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NCAA MEN'S 1ST AND 2ND ROUNDS: NASHVILLEMarch 16, 2018Eric MusselmanKendall StephensJosh HallCaleb MartinNashville, Tennessee Nevada - 87, Texas - 83 (OT) THE MODERATOR: The victorious Wolf Pack are represented by head coach Eric Musselman, Caleb Martin, Kendall Stephens and Josh Hall. We'll ask Coach Musselman for an opening statement and we'll go to questions for all four gentlemen from the Wolf Pack here in a 12-minute session. Eric, please. ERIC MUSSELMAN: First of all, we'd like to apologize for any language that might have been caught on TV. Obviously, we had an excited locker room. We apologize for that. So the game, I thought, you know, the second half, you know, we had to play at a faster pace. I thought that Texas and Coach Smart did a phenomenal job of controlling the tempo for those first 30 minutes. Then eventually, we started knocking down some 3-balls. Once we started driving the ball a little bit more in the second half, I thought that that opened up our 3-ball. Couldn't be prouder of the team. Obviously, the size advantage that they had inside on the back boards, we did a much better job in the second half of scrapping around and trying to get loose balls and really proud of the job our team did of taking care of the ball. We thought that Texas could, you know, could cause some trouble if they jumped in the passing lanes and with Roach and Coleman's ability to get out and get steals. These guys did a great job, only have seven turnovers in a game that we score 87 points. Q. Caleb, you guys are fighting from behind basically the entire game. Your last lead before overtime was 5-2, down 14 in the second half. Did just getting to overtime feel like a second life? Seemed like you guys played a lot looser in the final five minutes. CALEB MARTIN: Yeah, for sure. With a team like us, it felt like the Texas Tech game. We knew we were going to be in trouble if we got in overtime at their place and I feel like that's exactly how it was for this game. Vice versa for us. Jordan had big free throws at the end and had one that was huge for us. We got in overtime, like you said, it gave us more life. It's a whole 'nother game, five-minute game. Q. Coach, what was that feeling? Looked like you jumped into Johnny Jones' arms with two seconds to go. Can you describe what you were feeling in that second? ERIC MUSSELMAN: I don't know how we won, Chris. I mean, just the progress of where the program's come, you know, we made it here last year. We've grinded, you know, all of us hard since the beginning of the summer with a goal in mind, and that was try to advance. Again, we didn't play very well, but just the ball movement in the second half when you look at the stat sheet and you see Cody's assist, Caleb's assist, Jordan Caroline at the center spot to have five assists. I mean, I thought we really, really shared the basketball. We might have played a little tight in that first half, and I think that the guys started to settle in in the second half, and once we started knocking down some 3s, you know, and, again, the pace of the play, I mean, for us to score 26 points at the half is frustrating for us. But we got out and got some transition baskets and it really opened the game up for us. Q. One for Eric, and then one for Caleb. Coach, the play call at the end of regulation that Caleb shot, was that the shot you wanted or did they defend and make you do something else? ERIC MUSSELMAN: No. We had two options. 1A was the shot we got. If we get close again, we'll probably run something pretty similar. The other one was Kendall running the baseline and he was open as well. You know, you just want guys that are playing well and that you have good confidence in to take a shot. And I thought he got a really, really good look. It didn't fall, no big deal. We got back into the timeout in overtime, and said hey, it's a five-minute game now, and Bamba's out of the game and he had such a big impact on our dribble drives and stuff. I thought Jordan did a great job of getting into his body on dribble penetration in the second half. Q. Caleb, you had, I think, three 3s off the bat to start the overtime. Did you feel a little more pressure going into the overtime in terms of trying to take on yourself? CALEB MARTIN: I mean, not really. Honestly, I felt looser. I felt like the regulation, you know, regular regulation, I just played like Coach said. I felt like I was playing tight. The ball felt for me when I was putting it on the floor. I was probably a little nervous. Like Chris said, when we got to overtime, it's just like more life. Like Coach said, just trying to settle in. I felt better, honestly, in overtime. Q. Kendall, that first half didn't look too dissimilar from the first half against San Diego State. I guess how did you guys keep looking forward and not getting kind of stuck in how you played offensively in the first 20 minutes? KENDALL STEPHENS: Yeah, man. We knew that it was a team that we could beat. We were confident in ourselves. We were kind of disappointed in our effort and kind of our mishaps on defense. I think once we cleaned it up and moved the ball more on offense, we was able to get confidence from getting stops, consecutive stops. And then that kind of allowed us to use our momentum from hitting jumpers and things like that. I think the biggest thing for us was kind of working on our self and kind of making sure we were getting consecutive stops. Q. Josh, you played really well in the NCAA tournament last year. What is it that you like about this stage that seems to bring the best out in you? JOSH HALL: I want to win. Plain and simple, I just want to win. Not only do I want to play good, but I want my team to play well. I want to advance. We didn't win last year. Winning this game was really big for us and shows we're a better team than last year and moving in the right direction. So I just want to win. Q. Can you talk a little bit, Coach, about Josh's play. Seemed like he buoyed you guys in the first half and kept you in it and kept you in striking distance in the second half. ERIC MUSSELMAN: He had really good shot selection. He's such a good basket cutter. Defensively, he gives us another dimension. He gives us a fifth guy out there that's across the board. We're 