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STATE FARM MISSOURI VALLEY CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENT

March 9, 2019

St. Louis, Missouri - Arch Madness

Bradley - 53, Loyola - 51

THE MODERATOR: The Loyola Ramblers are here. We are joined by Coach Porter Moser, flanked by Marques Townes, Clayton Custer, and Cooper Kaifes.

PORTER MOSER: Hat's off to Bradley. They won a tough game. It was a one-possession game. A couple of our players said it's a man's game during the game. Hat's off to them. I'm disappointed for these guys. I know how bad they wanted it. I know how bad they've worked. I know the pressures they've been under all year long, and I really wanted it for them.

So you can tip your hats off to Bradley. They made some tough plays and very physical, but I'm proud of my guys. I'm proud of who they are as men and proud of how much they've invested in this program in the off-season.

We're not done yet. We still have a postseason. But my feeling of right now is about these guys that they've worked so hard and invested so much, that they didn't get the win tonight to support that.

Q. Marques and Clay, this was your last Arch Madness tournament ever. What was the experience like this time around?
THE MODERATOR: Marques first, please.

MARQUES TOWNES: It's a really good tournament. Only played in it two years, but I can just see the excitement around it. Every team comes in here and thinks they can win, so every game is a big game. I'm just happy I got to play in it.

CLAYTON CUSTER: It's always fun to be down in St. Louis. I appreciate all our fans coming out because everybody came out and supported us, but, obviously, we didn't get what we came here to do.

Q. Marques, you had a big game against Bradley just a week ago. How did they defend you differently today?
MARQUES TOWNES: It wasn't if I was making shots or not. It was just our defense, our rebounding, and our transition was what lost us the game. It wasn't my points that won us the game last game, or if it would have won us the game today. It was our defense last game that won the game, and our defense and our transition wasn't there today.

Anybody can step up and have a big game. Coop had a big game today. We just have to lock in more defensively and get the stop. A couple of transition threes or defensive rebounding, and you'd be seeing a different story.

Q. Marques, can you start out just what was -- you went to the bench for a while. What was troubling you?
MARQUES TOWNES: Just got some cramps, cramps in the game. I was fine, though.

Q. And for Clayton and Marques, just you both were pretty emotional after the game. Could you just kind of describe the feelings going through your head at that time.
CLAYTON CUSTER: I mean, you work so hard all year. The goal is to go to the NCAA Tournament, and our last year here, Marques' last year at Loyola, we got a taste of it last year. We had a goal, and we didn't reach it, and that hurts a lot.

MARQUES TOWNES: Our goal was to get back there. I was sitting on the bench before the game, before they announced the lineups, and I was just looking at the little video board, and I almost wanted to cry because I was so excited just to get out there and play, just to realize now that that was our last chance to get to the tournament for me and Clay. It hurts, but we fought hard. That's the way I want to go out. We fought hard. Even though we didn't come out with a win. I'd rather go out that way than not fighting hard.

Q. My next two are for Cooper. So you only missed one shot the entire game. What was that like? You made 16 points, I think it was, only missed one shot. What was that like for you?
COOPER KAIFES: I come into every game knowing that I'm going to have to make shots in order for us to win. Clay and Marques always find me. They drive it and I get to the open spots, and they're able to find me. They're always on me about shooting more and everything. Just sucks that we couldn't pull this one out.

Q. And then this is your first Arch Madness tournament. What was the experience like for you?
COOPER KAIFES: It was awesome seeing all the Loyola fans coming around and traveling all this way just to support us and everything. It just gets me excited for these next three years.

Q. This is for Porter and then if either Marques or Clayton want to chime in. You reached the pinnacle of the sport last year, and now you've fallen short. You've got to go to the NIT. How do you regroup the guys? Guys, how do you recalibrate and go after Madison Square Garden?
PORTER MOSER: We're going to take tonight to process it with each other. We'll go back to the hotel and eat a meal together. I can't tell you how proud I am to be the coach of these guys, the kind of men they are. You can just hear it in their responses. I'm not going to ask them not to hurt tonight. I'm not going to do that. They've invested too much. They're going to hurt. So I'm going to let them go to that natural process. We'll go back. We'll talk some days off. And I know the competitors they are. If they're going to lace them up, they're going to want to win.

