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NCAA MEN'S FIRST FOUR: DAYTON

March 19, 2019

Dayton, Ohio

Belmont - 81, Temple - 70

THE MODERATOR: We're joined by Belmont head coach Rick Byrd and student-athletes Dylan Windler and Kevin McClain. Rick, an opening statement.

COACH BYRD: First off, I'd like to congratulate Temple on a great year and Coach Dunphy on an unbelievable career. He is really one of if not the best guy in our business and a quality man. And this game will miss him. So I was fully prepared to be happy for him if we weren't able to win this game because it's his last year.

Anyway, this is an historic night for Belmont University and our basketball program. Just 48 hours ago we didn't know if we were going to be in this, and I didn't know if these two seniors were ever going to get to play in the NCAA Tournament. And now they've got Belmont's first win. So it's a big night for us, and we're happy we're up here talking to you.

THE MODERATOR: Questions for the student-athletes.

Q. Dylan talk about [inaudible]?
DYLAN WINDLER: Obviously, looking at his stats he was a huge role for us tonight in the win. Just having the inside presence, being able to score it. Even if he's not scoring it he's a really good passer out of there and he gets guys open. So, just having that big presence in there and on the defensive end, he got some good deflections and blocks. He's a big piece of what we do.

KEVIN MCCLAIN: I totally agree with what Dylan just said. He's a great scorer inside, and that's what we were hurting on in our championship game in the OVC. And he came back and did what he had to do.

Q. Dylan, I think as many wins as the guy beside you has over his career, how does it feel to be part of his first NCAA Tournament win?
DYLAN WINDLER: It feels amazing, to be honest. Obviously a hall of famer. The fact that he hasn't won a game, it's tough. I'm baffled by it. But I'm just really happy to be a part of it. I think this team is really special. And I think we can make a run in the next few days and weeks to come. So I'm really excited about what we've got going here. And I think we've got a really good team led by Coach.

KEVIN MCCLAIN: It's almost an honor to win a game with Coach Byrd in the NCAA.

COACH BYRD: Almost, just almost?

KEVIN MCCLAIN: Even though we didn't know we were going to be in the tournament and everything, how that went down, it's just amazing to me.

Q. Dylan, was going to Nick down low what you wanted to do going in, or was it something you went to when you weren't as much a factor?
DYLAN WINDLER: No, that's always our game plan. Our offense revolves around him. We're always looking to get it inside. Whenever he's in the game we're trying to feed it to him. We have a really good back-up in Seth Adelsperger, and when he's in the game we run more ball-screen offense.

We have that dynamic there and I think it works really well. Brings a little change of pace. But he was scoring it amazing inside tonight. So we just kept on feeding him and he did a really good job.

Q. Nate Pierre-Louis, No. 15 guarding you, what kind of matchup was that like for you?
DYLAN WINDLER: It was a good one. He's a really good defender obviously. He got up in me early and often. I just tried to stay patient, not force anything. I didn't shoot as much as I would like to. I think I stayed really patient and I think that helped our team a lot.

I try to do everything I can whether it's -- if it's not scoring on that night I'm going to get rebounds, I'm going to get steals and deflections. I'm just a winner. Luckily it's a team sport, so not just one person is going to carry the team always. We've got a really good team. So just do what I can to win.

Q. Coach mentioned he wasn't sure if you guys were going to get a chance to play in the NCAA Tournament. When you see your name pop up and you're getting sent here to Dayton, is there any kind of additional chip on your shoulder or motivation that you have going in to a game like this?
DYLAN WINDLER: I would just say motivation, just proving ourselves and proving to not only the committee but everyone that supported us over the week to help us get in the tournament, all the supporters and everything, just motivation to prove to them that we're a really good team. We deserve to be in this tournament.

KEVIN MCCLAIN: That just means we belong in this tournament and that's tonight. You can see that.

Q. Kevin, I want to ask you about the play, it was the winning basket, it was Grayson throwing to Nick, kind of bounced off. What did you see on that play, what do you remember from that play?
KEVIN MCCLAIN: I saw it being, like, the pass wasn't so great. So like he had to reach back, and I just kind of ran right behind him, just to hope that this would be sure to like not lose a possession. So I was just running and it came right to me, the way I played it out in my head honestly, and made a layup right after that.

Q. Kevin, your offense seems to be predicated on -- the team's offense seems to be predicated on shooting 3s or getting looks in the paint. How do you think spreading the floor like that helped the team tonight?
KEVIN MCCLAIN: I think it helped us out a lot. We normally -- that's not the way -- we don't, like, rely on shooting 3s, but tonight it was just there and I picked my poison with each shot and they just happened to go in tonight.

THE MODERATOR: Thank you. Questions for Coach.

