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NCAA MEN'S FIRST FOUR: DAYTON

March 15, 2017

Dayton, Ohio

UC Davis - 67, NC Central - 63

THE MODERATOR: We're joined by North Carolina Central student-athletes Dajuan Graf and Kyle Benton as well as coach LeVelle Moton.

COACH MOTON: First and foremost, congratulations to UC Davis. Well-coached basketball team. And really good basketball players.

Overall, I just thought our mentality to begin the game, it wasn't where we needed it to be to be contenders and competitors.

We had guys, mentally they just weren't there. And they got in their feelings and their emotions a little bit, and they busted us in the mouth. And I think we gathered ourselves and obviously we made the switch to the 1-3-1 and caused some turnovers and got us back in.

But overall I just thought we didn't shoot the basketball well at all. We shot 35 percent. That's probably the lowest we've ever shot in my tenure here, especially this season.

And hats off to them. They played really good defense. But a lot of those looks was just wide open. We just didn't make them. And we weren't even close on some. We have guys that's capable of knocking down shots.

And I thought it messed with their mentality a little bit. At the end I would have liked for Rashaun Madison to take the 3, but he pump faked and threw it back.

We missed too many layups. And I told the guys at the beginning of the season: Your season is going to come down to one possession. And you gotta capitalize when you get that opportunity. And I just thought we missed a couple of layups at the beginning of the second half that really slowed the momentum. But hats off to them. They executed on the game and won the game.

THE MODERATOR: Questions for the student-athletes.

Q. Dajuan, talk me through the last possession. You guys had two shots at it?
DAJUAN GRAF: We had some good looks at the rim. We just couldn't knock it down. I think I should have did a better job of driving the ball when we were down one, and I shot a 3.

Coach was telling me to drive the ball because we was in the bonus. I think I should have just did a better job of listening to coach and driving the ball and getting something at the rim.

Q. Kyle, to start the game, Coach said there were some gimmies that was missed. Was it the nerves or atmosphere of the game got you guys a little bit?
KYLE BENTON: None of that. I just missed a couple of chippies. It's my fault. I gotta make those. Coach tells me all the time I gotta make those. Those are costly. It wasn't nerves or anything.

Q. Looked like there was a lot of inside/out game going, you were shooting a lot of deep balls after kicking it deep. Were they collapsing? Was that something you saw you guys were trying to move out of?
KYLE BENTON: I mean Coach told us to drive, like he said, he told us to drive. When we drive it opens up shots for our shooters.

DAJUAN GRAF: We usually preach on getting to the rim and attacking the basket first before we just start jacking up 3s. But once we started driving we just really didn't hit any shots, any 3s at least. And I mean it kind of cost us.

Q. In the first and the second half your defense kind of got you back into the game. You made a 10-0 run in the first half, and similar run in the second half. Was it a situation where you kind of used so much energy to get back to the game, you didn't have anything left in the tank to get over the hump towards the end?
DAJUAN GRAF: I don't think we used too much energy. We're usually playing tough defense, but we should have started off the game playing harder defense and not putting ourselves in the hole. I know we went on a little run, but we should have went on a run earlier instead of having to like fight back. And that's really what uses all the energy trying to fight back and trying to get back in the game like that.

Q. Just despite what happened today you guys had a spectacular season, regular season and conference tournament. Kind of sum up your senior year and what everything was like this year playing for Central?
DAJUAN GRAF: I just want to thank Coach LeVelle Moton. He gave us an opportunity this year. Start of the season, I just didn't come in in the season with the right mindset.

I had a meeting with Coach. And he just talked me through it. He told me I would have a great season if I just did what I had to do in preseason. I had a great preseason and it carried over throughout the season. And these guys, they trusted in me and they believed in me. And Coach believed in me, and I just tried to lead this team is all.

I can't be mad at the way the season ended because it was a great season but we also wanted to get this win.

KYLE BENTON: First and foremost, I want to thank Coach LeVelle Moton. Coming out of JUCO, I actually signed a week before school started. This was my last, my only option. If it wasn't for him I wouldn't even be here. So I want to thank him also. This is my senior season.

