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ATLANTIC COAST CONFERENCE OPERATION BASKETBALLOctober 24, 2018Jim LarranagaDewan HernandezAnthony LawrenceCharlotte, North Carolina THE MODERATOR: Coach, as we think about this being in October and knowing that we're back here in March, what type of team would you like to come back to this arena with in a couple of months. JIM LARRANAGA: Well personally I would like to come back with a championship team. A team that plays great defense, does an outstanding job of sharing the ball on offense, we have got great group of guys who are working towards that goal. Q. Anthony, what's your expectation you're a senior and I don't know how that happened so quickly, it just seemed like just the other day you were a freshman. So what's your expectation this year? ANTHONY LAWRENCE: Personally I want to get back to the NCAA tournament and win an ace championship this year. Q. Dewan, a long season ahead obviously and everybody's enthusiastic right now at practice. Is this the type of team, does it have the personality to keep that high energy up for the entire season? DEWAN HERNANDEZ: Definitely. We have a bunch of guys that just want to win and have fun, so when you look at winning teams, that's where it starts. Q. You you've got a new crop of kids coming in. As ever program does every year. This time next year when we're reflecting on the '18-' 19 season what are the names of the young people that we think that are going to be highlighted for us this year? JIM LARRANAGA: Well, we have several young players who I think will be tremendous contributors for us. Chris Lykes is a sophomore, he's a dynamic little point guard, he's a high octane scorer, but he also can be a real pest defensively and we need him to be our quarterback, our leader, the guy who is the catalyst of our offense and defense. So he's one key player. We have a sophomore by the name of Deng Gak who will be new to ACC fans, he's 6'-11", he's long, he's athletic, he's got a lot of potential, we think he's going to be an outstanding player. And then Anthony Mack. He's a transfer student from Wyoming, he's a sophomore, he has long range shooting ability, but he's also very strong and very tough minded. Q. Dewan, you just about doubled your scoring totals from your freshman year to your sophomore year. Not that there's an expectation for you to double it yet again for your junior year, but what does this say about the evolution of your game, the time that you were a freshman to the time that you're now a Junior? DEWAN HERNANDEZ: I think it just shows the ability for me to get better, that's all it shows. With hard work, that's all I did all summer, I think it's going to happen again my junior year. Q. Anthony, can you describe Dewan in one word? ANTHONY LAWRENCE: Goofy. (Laughter.) Q. That's not exactly what I was expecting, but why goofy? ANTHONY LAWRENCE: Always laughing, very fun to be around, playing around all the time. Q. Anthony, you get equal time if you want to describe your teammate in one word. I mean, Dewan, if you want to describe Anthony in one word. DEWAN HERNANDEZ: He's a cool dude. Q. Coach, obviously this is a team that sort of likes each other, at least by these two guys. Is that going to be a personality that's going to help you out this year? JIM LARRANAGA: Well I think these two young men have great personalities, they work very well together. Dewan is obviously the big man inside for us, but he also has added range to his jump shot, he can knock down the three-point shot. Amp, who plays multiple positions can shoot the 3, he's great at driving the ball to the basket, but the one thing that he does maybe better than anybody, he really finds the open man, he's very team oriented. He was coached by his dad in high school and you can see the characteristics and skills that he has developed from the high school ranks all the way through his four years in college. Q. One of the interesting questions that came up earlier today was the type of non-conference schedule you put together in anticipation of the league season as well as the entire season. What is it about the strategy of the teams that you put on the non-conference schedule that helps prepare you for the in-season schedule, the league schedule? JIM LARRANAGA: Well we have had a scheduling philosophy for many, many years and it's always been to put a competitive schedule together to prepare us for the ACC and also to win an at-large bid. We try to schedule four games of people in what is now known as quadrant one, four non-conference games in quadrant one, four in quadrant two, and then four in quadrants three and four. If you have good balance in your schedule, with good home games and really strong competitive away games and neutral site games, we think that prepares you for the ACC. Q. Even though it's one game at a time, do you ever look at the conference season and think about the rotation of home games against the amount of time on the road or who those opponents are? JIM LARRANAGA: Yeah, I try to avoid looking at our conference schedule too far in advance because it gives me a headache knowing how good they are. Last year we ended the season with a game at Notre Dame, at North Carolina, then home against Virginia Tech and it took three great wins to put us in the NCAA tournament. So looking down the road is always hard in this conference. Q. Anthony, when you think about your senior year, to be successful do you have to have a trophy? I know that it helps to win a championship, but to have a successful season, senior season do you have to win a title? ANTHONY LAWRENCE: Of course that's the main goal, but if that doesn't happen just to have a great year, go far in the tournament, in the ACC tournament, and just to have a lot of great memories in my senior year, that's a successful senior year. Q. Any one venue that you'll be excited to play in because you know it will be your last time playing there? ANTHONY LAWRENCE: Cameron Indoor is one of the venues I like to play in. Q. In the past you had a chance to end our media session with you with a great story, we talked a couple years ago about how you were mistaken for Larry David, last year you told us about how it is that you kept your lunch money and bought chocolates with it is there something that you can add to the forum this year that's different? JIM LARRANAGA: Well, one of the biggest things in order to build a basketball program you have to sign great recruits and my favorite recruiting story is when I was an assistant at the University of Virginia and we recruited a young man named Tom Sheehey, who was a high school All-American out of Rochester, New York. And Dave Odom, the great head coach of Wake Forest, he and I flew to New York City, he dropped me off to pick up three outstanding recruits, Kenny Smith, Bruce Dalrymple and Olden Polynice and then he took the Lear jet up to Rochester to pick up Tom Sheehey. And he picked up Tom at like 6 o'clock in the morning at his house in a taxi cab and he put Tommy's gear, bag in the trunk, they hopped in the cab and took off, and then all of a sudden you heard, a dog crying. They had run over Tommy's dog. So that didn't get the recruiting weekend off to such a great start, but it ended on a good note, Tommy Sheehey ended up signing with the University of Virginia and in his freshman year he helped get us to the Final Four. So it must have been a pretty good recruiting weekend. THE MODERATOR: Thank you for being with us today. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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