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ATLANTIC 10 CONFERENCE MEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIPMarch 9, 2018Mark SchmidtMatt MobleyLaDarien GriffinWashington, D.C. St. Bonaventure - 83, Richmond - 77 MARK SCHMIDT: I thought we struggled early. I think both teams probably had nerves, especially us being the first game. But I thought -- and I always tell our guys, the first five minutes of the second half, the first 10 possessions of the second half are critical, and I thought Matt did a heck of a job to get us going, built that, whatever, 14-, 15-, 18-point lead, and then we just held on. We didn't play great offensively. I thought we did a good job defensively for the most part. We didn't make our foul shots. You know, in tournament play, defend, rebound, take care of the basketball and you've got to make your foul shots, and every time you go to the foul line and you miss it, it's like a turnover. I thought we did a good job offensively. We shoot 58 percent, 52 percent from beyond the arc, but we miss 11 foul shots, and that's an area that we need to improve on. But it was a good win for us. Courtney got hurt in the last 10 minutes, and I thought LaDarien did a really good job coming in and playing the 4 position, which he hasn't played a ton of. But we persevered. We found a way. We dealt with some adversity, and we made enough plays to win the game and win our 13th straight. Q. Matt, Jaylen Adams only scoring five points, can you talk about your game that first half and coming out in the second half to pick up the load for your co-A-10 Player having arguably his worst game of the season? MATT MOBLEY: Yeah, we told each other last year that no matter what, both of us can't have an off game at the same time, so you know, he was struggling a little bit, wasn't really getting open looks. They did a great job defending him. So I had a lot of open looks. Teammates did a great job of finding me, and I was knocking down the shots. I just wanted to keep giving us a little confidence and push the lead out the second half. Q. Matt, you set an A-10 tournament record for threes in a game tonight with nine. We've seen you have these kinds of games a lot during the season. Was it just another one of those kinds of games, or was it something, the way they were playing you guys defensively that allowed you to kind of go off again? MATT MOBLEY: I mean, like I said earlier, I just think my teammates did a great job of finding me when they were rotating and they weren't -- Richmond wasn't finding me, so teammates did a great job passing me the ball, and I had the easy job, I was just making the shots. It's just another game, and I'm just happy we were able to get the win. Q. Matt, can you explain your mindset, at one point you threw your palms up like Jordan. Some of them were deep threes. You get into a zone like that, what's that like? MATT MOBLEY: I mean, it feels good. Every shot feels like it's going in. Every shot I took today felt like it was good. You know, when shooters get in that rhythm, it's hard to get them out of it, and I'm just thankful I was able to get in a great rhythm today. Q. LaDarien, your matchup with Golden today, he had a good first half coming out, seven points, seven boards, finished the game with just nine of each. Can you talk about any adjustments you made going into the second half how to guard him? LaDARIEN GRIFFIN: I just tried to get him away from the basket, make him catch the ball far out. My teammates had my back with over-the-top passes and doing a good job of just helping behind me, and then we just started swarming and just making shots difficult, and then went to just get the board and beat up. Q. Matt, we talked on Tuesday before you guys left about how you want to win the whole thing while you're here, but do you feel like with tonight's win you guys maybe secured your place in the NCAA Tournament or come close to that? MATT MOBLEY: I think the only way we can secure our spot is winning the whole thing, honestly. You know, the snub in 2016, everybody remembers that, and we don't want to go through that again, so the only way to avoid that is to try to win this whole thing, so we're going to come back tomorrow, either Saint Louis or Davidson, and try to get a win. Q. It seemed like the crowd was really on your side; did it feel like a home game? MATT MOBLEY: Yeah, we knew our fans were going to come out and support. We've got the best fans in the country. They're going to be everywhere, every bucket. Definitely felt like a home game a little bit. I'm thankful for all the fans that come out and support, and we're going to need them all back tomorrow. Q. LaDarien, you personally just kind of finished strong tonight because the last field goal you guys had was at 6:30 and