Q. Just hearing what your players said about you, about this being your first NCAA Tournament win, I know obviously you've already probably got your mind thinking about Maryland in a couple of days. But when you look back on this season, your 800th win this season and first NCAA Tournament win this season, what does it mean to have these guys in the locker room with you?
COACH BYRD: Well, those two guys right there, particularly, when we recruited them, we had made six trips to -- in their senior year in high school, our seventh trip to the NCAA Tournament. So they had every reason to believe they would play in the NCAA Tournament when they came to Belmont and we had three years prior to this not making it, even though two of those years we were good teams -- regular season champions and this year regular season champions that don't win the tournament.

So there's a lot of things about all this, but the most special part of making this tournament and now winning this game is those two guys right there because they've been great leaders. They've worked really, really hard to become better basketball players. And they both represent Belmont in such a positive way at all times. And so that's the best part of it.

I get the question a lot, what's the missing piece? The missing piece is you all haven't won a game in the NCAA Tournament. I don't really care about the personal part. If we would have lost this game, I would have been proud of what we've accomplished. But I don't have to answer that question anymore.

Q. I wanted to ask you about that play too, Grayson. Specifically if you remember what you were yelling to Grayson after the play. And maybe some of the ups and downs he had tonight.
COACH BYRD: I don't remember what I was yelling at him. I mean, that's just one of those things. Both teams had probably double figure points off of almost accidental scores it seems to me. I don't think it was nearly the cleanest basketball game you're going to see.

I thought that play was real important. I also thought that the back door that we got to Dylan late in if game was -- it didn't mathematically clinch it but it did make it tough for them to come back.

I yelled at Grayson quite a bit tonight so I'm not sure what that one was about.

Q. You said it wasn't a clean game. Did you ever feel like you guys were losing control of it or did you feel like you were in it the whole way?
COACH BYRD: We were in it the whole way. But I felt probably at least three different times that our guys had absolutely no concept what we were supposed to be doing, particularly on the offensive end. And that's disappointing. And if that had happened and we would have lost, I'd be embarrassed by us coming down offensively and really not knowing what our offense was supposed to be, what our concept was.

And we've got several of them. But they know. And I don't know if it's the moment -- we're young. We've still -- Grayson is a freshman point guard and he does a lot of great things and made a lot of big driving baskets for us tonight, and nobody plays harder or competes harder. But a freshman point guard is going to make some mistakes.

And we didn't get into our offense. All the times they made their run, they were scoring easy baskets because we weren't scoring on our end and they were getting transition baskets and open-floor baskets.

Q. Were you surprised at all how well Nick Muszynski played tonight? And was there any point that you were a little nervous he may -- he could have re-aggravated his injury by the amount of time he had?
COACH BYRD: As good as he was playing, I was not the least bit concerned about his ankle at that point. He needed to be in the game for us to be good. So that thought never entered my mind. We got him enough rest because he got tired. Actually, he does anyway. He needs to be in better shape, period. But certainly he hadn't run hardly at all in 10 or 11 days, and we knew he wasn't going to be in good shape.

I thought he played terrific -- we just didn't know what we were going to get. Frankly yesterday in practice he didn't look very good at all. He missed -- that first shot he missed, if anybody can remember just the wide-open, little bunny layup, pick-and-roll. He did that about six times yesterday. I thought, I don't know what we're in for. But he really showed a lot today.

Q. In a situation like this and looking forward to Maryland, when you have 48 hours to prepare for an opponent, what's the biggest key to get your team ready?
COACH BYRD: Fortunately in this day and time, with all the video that's instantly available and with the staff of enough people to divvy up games that Maryland's played. In fact, we already started. Coach Brian Ayers has already looked at quite a few and made some clips and I'll certainly do the same.

And we ought to be ready to practice tomorrow. I hope it's afternoon. I hope we get to sleep a little bit once we get to Jacksonville about four in the morning and hotel five in the morning, whatever it's going to be, that we can practice late in the afternoon, early evening, and give us time to get ready for what they do and how they do it and what's the best way to attack their defense and do the best we can to defend their offense.

I've really not seen Maryland play much on TV this year at all. And I know they're a young team and they've had a pretty impressive year.

Q. Wondered about Kaleb being ill and what do you think about him a couple of days from now, to have a little depth from him?
COACH BYRD: He would have played tonight for sure some. I don't know if he has a stomach virus or if he just did not feel like playing basketball. And got a little medicine and he started to rebound mid-afternoon, but it all came back. That's about all the detail you need to know.

So hopefully he'll get through that and be able to get out there play a little bit. Because he gives us some physical presence and toughness, and he can shoot the basketball and we could have used him.

THE MODERATOR: Thank you.

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