So that's going to be an easy job for me, to get them recalibrated to get them ready for the NIT so I'm just going to go through the natural process of letting them -- hopefully, they can hang with each other, hang with their families, and then a couple days, we'll go back to Chicago, we'll get back into school. Give them a couple days, and then we'll get together. And if they're going to lace it up, they're going to put that jersey on and represent that name on the front of the jersey, one thing I can guarantee you, these guys will go after it. That's who they are.

So recalibrating them, the process of getting through this when we restart it up again, they'll recalibrate themselves.

THE MODERATOR: Clayton, how do you regroup as a student-athlete?

CLAYTON CUSTER: I mean, the character of the guys on our team. Obviously, this hurts worse than any loss that I've ever had, other than the Final Four loss last year. So I mean, we'll go back. We'll stick together. We'll hang out and get through this together, but like Coach said, we got a lot of winners on our team. We've got a lot of people who have a lot of pride, and we're not going to go out there and not play hard or whatever at NIT. We're going to go at it to win it. That's how we always have been, and that's what we're going to do at NIT.

Q. Porter, not many fouls called. I think in the first half you only had two free throws. It did look kind of physical at times under the hoop. How do you feel like how that can impact the game or how it did today?
PORTER MOSER: Yeah. I'm trying to process. The best way to answer this is, yeah, it was extremely physical. It was extremely physical. Sorry, Shannon. I mean, I'm pressed with how I really want to answer that question in a little bit.

Q. Porter, you've got four guys from outside the U.S. on your team. How do you go about recruiting players not from the U.S.?
PORTER MOSER: I don't know. When we recruit, we just identify guys who fit who we are, fit our culture, fit guys that just fit what we're trying to do, and those guys just kind of fell that way. It wasn't anything other than just finding guys that fit what we do.

Q. Porter, what was the message to the team in the locker room, and what were the emotions like in that locker room?
PORTER MOSER: It was very tough. It was very tough, very emotional. When you have this close of a group and program with the guys we have, there's nothing these guys haven't done to invest in who we are. I'm telling you, all summer, all fall, to withstand the pressure that these two have had to go through this year, it's very hard.

The more you invest in something, the harder it is to give up. So it was very emotional in the locker room, very hard. I told them to put their heads up, very proud of them. Got in the circle, said a prayer, and we'll move on. We'll get back together at the hotel. But it's very hard, very hard.

I mean -- I'm not sitting here with regret, saying I wish we would have worked harder. I wish we would have done this, would have done that. Through all of this stuff these guys have been through, they should have no regrets on how hard they worked, how hard they led. They fought through so much with an injury, with all -- with everything they went through this year to win a Valley championship. But how they prepared, you'd be proud if you were behind the walls watching. If you were a fly on the wall and you watched how these two led and prepared, you'd shake your head and be like, wow, that's impressive. So any time you do that, man, it's hard to give up.

Q. I know Krutwig came back into the game. It looked like he got his foot stepped on or rolled his ankle. Could you just talk about what was -- how they limited his effectiveness today maybe or his touches.
PORTER MOSER: Yeah, I've not been outspoken with it. He gets beat up a ton, as simple as that. I believe that. He's battled it. Sometimes you look at him and you say, oh, he's 6'9", 265, he can take that. So he did tweak his ankle. He's fought through little nagging injuries, so I don't think that affected him. But it was very physical out there.

You've got to give credit to them too. They blocked 13 shots. They came flying in. Childs -- they had some athletes that came in and just said we're going to try to block their shots. 13 blocked shots is a lot. They had 13 -- I think that's what they had, right?

THE MODERATOR: 9.

PORTER MOSER: 9 blocks and 13 offensive rebounds. The 9 blocks and 13 offensive rebounds, those were two -- those intangible stats on a one-possession game gave them 13 extra possessions, gave them nine stops at the rim in a one-possession game. Those are intangible stats that were really lopsided. They did a good job blocking shots and offensive rebounding.

THE MODERATOR: Thank you, gentlemen. Good luck in the NIT.

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