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NCAA MEN'S 1ST AND 2ND ROUNDS: DALLASMarch 14, 2018Kyle KellerKevon HarrisTJ HolyfieldIvan CaneteTy CharlesLeon Gilmore, IIIDallas, Texas Q. I know you're excited to be here, but Ty, being in your hometown, what's it finally like being here? TY CHARLES: You know, this is nothing but love and just glad to play in front of my family and my friends with my brothers. Q. You're finally here on this stage. I know it's been a goal all year to get there, and it was kind of iffy during the middle of conference play with those four losses. Now that you're here, what are you expecting to show the nation? TJ HOLYFIELD: I feel like we play our best basketball on the bigger stages, so we had our ups and downs during our conference, but I feel like we can show everyone how SFA basketball should be played. KEVON HARRIS: I feel the same way. I feel like we've been looking forward to this all season. That's what we've been working hard for, so we're just excited to be out there. LEON GILMORE III: The same as my two teammates. I feel like when the stage is bigger, we play up to competition rather than kind of playing down to our competition when there's not really no one in the crowd watching us play. I feel like we're prepared for it, and it's a big stage, and we can't wait to get out there and show the world. TY CHARLES: We've prepared, just ready to get out there and show what we can do. IVAN CANETE: Same thing, just ready to play. Q. TJ, you said SFA basketball. Explain what you think that means or what does that mean to people that haven't seen you guys play? Explain basketball the way you guys play it. TJ HOLYFIELD: Disruption, pressuring the ball, where we consider ourselves a defensive team, forcing turnovers, pressuring on-ball defense, help ball defense. That's SFA basketball. Q. For any of the players, pop quiz: What does the F. stand for in Stephen F. Austin? IVAN CANETE: I got it. I got it. It stands for fun. TJ HOLYFIELD: Dang, that's bad. We'll know after this. Q. Guys, when y'all can play y'all's style of basketball, we've seen you put up close to 80 points in some games, and it seems like when you get slowed down like you did in the conference championship, it slows your production down. What do you do have to do out there against Texas Tech to get those turnovers going and keep that fast pace? IVAN CANETE: We've just got to play our style of basketball, get out and run and play together offensively. And once we do that, the points will just start piling up. Q. Leon, what TJ said about defense, how tough are you guys' practices? Do you guys love defense, because you have to or because you do? LEON GILMORE III: Man, practice is tough. You have to come with a different mindset to get through one of our practices. It starts in the summer. I mean, just getting conditioned, learning where to be on the court. We have to be at a certain spot every time. Everybody moves in a certain pattern, and you just have to be tough mentally and physically to get through it and learn it. But once you get it, it's fun. That's what makes it fun. We go through all those hard times in practice just for the games, and then we get to finally express it once we get to the games and show everyone what we can do. Q. Ivan and TJ, I was just curious ever since that game against West Virginia, almost making the Sweet 16, a lot of teams seeded where you are are a little bit under the radar. You guys probably aren't going to be sneaking up on anybody. What's it been like for you guys since that game and kind of putting yourselves on the map? IVAN CANETE: I didn't play in the West Virginia game, but I watched it, and it was pretty cool. TJ HOLYFIELD: Yeah, the game definitely put SFA on the map. It was already on the map, but I guess people started respecting the school a little bit more. They heard about the school. It helped bring in recruits, and -- I don't know. TY CHARLES: I mean, he said it. That was that team, this is a new team, so we're here to create our own legacy. Q. Ty, about the defense, I talked to a coach that played you guys this year, and he said that if you make teams go east to west, like side to side, they're dead, they've got to go right at the basket, attack real quick. If you were coaching against Stephen F. Austin, would that be your game plan, to just attack quickly, and if you go to the side, to a wing pass, that's when things get hairy for other teams? TY CHARLES: Most definitely, yes, sir. Q. Why? TY CHARLES: I mean, playing against our defense is tough, so you've just got to make shots. If you don't make shots, it's going to be pretty hard to beat Stephen F. Austin. KYLE KELLER: Well, we're excited to be here. I think our players have earned the right, obviously. We had a tremendous non-conference schedule, and the kids played tough. We had little bumps in the road in the league, but we talked all year long about playing well as we went through March, and I think our kids are peaking at the right time, and I'm excited for them as we prepare for this two-game tournament here in Dallas, which to me is the perfect venue for not only our players, but our fans. We know we have an unbelievable mountain to climb in Texas Tech and what a great coaching staff they had, but hopefully I think our kids will try pretty hard tomorrow. Q. Coach Beard discussed your relationship and your time throughout the years. Can you look back at some of your memories with him, maybe at a McDonald's stealing Sprite instead of water? KYLE KELLER: You know, I have amnesia pretty good, so I'm not really referencing what he's talking about, but I think he would really hate if I aired some of my dirty laundry on him through the last 25 years that I could throw back at him. But I think my hand just slipped on what lever to push. I didn't hit water, it just slipped off the water tab. I think that's what happened and Sprite accidentally came out into the cup versus water. I don't know if he remembers it exactly like that because I think I threw it in the trash versus drinking the Sprite. Everybody that knows me knows I hate Sprite. I'm a root beer and iced tea guy. I'm not sure how he remembers it, but you know, Chris and I have spent a lot of time together, and we're great friends, and I have the utmost respect for him. You guys are really lucky to have a great coach like him. I'm glad he brought that up. What a great guy he is. (Laughter). Q. Chris was also mentioning earlier today about how you guys come from a rank of coaches that not a lot of people talk about from places that people haven't heard of, and he said he took kind of pride in representing those guys. I wonder if you feel the same way, and do you think there's any kind of connection there