	products recent interviews FastScripts archive about ASAP Sports

Our Clients:

Browse by Sport

Find us on

Subscribe to RSS

Click to go to
Asaptext.com

View our
e-Brochure

NCAA MEN'S 1ST AND 2ND ROUNDS: COLUMBIA

March 22, 2019

Columbia, South Carolina

Duke - 85, North Dakota State - 62

THE MODERATOR: We have North Dakota State head coach David Richman with student-athletes Vinnie Shahid, Jordan Horn, and Tyson Ward.

DAVID RICHMAN: Obviously, Duke was the Number 1 overall seed there, especially in the second half, they get out in transition like that and turn you over, they're elite. That's an exceptional team, and it was a pleasure to coach against Coach K and for our guys to compete in that environment.

More so than anything, what our guys accomplished in the last three weeks in particular and over the last six weeks is tremendous. But that doesn't come close to what I'm really proud of. What I'm really proud of is how they did it. We talked a lot about representing a school, a community, a fan base, a state the right way, and to me, these guys did it.

We talk in our program a how is way greater than a what. Our guys, how they attacked this, how they stayed the course from a group that was 2-7 at one point, it was just an absolute pleasure to be around.

Appreciate it. This is a great opportunity. Our guys stayed in the moment. I asked them in the locker room to stay in the moment for one more minute and challenged them to what are they going to sacrifice to put ourselves in a position where we can be right back here next year?

Q. Vinnie, Coach K just called you a dominant leader. What does that mean hearing that from a coach of his stature?
VINNIE SHAHID: It means a lot. A lot of it has to do with what my teammates do. They give me confidence. They trust me with the ball. But it means a lot to hear that.

Q. Vinnie, you've known Tre for a while now. What was it like battling it out with him?
VINNIE SHAHID: It was very exciting. You grow up with somebody playing on the same team as them, and then you compete with them again through high school, and then you see them on the biggest stage there is in college basketball in March Madness. It's very exciting.

Q. Tyson and Vinnie, the stretch that Zion had at the start of the second half was something else. Have you guys ever seen anything like that, and how would you describe what happened there with him going off there?
TYSON WARD: To be honest with you, the game just went by in a flash. So I can't really tell you like what really happened at certain points in time. But he went on a stretch where he got some rebounds, and he does what he does, and it makes him a good player.

VINNIE SHAHID: Yeah, he's a really good player. He capitalized in transition and on the offensive boards, and he's finishing around the rim. Probably one of the best athletes I've ever seen with my own eyes, but he's a really great player.

Q. Question for any of the players, Coach mentioned a minute ago, guys, taking a moment in the locker room to think about what you want to accomplish and get back here next year. What do you guys each take away from the last three weeks building toward the future?
VINNIE SHAHID: Coach just said it, staying in the moment a lot. If you go back to June, we had a lot of ups and downs throughout the season, starting in June and going 2-7 and then going 5-0 and then losing three. A lot of it was just staying in the moment and learning and growing from those experiences.

JORDAN HORN: I kind of have to agree with all that Vinnie said, kind of hit it on the nail. But, yeah, we just stuck together through the whole process. Since June, since we've been here in the summer, we've all had our ups and downs personally and as a team. To get through what we went through and do it all together as one, it's very special. We all know we want to get back to this moment, to this stage, and make it even further. We know what we expect from ourselves, so we'll be right back.

TYSON WARD: We can take just how hard we worked, how much perseverance we went through, and when we get back, it starts then, preparing for that first game. Actually, that first practice in the summer or first practice in the spring, just preparing for those big moments and those little moments.

Q. To Tyson and Vinnie, can you talk about the opening stretch? You led most of the first half and got out to a 12-5 lead. What was the feeling like when you were executing and scoring and taking a lead against Duke here in this scenario?
TYSON WARD: It was just playing basketball. You know, 40 minutes were up, and we came out teed up, ready to play, and when we played with a whole bunch of excitement, we're a tough team to beat.

VINNIE SHAHID: I feel really good. I think we were getting some stops on the defensive end, and we were scoring on offense. So it wasn't allowing them to get out in transition as well as they usually do. It definitely feels good to have a lead. Only down four going into halftime.

Some things we had to clean up coming out in the second half, turned the ball over a little bit, but it feels really good.

Q. Did playing against Mike Daum multiple times during the season help you prepare for Zion, and who on your scout team had the impossible task of trying to emulate his play this week?
TYSON WARD: I think they're two totally different players. Mike Daum, he's a great player himself, and Zion Williamson is a great player himself, but you can't really compare those two. I think that you just come out and play basketball at the end of the day.

JORDAN HORN: I would say the same thing. They're both really great players, and playing against both of them, it was nice to see them and play against them and stuff like that, but I think they're two totally different players. In practice, we kind of challenge each other on both ends, whether they're on the scout team or in the rotation. With the scout team, playing against Mike Daum, we didn't really get that much time to go over Duke as a scout, but just pushing each other in practice was huge, and preparing was a big stage for us.