6'6" and, you know, I mean, we had a conversation at the very beginning of the year about whether to start or not start. You know, he told me, and he told other guys on the staff that he was fine coming off the bench and so that's kind of been his role. We look at him in the entire season as a starter, and obviously, to play him the minutes that we did last year, you know, over even guys that were seniors and stuff. I mean, I have great, you know, confidence in him. Late game, we had him as an in-bounder because I have confidence in him. He just gives us another dimension of a guy who can rebound, defend and make shots. Q. Kendall, they hit a 3-pointer to start overtime. They hit a 3-pointer with a foot on the line, then they get a four-point play. They're coming out of that, into overtime, really strong. What kept you guys thinking that you could stay in this game and pull it out? KENDALL STEPHENS: Across the board, we just got guys that have played in hostile environments. We've been there before so we know that all we need is a chance. We're confident. Once we get back down the court, we're able to score effectively and that's what we did. We just got to tighten up defensively towards the end and that's what we were able to do, get more stops than they did and we made more plays than they did down the stretch. It was a tough game. Gotta give credit to Texas. They made it tough. Q. Coach, you mentioned Bamba not being in there in overtime. How much did that affect the game? Seemed like a different game in overtime. Pretty much a grind through regulation on both sides. Overtime, everybody starts hitting shots. ERIC MUSSELMAN: It kind of changes the complexion of who Texas is. Instead of being a team that's dominant throwing the ball inside, the guards are so talented in Roach and Coleman. Look, we tried to do as good a job as we could with our size on Bamba, and I thought we did a great job. He averages 12 points a game. He got 13. They play in a league with great size. We're undersized even in a league that doesn't have much size. So I just thought our guys really, really battled on post defense. I mean, all my friends, people in the media, everybody was asking how are we going to defend Bamba inside. I thought we did a phenomenal job with our fronts and really battling, had great weak side help as well. Q. Coach, talk about Coleman's play. We haven't heard a whole lot about him when you talk about Texas. He seemed to keep them in the game in the second half. ERIC MUSSELMAN: He played a great game. Obviously, if you look at his 3-point shooting over the course of the year, it's a lower percent. We wanted him to take shots. And sometimes when you make a coaching decision, it can backfire. And he played extremely well. And we kind of stuck with the philosophy of how we started the game. We didn't alter it. We thought that over 40 minutes, if we could just try to keep him out of the lane, you know, the more film we watched over and over and over, he's so great at getting in the lane and throwing lob passes to Jericho Sims or Bamba. We didn't want that to happen and we kind of lived with the 3-ball. Obviously, he went 4 for 5 and he and Roach played phenomenal basketball games. But we felt like, you know, their guards, if they score, that means that they're not getting, you know, shots by the rim and Jericho's percentage and Bamba's percentage is above 50 percent. We were going to live with the guards shooting. Q. Josh, you guys are down 14 in the second half. How would you describe the heart and resiliency of this team to be able to pull out a victory in that situation? JOSH HALL: It helped us a lot with the non-conference schedule we played, especially on the road at TCU and the tougher games we played. That helped us this time of year. That's what these games were meant for. When we got down, we knew we had to keep fighting and working hard and not get down and stay positive. We knew we would come out and win. Q. Kendall, you transferred here, knowing you only had one year to play. You had a goal to get to the tournament but to win games. What does it mean to you to pick up this program's first victory in this tournament since 2007 and only the fifth in the school's history in this tournament? KENDALL STEPHENS: It means a lot. When you play the game, especially for as many college years as I have, you want to be known as a winner. I wanted to go out winning one game at least. So the biggest thing for us as a team is just to use this game as confidence and build on it, going into the next game with more energy and more focus. Q. Caleb, did you feel like there was a turning point in this game that swung things in your favor? CALEB MARTIN: Probably just the overtime. I just think that us fighting and Jordan going up and hitting the big free throw to tie it up to go into OT gave us confidence. You could kind of tell when we walked back on the floor, you could tell the energy of their team was low. It's one of those things like dang, I wish we didn't go into overtime. I felt the same energy with us walking into Texas Tech when we walked back on, when guys were in foul trouble and we had the same energy. We were like dang, we shouldn't have got in overtime. We felt the same way with them, walking back on the floor. Q. Coach, you guys are 0-2 in overtime so far this season. Do you feel like they took any lessons from the games going into this extra session? ERIC MUSSELMAN: I think so. As I look back on the game, the conditioning, I thought, was very important. I thought both teams have limited benches and I thought our conditioning, like I didn't feel we got tired at all. And I do think that, like, certain plays that we run, because we've been in close games, I thought they did a really good job executing like our wing pick and roll down the stretch, which we've done pretty well for three years. I thought we looked at some different options and I do think that there was confidence going into the overtime, even though, you know, we would have liked to have won in regulation. But I sensed the huddles were much different in overtime than they were in the first half, especially. THE MODERATOR: Thank you, gentlemen. Best of luck. See you Sunday. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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