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MOUNTAIN WEST MEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP

March 8, 2018

Las Vegas, Nevada

Utah State - 78, Boise State - 75

LEON RICE: Well, thought Utah State did a great job of weathering some storms, and started out really good. And they just kind of hung with us, hung with us, and we couldn't break away from them. And they did a terrific job of making some big shots down the stretch.

Q. You just talked about this being a special group and you felt like this was going to do special things. To have it end this way this early, what are your thoughts?
LEXUS WILLIAMS: My thoughts haven't changed. Still a special group. This isn't our last game. Just trying to swallow this tough pill. But nothing about how special this group is, it will always be that way.

Q. What did go wrong tonight?
LEXUS WILLIAMS: We just didn't get stops down the stretch like we needed to. In the first half our defense was really good. In the second half they were getting open looks and knocking them down like they were supposed to.

Q. I know you kind of are the voice of reason sometimes to your team. Was there a message that you shared after the game to encourage them to keep their heads up?
LEXUS WILLIAMS: Let them know we're not done playing. This one hurt us, but we've still got a chance to compete in a tournament and that's what we look forward to.

Q. What did you see from their 3s, and from Merrill in particular? Was it your defense? Were they just on fire? What did you see from them to make that percentage from the three?
JUSTINIAN JESSUP: Yeah, I think it was part of both. Part of our defense. I think we gave them some easy looks too much, and others he was hitting like the last one, I thought it was a good contest, some others I thought were good contest, too. Give credit to him, he made some tough shots.

Q. You were able to get inside and force the ball inside in the first half. I think you guys had 16 points in the paint in the first half. I don't know if it was there in the second half. Did you notice it was there? Did they do something to take that away from you or did you look somewhere else?
LEXUS WILLIAMS: A lot of buckets in the first half were a lot in transition. I don't think we ran enough in the second half. They hard hedge on ball screens. It's tough when you coming off a ball screen and the big man comes out and you try to get downhill.

So I think it was a credit to them for making shots. We didn't even really rebound that well in the second half. We didn't get a chance to get on a run and make the transition buckets in the paint.

Q. Is this hard for you guys to believe? You were up, they keep hitting the shots. You had the lead. Just kind of like the previous question with your guys, everything you thought this season was going to be, and even with this game, is it hard to believe they came back and got you at the end?
LEXUS WILLIAMS: It's a tough pill to swallow, it's frustrating. Credit to them. They weathered a lot of storms during the game. They kept coming back and coming back. They didn't lay down at all.

Q. I know you think pretty highly of Chandler Hutchison and he had some good looks. He's done a lot for this program. Deserving of those shots. And I don't know if you had a moment to talk with him after the game, obviously some big shots and tough misses.
LEXUS WILLIAMS: Yeah, I haven't talked to him. Those are the shots he is supposed to take, and a lot of those are shots he makes. Tonight they just didn't go down, and they're not going to go down every night.

But just like I told him last time when we lost at Utah State, You did everything you could do. And it's something that you have to live with, it was a good shot.

Q. We talked about it yesterday, but this team, you thought had the makings to do some big things this year, and to have it end like that with a barrage of 3s from Utah State and go down in the quarterfinals for the third year in a row, how tough was that?
LEON RICE: It was really tough. I thought we came out really good. Got in foul trouble that we weathered and couldn't shake them. They hung with us, hung with us. And made it -- we had a few big plays. We had a fast break to go up ten, we miss the lay-in. There were plays like that all night that we just didn't make that maybe could have put us over the top.

It's a tough one for this locker room. Like I said, I've got a special group that wanted to keep playing. And I thought, I really thought we were going to do some great things down here. So it's a hard one to deal with.

Q. Obviously you have seen Chandler develop tremendously since he's been at Boise State. What was it like to watch him inside that final minute? Tough missed free throw on the front end and a couple of chances after that, too.
LEON RICE: Right. And as a coach you ride them for 30-something-odd games, and he's won a lot of those for you. And so you feel like the team wanted to give him those chances and he was right there. A couple of them just rolled in and out. We made some tough defensive plays to get the ball back and another chance, and just couldn't get it over the hump and a couple of crucial calls down the stretch that made a difference.