VINNIE SHAHID: They couldn't have said it any better.

Q. Tyson, you guys struggled in the first half and most of the second half shooting three-pointers. That's usually your bread and butter, making three-pointers. What did they do to make it so tough on you?
TYSON WARD: They just weren't falling. Sometimes you get a little bothered by their length and athleticism, but you've just got to prepare for that and shoot your shot. You can't be overthinking sometimes. I think that's what kind of happened a little bit. Overthinking really might have affected our shot a little bit.

THE MODERATOR: Thank you, gentlemen. Congrats on a good season. Questions now for Coach David Richman?

Q. What do you do when that second half starts and you can tell the whole thing is about to slide down? Is there anything you can do? Or do you just go, we gave it our best shot?
DAVID RICHMAN: That's not what we're about, just throwing our best shot. Obviously, it's Duke, the Number 1 seed. We knew it was coming. It's really tough when they're so well-coached, the length and athleticism. When you get them out in transition, we talked about it to our guys the last couple days. They're elites, and it's hard to get a stop when that gets going.

Q. On preparing for a guy like Zion, because you don't see a guy like him ever because you can't practice --
DAVID RICHMAN: Is there any guys like him besides him?

Q. Exactly right, and you're not in the ACC, where you see him twice a year. All those things considered and you have two days to prepare for him, how do you prepare for him? Because it seems what you guys did in the first half is as effective as you could have been in the first half?
DAVID RICHMAN: I think it's just real important. We talked about. You've got to be solid. You've got to be disciplined. You've got to make him earn it. He hit a three, something he hasn't done at a high level this year. But early in the second half, he got that offensive rebound off the free throw. It's things like that that breathe life into a guy who might have been quote, unquote, might have been struggling a little bit and just got his energy going. That's why they talk about him being the Number 1 pick overall. He's a special talent.

Q. A whirlwind of a week for you guys. Winning in Dayton, late night flight here to Columbia. What does it say about your team that they came out and competed and fought the way they did?
DAVID RICHMAN: When I asked at Selection Show for people to help tell our story, I think it's something that I've known, our staff's known, our guys have known. This is a terrific group. Being a student-athlete is extremely tough. It's a lifestyle. You give up a lot of things. You've got a head coach that's on your tail all the time asking you to be better and probably not in this voice all the time. These kids keep showing up. They've done tremendous work in the classroom. They're doing tremendous work in the community. Just extremely proud to be the leader of these guys.

Q. Jones against Vinnie, what do you know about their history together and watching them battle it out today?
DAVID RICHMAN: We were talking about it in the back. Jordan played AAU with them. Those guys are really tight. Vinnie Shahid is like a pied piper in the twin cities. Everybody knows Vinnie. Same with Jordan. They're at every open gym. Whether we play somebody from Omaha or somebody from Denver, from the twin cities, everybody knows those two guys. So it was a cool experience for them. We want to wish Tre all the best, too. His mom is battling some cancer, we understand. We want to wish Deb, I think she's got some North Dakota ties, all the best.

Q. Coach, to have a lead on the Number 1 overall seed and to fight for 40 minutes against that team, what does that do for your guys that you bring back every single guy on the roster next year? What does that do for their confidence moving forward?
DAVID RICHMAN: I think it's just that. I think it breeds a lot of confidence on the biggest stage against the best in the biggest tournament in one of the greatest -- obviously, I'm biased -- but in the greatest sporting event there is. We competed. What we've got to understand is we put up 40 minutes. We weren't able to do that -- and by no means am I or we ever going to be about a moral victory, but there's an extremely -- I and we can be extremely proud of, again, a lot of things we were able to do.

Q. Dave, how did you position this game with your team going in? Did you say, guys, we're going to go in and win the game, we're going to play our best and see what happens? How did you approach the game philosophically with your team when you started talking with them about it once you knew you were going to play after Wednesday's game?
DAVID RICHMAN: We talked about three things. Do the necessary, do the possible, and you will achieve the impossible. When you tie in the necessary and the possible -- it wasn't necessarily that we thought it was impossible, it was everybody else thought it was impossible. I get it. I get the percentages. I get the rankings, all those things. But it's just a weird feeling being around our group, and you could see it. You saw it Wednesday night. You saw it in the tournament, the poise and the confidence they play with down the stretch. It just never felt like you were going to get beat until they really got going and things got out of hand in the second half.

Q. I think you shot about 13 percent on three-pointers in the first half, which is not your norm. Did you almost feel like you could have had a lead at halftime if you'd have made some more threes? You were only down four, I think, at halftime.
DAVID RICHMAN: Yeah, but that's Duke. The length and athleticism is something that we don't see. You have to experience those things. You get sped up. I give Tyson a lot of credit in his answer to it, but they have the ability with their length and athleticism to speed you up, and that's what happened here this evening.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297