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NCAA MEN'S FIRST FOUR: DAYTON

March 15, 2016

Bill Carmody

Dayton, Ohio

THE MODERATOR: We're joined by the head coach of Holy Cross Bill Carmody. Coach, an opening statement.

BILL CARMODY: Well, I guess everyone says they're happy to be here, and certainly we are, as a team representing Holy Cross. And it's great to be in Dayton, because it's here every year, and the people that greet you are so happy you're here, you sell out every game. It's just a wonderful place. And the program itself has had such a rich tradition of basketball success. I mean, I remember when I was in high school, Donny May, most of you probably never heard of that name. He was a lefty, he was probably a first-team All-American -- anyone ever heard of him? Okay. You know, a great, great player. And I just remember looking at him saying, wow, this guy is something special. And it's continued for 60 years now, whatever it's been. So we are happy to be here representing Holy Cross and the Patriot League, and we'll see what we can do.

THE MODERATOR: Questions.

Q. The guys seem pretty relaxed. Do you think they've kind of moved on from all the excitement of the last few days to really get focused on the game tomorrow night?
BILL CARMODY: Yeah, I think everyone, you know, you have all these teams in the tournament, and there's that level of excitement. We had a few days more because we knew we were in. So they had three or four days to -- people say -- have fun. All the people that never coach say that. And now I think they'll get down to business. But you still have to enjoy it and play loose, play free, and I think they're at a good point.

Q. You've been here before, three times in the tournament. What can you do, what can you say to make this not be too big of a stage for them?
BILL CARMODY: Well, you have smart guys. And they recognize all the trappings and all. And I think they're pretty mature. And I think they can put those things aside. And like I said, we've been in a pretty good place the last two weeks. So I really don't want to coach that much and to upset the balance of things. Their heads are just where we want them to be. And we've had a couple of practices, just working on our own stuff, a little bit yesterday on some Southern. And after this we'll go down and have a little shootaround out here, and then we'll practice for about an hour and 15 minutes or something. But I think they're at a good place. And like I said, most guys these days, they've been on TV. They've spoken to reporters, and this is extra special. No question. But I think they know how to handle it.

Q. What have you learned about Southern?
BILL CARMODY: Pretty explosive team. They like to get up and down, well-coached, balanced scoring with inside/outside kind of game. So what you learn in a few days and what you can impart on your team, I don't minimize it. But I think you have to do what you've been doing and tweak it a little bit according to the team that you're playing. So I think they're a very good team and they're playing well because they're here right now and they won a tournament. It wasn't like they won early. So you know that you're catching them on a high note.

Q. What little you've been able to see of Southern, did they remind you of anyone in conference, as far as style of play or even out of conference for that matter, that you've faced?
BILL CARMODY: It's just the style of play. I don't know particular teams that they necessarily remind me of. But like I said, they play multiple defenses, man-to-man, 2-3 zone. They'll pick up full court, three-quarter court, things we've seen before. But different teams do them better than other teams. And they seem to be pretty effective in certain areas, forcing turnovers. And so it's just that style. So we're going to have to take care of the basketball.

Q. I know you said you have been kind of relaxing a little bit since in the days since --
BILL CARMODY: My players, my players.

Q. The players have been. What have you been specifically asking your team to focus on in terms of areas to focus on between the Lehigh game and tomorrow night?
BILL CARMODY: We just run practices short, hard practices and worked on precision in our offense, pretty much. Just some of the things I saw in the last few games, even though we beat Bucknell, we played our best game of the year against Army. So we did well there. And then Lehigh, things that I know we can do better. And so we showed some tape of the things that we did well and also some of the things that we can improve upon. So we worked on those things a little bit on the offensive end. And the defensive end, just, again, we won four games in, like, eight days and three of those games came down to the last play, last second, the last shot. And so it's not like we're blowing teams out. So there's a lot of things we can work on, and we have.

Q. Bill, what did you see in Karl Charles when you were recruiting him, and can you just talk a little bit about the season he's had up to this point?
BILL CARMODY: Yeah, Karl, I saw him when I first took the job, just got in the car and drove for about three days with one of my assistant coaches and just seeing all open gyms, because we had a couple of scholarships. And saw him and really liked him. It was in an open gym kind of situation. But sometimes you get real excited when you see a guy and it colors you. So I just told him, listen, I like what I see, but if you have to make a decision -- because it was getting pretty late -- in the next week, I'm not going to give you a scholarship tonight, I'm coming back next Wednesday, because it was a Wednesday night. If I see what I see then we can talk. I came back, in 20 minutes I saw he was better. Actually when I was driving home that night or wherever I was driving to I said I should have offered him the first night. Because he's a lefty and you know how lefties are -- he's just a little different. And he's from New Jersey. He could do everything pretty well, nothing great, except he could see things. He saw the court. And he had a little something, a little fire in him. So went back the next Wednesday and went after him and just told him. And we got him. We're real fortunate. He's had a terrific year for us.

Q. Considering the struggles you had during the regular season and what you just came off accomplishing, can you think of anything more surprising in your coaching career or in your life that's such a big surprise?
BILL CARMODY: I mean, it's up there. It's up there. I mean, it definitely was a surprise. But as I told the team, and I've said this in the last couple of days a few times, that about three or four games before we got to the tournament -- the last game, Boston University killed us. But before that we lost three games, and they were all pretty close. And I thought we played pretty well. They seemed to be coming together pretty nicely. And I don't look for silver linings ever, just about, but then I said, listen fellas, we lost, but there's something there. And they started believing a little bit, I think. And then when we won the first game, Loyola, they really gained confidence and they started believing in themselves and then the team just took it from there.

THE MODERATOR: Thank you.

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