because of your shared background? KYLE KELLER: You know, Chris and I, I think both were at one time, and Jeremy Cox on my staff, who's my associate head coach. We were all living in San Antonio when we were trying to figure it out, and he was at Incarnate Word as a GA and Jeremy and I were at UTSA, and we were all trying to figure out where we were going, hoping to make it in this career and if we could be somebody, just hang on. Then all three of us go junior college coaching, and then you never know, you take a chance. And Chris obviously has won everywhere he's been, just like Jeremy has, and I've been blessed. And I just think the Lord has blessed all three of us. There's no perfect -- I tell the young coaches all the time, there's no perfect way to become a head coach in this level. You have to be blessed. I've been blessed by my athletic director who's leaving me right now. I'm not happy with him at all one bit because he's leaving. But you know, Chris is -- I think he's only had 62 jobs in the 28 years, 25 years he's coached, and won everywhere. He left Tech and came, and we had dinner at PJ's Brewery. He wanted to learn Bill Self's ball-screen continuity. I think it took all of 20 minutes to learn what Coach Self has perfected. Then he went undefeated in his professional basketball career because he never runs that ball screen offense. That's how smart a dude he is. And so you know, he's a special guy and a special coach. He can do anything. You know, he's a magician as a basketball coach. You know, you can imagine how excited I am that we get to play them. Q. Getting your guys to play the relentless defense that they play, I guess if they don't do that, it's a non-starter literally. But it sounds simple; go out there and play defense. How do you get guys to do that? KYLE KELLER: We're on our second treadmill at our place. You know, we don't have a chance to be successful. We don't have a chance -- if you follow this program, and I know from here you love basketball, Brad Underwood couldn't have won two games in the NCAA Tournament. If we're going to line up and be traditional, we have no chance to win a game. But if we do something different, we have a chance, and Tech averages 12 turnovers a game. If we force 12 turnovers tomorrow, it's going to be -- we're going to ride the bus back home again. We have to do something different for us to have a chance to win. And for us to try to not let them catch, to make them uncomfortable and those kind of things. You know, it's a credit really to our kids' parents, allowing us to make them uncomfortable every day in practice. We have got great parents. Our staff has recruited great kids, and to allow us to coach them, and to not be entitled in this society and in the generation today and allow us to make them uncomfortable every day to take them to another level. I think we have nine starters. So they know if they don't do it the way we think we can be good at, then they'll -- I told them today, I said, hey, please put the shooting shirt on and cheerlead or go play the trumpet in the band tomorrow, whatever you want to do, but if you can't play this way tomorrow, just be ready to go home with the band or the cheerleaders because you ain't playing tomorrow if you can't play the way we play. Q. I subjected your players to a pop quiz, so I can't spare you. KYLE KELLER: Uh-oh. I was a terrible student. Q. What does the F. in Stephen F. Austin stand for? KYLE KELLER: Well, golly. You know, I did my research before I got this job, and I think it's Fuller. Is that right? I was pretty blessed. I wanted to know everything about the school before I went into it the most I could, but I'm sure our guys -- I can imagine the dumb looks on their face. They could have thrown some stuff out there. I'd hate to -- I don't even want to know what they said. Q. Following up about the defense, do you have to recruit a certain kind of player that you know will, like you said, not be entitled and be willing to be pushed maybe beyond limits? KYLE KELLER: As a coach, as you know, we all think that we can change every kid. We all believe that. And I'm no different than most of them. And I've tried. Some play, some don't, some leave. We've had a couple leave since I've been there. I said this a week ago, the greatest talent you have in my opinion, and I learned this from Coach Sutton, spending so much time with him and Sean, is your heart, your Valentine. The last kid I signed won our game for us last Saturday, is a kid named John Comeaux, who his mother when she asked me if I offered him a scholarship, she got down on her knees and cried last spring in her house, and I really -- it was kind of a soft scholarship offer if you can believe it, but I knew right then and there I had to have him because it meant so much for them and their family to come to Stephen F. Austin. We had gotten tight and nervous and we had the game under control, but he would give the energy to our team. He wasn't afraid. He cared so much about Stephen F. Austin, and he changed the game for us. But it's character and willingness and those kind of things. And it's deeper than, hey, how pretty is this shot, those type of things, I think that allow us to remotely have a chance to beat somebody else versus, hey, he's 6'8", 220, or fits all those things maybe like those kids that I've coached in the past at our place. Don't get me wrong, I'll take a five-star kid, and we'd like to have them. If they'd like to come tomorrow for the spring, they can come on, we'll coach them, too, but they have got to be the right kind of kid. We consider ourselves gritty and grimy and that kind of stuff. Q. Let me ask you first, how big was it on Sunday when you find out you were playing in Dallas, and secondly, have you got enough tickets now? KYLE KELLER: You know this story. Back in December, the Lord told me we were going to play in Dallas. And the second thing is there is not enough tickets for all the people that want to come to this game that are involved in my life. I need to get to this game, that's for sure, at least I'm responsible for getting them tickets. But I'm sure Coach Beard and their families and the players that are involved with Texas Tech have the same problem that I do, which I think is great. I think it's wonderful, and I'm blessed that so many people want to come to this game tomorrow, especially for me, for my first time. I'm so lucky that people want to come to watch us play and that has been a part of my life, and I get to play in Dallas? Oh, it's a story book. But I've been led everywhere, and it's no shock. You know, trust me, it's no shock that we're here. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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