Q. I know it's not easy to talk about the positives tonight, but Lexus Williams, he had a career high with 24 points and you've got to have him for 9 months now. How special was his joining the team this year?
LEON RICE: All three of those seniors, I wanted it so bad for them, they deserved it. They've done some great things. And I told them in the locker room, it doesn't change how I feel about this team. They're all heartbroken. We're all heartbroken. And wanted to keep this thing rolling.

So that's the hardest part of only having those guys for the eight months you get them because they're just awesome. You want them to go out with a big bang.

Q. I know that the 3s are what kind of scares you about Utah State. You mentioned scoring in bunches. How do you feel defensively you did against them?
LEON RICE: Obviously not good enough with the way -- but part of it is them, too. They're hard to guard. They put a lot of guards out there and spread you out really well. Then you've got to make them, and they made some tough ones. And when we contested a couple of them, then you foul. You're damned if you do, damned if you don't. You want to contest them, want to be aggressive, but you can't be fouling the 3-point shooters, as well. And there were a couple of those that were tough.

But we gave them some pretty good looks. And Merrill is going to make those.

Q. What was it about this round that is just giving you guys trouble?
LEON RICE: When you get to the conference tournament everybody is playing good. And you've got to play really good. I think we played really good in stretches and just down the stretch we didn't make enough winning plays to get it done.

Q. What is next for this team, NIT?
LEON RICE: I have no idea.

Q. The bigger picture is your success or lack thereof in this tournament. And without you having a chance to decompress what happened tonight, do you have any idea why you've had so much struggle of getting to the championship game, of getting past the quarterfinals or semifinals?
LEON RICE: Might be we overachieved during the season. Maybe you watch those two teams, they're pretty darned close. And these guys played for three months and finished second. So I don't think we roll in and out talent to everybody. People just assume that, Oh, they're going to get to the championship and win it.

If you look player for player there's a lot of talent in this league. So maybe it's a fact that we overachieve in the regular season, I don't know.

But that team we played was really good. And their guards are really, really good and they make shots and I knew that. So proud of what our guys do during the season to compete for a championship and get second. It's disappointing, though, because -- but you've got to play a great game, and you've got to play great down the stretch and that's the difference, a couple of shots. And then you feel completely different.

Q. Just to get back to Hutch, I'm assuming he's got at least another game in a Bronco uniform. How much has he kind of meant to this team?
LEON RICE: He's been awesome this year. And he's carried us through a lot of amazing performances that got it done for us a lot of nights. He just had a few -- some of those bad luck rattle in, rattle outs.

And then it's tough for a guy to get two fouls and sit the whole half. But we were pretty -- had him at arm's length, you don't want him to pick up his third and you're without him most of the second half. We felt like he would get it going in the second half. It's hard to sit there that long and then turn it back on.

Q. Going back 30 years, you've only been here a short time of that, but do you get a feeling that there's a ceiling over this program that you can't bust through? You've had growth, I'm guessing you think it's frustrating slow growth.
LEON RICE: I don't know, I don't see that. I don't get that. We've been the most consistent team in the league the last four years. We finished in the top three the last four years. You're talking about San Diego State, UNLV, and New Mexico. I don't understand where the slow growth is talking about.

We went from the WAC to contending. We won the Mountain West. We contended for a title four years. And so I don't get what -- I think it's ignorant to say "slow growth." You're talking about a UNLV program that has won a national championship, a national championship. You're talking about a San Diego State team that's 18 straight years of being terrific, talented, toughest places to play in this league.

Slow growth is -- we're selling out Taco Bell Arena. We're 15-1 at home and on and on and on. We're putting a guy in the draft this year.

So "slow growth" may be the most ridiculous term I ever heard from anybody about the basketball program and where we are. And you don't measure a program by a three-day tournament. You measure it by how it does in the league every year, because that's over the course of three months. And that's night in, night out, for three months.

One game, anything can happen in college basketball, unless you're by far the most talented team. And that's not who we've been. We're not by far the most talented team. We've got a bunch of tough kids that compete every night, that battle and they're in every single game. You just didn't win the last four minutes tonight.

So that statement makes no sense.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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MOUNTAIN WEST MEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP

March 8, 2018

Leon Rice

Justinian Jessup

Lexus Williams