I can't get mad at how things ended. We worked hard all season. Preseason prepared us for this. And me and my teammates, we know we had a good season.

THE MODERATOR: Questions for Coach.

Q. Was the pace of the game early kind of what you expected? They had that tough defense but looked like they were collapsing low. Had you guys prepared for that early on?
COACH MOTON: Yeah, we knew they would double team Pat off ball screens. I think the first play Pat was loafing, he wasn't moving as fast.

And I stayed on the guys and I told them, when you go to a new level it requires a new you. What you gotta win with two weeks ago you can't get away now. It's the top 68 teams in the country.

And everyone is playing with the act of a sense of urgency and an act of desperation. And I just thought we didn't come out with the proper pace initially, which allowed them to gain some confidence.

And normally the first in these games, or any of the game in the tournament, the first team to settle down -- they say they weren't nervous; they were nervous. I can look in your eyes and tell when you're nervous. The first team to settle down is the one that goes on the first run.

Q. Midway through the first half when you went on that 10-0 run, you got a combination of Ron and Pablo, your starters, they sparked things. What about that group that wanted you to stick with them? What were they doing that was so effective?
COACH MOTON: It allowed us to go into our 1-3-1. We had it all year, we just only used it the last week and a half.

And Pat -- Pablo, his length and athleticism allowed him to deflect some basketballs. And we got out and manufactured some points because we was having a difficult time making open shots and making point-blank layups. I don't want to take anything away from them, but I mean we were just wide open.

You seen those same looks getting knocked down all year. And unfortunately this time we didn't knock them down. And you know we knew at the end of the game we didn't have any more timeouts. So we called two plays, one for man and one for zone.

And Rashaun passed up a shot that I wanted him to take, and Graf took one from the top of the key. But we live with that. That kid has carried us all year. You've seen him make those.

I would like for him to drive the basketball. But hindsight is always 20-20. So he's done -- he's put his heart and soul on the line for myself, his teammates, this program and this university. So if I'm going to go down, I go down with them.

Q. Obviously you want to avoid the 16 seed in Dayton, but this is a great atmosphere anyway. Those last two games of the regular season you forget about those anyway. What was the atmosphere just being in the tournament and in Dayton?
COACH MOTON: It was tremendous. The fans and the energy, and you could feel the tension in the air.

And I think it's some neutral fans here, probably just Dayton fans who just love basketball, and I think after a while they just chose a side. That's what March Madness is about.

We wanted to represent our university well. We wanted to represent our league, the MEAC, because we've got some really good basketball teams and really good basketball coaches. And oftentimes we go -- we're overlooked. But we wanted to represent them and unfortunately we came out short. But the environment was incredible.

Q. You heard the guys kind of sum up their season. Throughout the year, they drew a lot of comparisons to the 2014 team. At times it was kind of unfair. Now that the season has come to an end, can you sum up this group and how special they were and what they accomplished?
COACH MOTON: In all honesty they shocked me. I didn't expect this from this team. And they shocked me. You know, we had some misfits, some guys who needed to buy into something that was bigger than themselves and they had never done that.

So we kind of took some chances and rolled the dice out there to see if they possibly could do it. And early on we all had a great preseason. And one thing that I love about those kids is they love each other. They genuinely love and care for each other. When you see one, you see at least seven or eight of them.

And I think that got us out of some critical circumstances early in the year. But you know they had the bull's-eye on their back all year. And that's not easy. Night in and night out, you're going out there, and it's almost like you're the Patriots or your Duke or you're the Yankees. You can't surprise anyone.

And going into hostile environments, you know, it's difficult now, but we'll look back and certainly reflect and one day smile about it sooner than later. They are champions. They are regular season champions. They are tournament champions, and this one hurts. Losing sucks and it's only going to be one team out there that's going to end on a happy note. That's the unfortunate part about this.

But they made a lot of people proud and they made me proud especially. And I think they made our league chancellor proud as well. And that's what we wanted to do was just to represent our great university.

THE MODERATOR: Thank you.

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