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NATIONAL INVITATION TOURNAMENTMarch 28, 2017Johnny DawkinsB.J. TaylorMatt WilliamsNew York, New York TCU 68, UCF 53 COACH DAWKINS: First, I'd just like to give TCU a lot of credit. I thought they played a very good basketball. Players played with a lot of heart. I think you can tell by the numbers: 20 assists, 15 offensive rebounds, they played a really good game tonight. Now for us, you know, I'm proud of our team. Our team had a good year. I thought we really came together as a group. I wanted to thank our seniors for everything. You know, really just creating a culture for us and leaving their legacy at our program with the season that they had. Q. You guys struggled in the second half. You shot 25 percent. What did they do in the second half? B.J. TAYLOR: Played with a lot of energy in that second half and we just didn't make the shots that we normally make. So give them credit. They are a good team, and we just didn't make shots we normally make. Q. For Coach and for Matt, there was a stretch at the end of the first half, at the beginning of the second where they out-scored you 20 to five. Felt like their energy picked up significantly and you guys didn't match it. Did you feel like their energy level dropped a bit and didn't quite match what TCU was bringing? COACH DAWKINS: I thought they were very active, and TCU played the way they normally play. They are a heck of an offensive rebounding team. I thought they kept some balls alive. I think we had a pretty good lead. They were cutting it on effort plays, like you say, offensive rebounds. We maybe missed a block or missed a rotation and they really capitalized on that. We watched a lot of tape and we talked about it as a team. We worked on those things. But it's different when you have to play against a team who actually does it every possession and they played to their strength, which was that, and that did give them a chance to make a run. We realized it's going to be a game of runs. Unfortunately we just didn't make enough of them in the second half, put us in position to give us a chance to win. MATT WILLIAMS: Similar to what Coach mentioned, we prepared for the game and Coach let us know they was going to come out and play very hard. Let us know they was going to come out and press the offensive glass and towards the end of the stretch, they did what they did. Q. What was the range of emotions that you guys went through when you went into the locker room for the last time? MATT WILLIAMS: The range of emotions in the locker room were more so, it was emotional. Everyone was emotional. But it was more so just because -- not because we lost, but just because the bond we formed with each other. We formed a bond with one another that was unbreakable and that was the emotion I think. B.J. TAYLOR: Like Matt said, very emotional. I just want to say thank you to the seniors, all they done for us this season and establishing the culture. We won't let them down. Q. For the players, obviously there was a lot of euphoria getting this point. What's the emotion now, disappointment, or do you still feel, hey, we had a great season? B.J. TAYLOR: No, we're never happy with season. Coach has instilled that in us this season, not only in basketball but in life in general, we'll never be happy -- I mean, moving forward, for Matt, I know he's anxious about it and he's got a great career. For me being a younger player, I know that I need to -- I think I've got to hold that accountable moving forward that we have for next season, that we don't want to, which, which moving forward we don't want this feeling, and we need to do everything we possibly can to avoid it and end the season with a win. Q. Not sure if you could tell how many fans that were there but a lot of UCF fans traveled up. MATT WILLIAMS: We appreciated our fans. It's just good to know that we established something that's bigger than us. A lot of people maybe think that we played for ourselves, but we play more so for our community and we play for our coaches and we play for our respect and it's just good to see UCF has earned that respect and we laid the foundation for the time to come. Q. Can you talk about how difficult it was offensively to generate good looks in the second half against their man-to-man defense? COACH DAWKINS: You know, it was, and they did a really good job. They scouted us well and they took away a lot of things that we considered to be our strengths, and give them credit for that. They were active. They really game planned well to try to take B.J. out more. They face guarded Matt all over the place and tried to eliminate him from what we do and any time they came off screens they switched it and made it difficult for us. Give them a lot of credit, as I said. For us, I thought you know, we also, you know, we didn't move the ball as well as I think we normally do. We didn't space as well as I would like for us to do, and we didn't go inside as much as we would like to do. So give them a lot of credit for being successful in their game plan and we got a little bit of out of character from what we do well and I think that combination hurt us. Q. The second half with the three-pointer, was it a matter of shot selection or what they did on defense? COACH DAWKINS: Well, I think, you know, we talk about being down and we've been down in games before, and we have to remain poised. I think at times when we got down, we felt -- I felt we were rushing. We were like trying to make it all up on one shot and that's not who we've been. We have to understand that it's a long game and keep playing it possession by possession. It's one of the first games, and probably a good stretch for us, where I felt like we were frantic. Like we were getting fed up. It comes from a good place: You want to win, you want to come back, but there's no 10-point shot. So we need to have a little more poise and unfortunately that's part of growth. It's part of these young people figuring out this game. Q. Matt, how difficult was it to get the three outside? I know Coach Dixon talked a lot about guarding the three and really trying to take that away. MATT WILLIAMS: I've been seeing that all year, just tonight happened to be some shots weren't falling. I credit TCU. They did a good job playing defense. I've seen that defense all year and they did a good job tonight containing me. Tonight we just once they came out, we just really couldn't hit. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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