trainers, everybody, down the list. Whoever is a part of this team, I love them. We're a big family. I mean, it's been historic for the university. I mean, seems like we've been on ESPN almost every other day now. But it's great for the university. I wouldn't change it for anything. Yeah, I'd love to win the game tonight but the season as a whole, it's been a great accomplishment and we're looking to build off of it next year. THE MODERATOR: Thank you. Questions for Coach. Q. Did this feel like an NCAA Tournament game? Did these guys not getting a chance to go on to what has been the traditional opening round make it feel any less special for you guys who have been involved in this? COACH DRISCOLL: Absolutely not. You're on the NCAA floor and the NCAA people are here treating you like -- the Dayton people were phenomenal. And these guys accomplished quite a season to get to this point. So no -- with Dayton playing after us and if you tell me we're going to get 77 tonight, I'm going to tell you we're probably going to win. So it felt like an NCAA game to me. Q. How difficult was it to defend the trio in the second half once they got things rolling? COACH DRISCOLL: It's no different than it was in the first half. I thought Pryor made that big 3 at the top of the key against the zone. And then the other one was in transition when Lucky got the 3, which was critical, back to back. I think it cut to one, 60-59, if I'm not mistaken. But we had done a pretty good job, gone up 13 and done a pretty good job on them. Those guys can make some shots. We weathered it and went back up eight. But give them credit for making those kind of shots and being able. Reed was rookie of the year, I think. Took 17 shots. Pryor took 17 shots and only had five turnovers. Five turnovers, you don't get a lot of shots. In the first half, we did a great job being locked into them. But when we turned the ball over so much, unbalanced floor, I thought they did a great job of taking advantage of that and obviously scored 21 points. Q. The turnovers in the game, you come in averaging, what, 11, 12 turnovers a game something like that. What did they do defensively to -- did you expect them to be long, lean? COACH DRISCOLL: What they do is they play extremely, extremely wide, and they pressure up on the ball and they allow you to play inside/out, so to speak. And when we attack that way I thought we were really good. I thought we got ready good shots, like we made the run at the end of the half. I thought we did that well and I thought we did it well to get up 13. And after we missed six shots and five turnovers, I thought we did it well again to get back up eight. So I thought -- but for whatever reason, and sometimes that's the hardest thing about coaching 18- to 22-year-olds, just keep doing what you're doing, why change if you're being successful doing it. We shot like 58 percent in the first half. One point in the game we were shooting like 63 percent. And I'm telling the guys: Guys, this isn't rocket science. Just move the ball, move bodies, and get a shot. So give Robert Morris credit for getting those steals. Q. You mentioned the 3 from Pryor at the top of the arc. Seems like that gave them a lot of confidence, did you see it as a game-changing moment? COACH DRISCOLL: Yes, we had gone zone. And I thought we had got a couple of stops in a row and kind of got them on their heels a little bit. I thought it did stroke it a little bit. Then we came down the other end and got a long rebound and Lucky was able to walk into a 3 and those are the best 3s to have is those kinds you walk into in transition. As soon as he shot it, I knew it was in. I was watching it the whole time. To their credit, that was -- I thought those two buckets were critical. Q. Given all the turnovers, given your preparation for the zone and everything, do you feel as though you kind of came away having lost the game as opposed to Robert Morris winning, or is the sentiment more that you just couldn't make a couple of plays, came down to a couple of plays and that's the game? COACH DRISCOLL: I would never discredit what Robert Morris did and say that we whatever. But I will say this: Our turnovers were self-inflicted at some points, and when you self-inflict and you allow them to get out and run, it's very, very difficult to stop and get, to get those key stops that you need. In the first half, remember, we had like nine turnovers or eight turnovers like the first 12 minutes. And then next thing you know, we stopped the turnovers and we made that huge run, because it's common sense. So I would never discredit Andy for what he did and the way they played, the way they play. We scored 77 points. 77. We don't lose very often when we score 77. So defensively I thought they took advantage of some things, and free throws, too. I thought they took advantage of free throws and got some points there as well, too. So I would never discredit them. But we definitely self-inflicted some turnovers, for sure. THE MODERATOR: Thank you, Coach. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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