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NCAA MEN'S 1ST AND 2ND ROUNDS: HARTFORDMarch 21, 2019Ahmad CaverJeff JonesB.J. StithHartford, Connecticut Purdue - 61, Old Dominion - 48 JEFF JONES: It's been a good ride for us this year. Obviously, extremely disappointing that, you know, the season has ended. But I couldn't be more proud of these two guys and the rest of their teammates back in the locker room. They've been terrific all year long. I really couldn't have asked for any more. I think today's game, obviously we were beaten by a very good Purdue team, but it seemed to be shaping up almost as a microcosm of our season. You know, we got down, things didn't look good, and our guys kept hanging in there, kept hanging around. The difference is, this time, we didn't have enough bullets in the gun. You know, I would have liked to have seen how things would have transpired if either one of those wide-open shots, three-pointers in the corner had gone down. That would have made things really interesting, but that wasn't to be. Hat's off to Purdue, they're a terrific basketball team. I certainly wish them the best going forward but I'm just really proud of these guys and their teammates. Q. Ahmad, B.J., how did losing Xavier to early foul trouble affect you offensively? Did it change anything you were trying to do? B.J. STITH: It was tough losing an experienced player, and X is like that. He's been playing really well for us these past -- last week, two weeks. I guess he got a little too excited, picked up a couple fouls. It hurt, but it's part of the game. I felt we still fought as well as we could in the first half. But that's just how the tips fell. AHMAD CAVER: It definitely was hard losing our basically third scorer. Offense was stagnant after we run the offense and after the play, so we tried to go one-on-one or something like that. But, I mean he's been playing well. He got a bright future, and I wish him the best after this year. Q. If you would just kind of comment, what got you triggered when you went on that run, and did you think you could sustain it a little longer than you did and maybe get a little closer. Coach mentioned those two shots. B.J. STITH: I don't think anything really triggered us. I just felt that collectively as a team we said that we didn't come this far just to lay down in the NCAA Tournament, you know? We fought all year. We fought to get to this point. We faced greater odds, but we weren't going to let Purdue -- we weren't going to fall on this stage. So, I felt that we really started a fight, and we really started to crawl our way back. But as Coach said, shot didn't fall in the key moments in that stretch. It's unfortunate, but... AHMAD CAVER: Yeah, just like all year, we battled and tried to get back in the game, majority of the year, majority of the game. We wasn't going to let them celebrate in one of the biggest stages in college basketball. We were just going to keep fighting, keep trying to play hard and still stay with our principles and see where we could fall out. Like Coach said, we didn't have enough bullets. We couldn't hit the shots that we needed to and they got away with the lead. Q. I think Jeff said yesterday the key was to be able to run your offense and hit shots. You didn't hit shots percentage wise. How did you feel the way you ran your offense. Did you get the looks you wanted or was it a struggle? B.J. STITH: We got the looks we wanted. We got great looks both in the first half and the second half. They weren't just falling. But that had nothing to do with our effort. We fought, it just -- the ball wasn't going in the hoop. Like I said, it's tough. Hat's off to Purdue. They guarded our sets. They scouted us really well. Even though we did execute pretty well, we just couldn't hit shots. AHMAD CAVER: Yeah, we got a couple good shots in the first half and in the second half. They just didn't fall, and it's kind of hard to get back in the game with shots not falling especially the wide open ones or the ones that we want. But we still competed on the defensive end. We still -- like I said, we still competed. We still got on the boards. We still stuck together as a team, and then we just couldn't get back in when our shots wasn't falling. Q. It's always tough to lose this game and have the season suddenly shut down. I just wondered for all of the particular things that you went through personally and also with the team this year, how are your emotions right now? Are they different than other times when you've gone through this? And then do you plan on like taking a bit of time off or just hitting the recruiting trail right away or what's going through your mind right now? JEFF JONES: It's tough ending the season this way. This group has been special, even before getting to this point. You know, maybe there might have been a season in the past where -- you never like to lose that last game, but maybe it was time. I would have enjoyed having the opportunity to be with these guys for a little bit longer. I think it is different. One of the things -- my message to them in the locker room after is that 25 years from now, when they get together, they're not going to remember this loss. They're going to remember the fact that we had this opportunity. They're going to remember the exciting wins that we had in winning the Conference USA tournament. They're going to remember the fact that we were Conference USA regular season champions and had some really remarkable comeback wins. Those are going to be the things they're going to remember from a basketball perspective. But even more than that, the relationships. This was a group that truly was a team. You hear it a lot. People throw out the term "family." People throw out the term "together." This group was together. They stuck together through difficult times, when normal teams might not. So, I think I'm probably more -- as much as losing hurts, I'm more appreciative of what these guys have done and how they've gone about it. I think that's probably the overriding thought and emotion. Q. Jeff, would you this think, holding on to 61, Edwards got some timely shots but didn't shoot a high percentage. Would that have been enough or just came down to the offensive droughts you had? JEFF JONES: Our defense at the half-court was really good, and I just don't say that because of these percentages. We did what we wanted to do when we were able to force them into the half-court. When they got their separation, it came in the open court. We didn't have a lot of turnovers, but in a game like this, you know, it was enough. But they hit some threes in unsettled situations. They got some buckets. There was a stretch there -- you know, we were hanging in there in the first half, and I was contemplating putting Xavier back in because we were struggling so much offensively, but we're only five or six points down. And so I made that decision to keep him on the bench, and then in the last couple minutes -- and I don't know exactly what it was -- they stretched that thing out from being 5 or 6 to being the 13 margin, I think. And those came on I think more because of bad offense, than it was bad defense. If you're going to beat an opponent like Purdue in order to give yourself a chance, you got to make shots when you get them. The question earlier to Ahmad and B.J., I thought we got some really good looks in both halves, but we had to work really hard to get them. And I think you've got to credit Purdue for that, their game plan. Again, I don't know what they were trying to do but I looked out there. I thought Haarms was phenomenal defensively. What he was doing with the ball screen situations, still getting back and protecting the rim, I thought he was the real key to their defense tonight. Bottom line, getting to your question, you got to make shots. You got to make 60 percent. But you can't beat a team like Purdue hitting 26 percent. That's just not going to happen. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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