then the rest of the way you got some big free throws, some big rebounds for you personally. How nice was it to finish as strong as you did? LaDARIEN GRIFFIN: I missed like seven free throws, I expected it. I wanted each time I stepped up there to go there confidently. I be in the gym all the time working on free throws. I was just shooting bad, but then my teammates and the coaches were just giving me confidence every time to step up there and knock them down and just keep attacking the glass. Q. Mark, can you give us an update on Stockard and the severity of his injury? MARK SCHMIDT: No, I can't. I don't know. Q. Is it a knee? MARK SCHMIDT: No, it's a hamstring. No knee. Q. Two things: One, you stressed starting the second half fast, came out 10 for 10, really seemed to get the game in control, but that it wasn't. MARK SCHMIDT: Yeah, we started -- as I said earlier, in my opening remarks, the first five minutes, the first 10 possessions of the second half are critical. I thought, as Matt talked about, he had some big shots, and we came out red hot, and we needed to do that. We got off to a rocky start, but Matt was -- and Jay didn't play the game Jay typically plays, so we needed somebody to step up, and Matt did a really good job in getting us going in the second half. Q. Mark, what did you see from Richmond as they were making that comeback? What did they exploit and what did they do well? MARK SCHMIDT: They just kept on attacking. They did a good job shooting threes. You know, our game plan going in was try to limit Golden as much as we could. I thought in the last five to six games they really went into him. He's taking the most shots on their team. So they were really going inside out, so we tried to do a good job of fronting him, backside help, and we did a decent job on him, but those guys started attacking, driving and kicking, and they got much more aggressive when we got them down by I think it was 17. They got much more aggressive, and we became tentative. So as their aggression got us on our heels, they just -- once you play on your heels, you're in trouble. They got us on our heels, and our offense wasn't too effective. We were missing foul shots. We turned the ball over a couple times, and they made their run. But somehow, some way, we found a way. Q. Mark, now eight of your games in this win streak have been by single digits. What does that say about your team's ability to close, especially down the stretch in this one? MARK SCHMIDT: It talks about how tough they are mentally and physically. You know, there was a lot of adversity in this 13-game win streak. There's been a lot of adversity, and our guys have made the plays when they needed to make the plays. We work on stuff in practice, try to put pressure on them, but there's nothing like a game, and they've done a really good job of making the plays, not just offensively but defensively, and that's why we've had the success that we've had. Q. Good sign when Jay doesn't score a lot and you guys somehow -- MARK SCHMIDT: You're exactly right. When your best player doesn't play his A game and you can still pull out a victory, it talks about how we're a team. It's not just one guy or two guys. LaDarien stepped up, Courtney did a good job before he got injured. I've said it from the very beginning: We're not a two-man team. It takes all these guys to play and fill their roles, and then when one guy is not playing up to his capabilities, a good team, another guy steps up, and we've had that. Q. We've talked all season about how guys have stepped up when maybe Matt or Jay aren't playing well, but to see that happen tonight on this kind of a stage at this point in the season, how big is that to see, and what does that mean? MARK SCHMIDT: You always want your better players to play well, but yeah, it's -- it doesn't matter if it happens at the beginning of the year or halfway through, in the Playoffs. It really doesn't matter. It's going to happen. Those guys -- you can't play your A game all the time. When that doesn't happen, someone else has to step up, and we've had, over this 13-game winning streak, we've had guys step up and take on scoring roles. They have confidence in doing that. This is not the first time that Jay didn't play well or the first time that Matt didn't play well in those -- even in this 13-game winning streak, those guys haven't played their A game every game. We've had other guys step up, and that's what a team does, a good team does. Q. Do you know what happened last time that Jay had five points? MARK SCHMIDT: We lost probably. Q. Nope, you won, Mobley had 35. The next two games Jay had 40 (indiscernible). MARK SCHMIDT: Hopefully that's good. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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