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MOUNTAIN WEST MEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIPMarch 5, 2020Leon RiceDerrick Alston Jr.RJ WilliamsJustinian JessupLas Vegas, Nevada Boise State - 67, UNLV - 61 LEON RICE: Well, we knew it was going to be a battle with these guys. I said it before the game, UNLV, TJ has done just a terrific job and their guys have done such a great job of -- they got better as the year went on, and they were playing maybe the best basketball in the league down the stretch, and we knew we were going to have to play a great game, and we knew it was going to be highly, highly competitive, and certainly didn't disappoint. We also knew that we weren't going to -- there's no knocking -- somebody wasn't going to get knocked out in the first round. It was going to go 40 minutes and it took all 40 minutes to get the job done. But I was really proud of our guys. They took -- we came in here last week, and they handed us our hats, and we responded the right way, like these guys always do, and they adjusted some things, and it was on them. They had to come back down here and play the home team and play a team that just, like I said, kind of stuck it to us. So I was really proud of our guys, the way they approached it. Q. Defensively you guys obviously really packed the paint and tried -- took some chances there in terms of letting them shoot from the outside. Only 18 points in the paint after they had 42 last game. Their shooting percentage went from 50 percent down to 32. Defensively what was the difference for you guys, after how the last game went? JUSTINIAN JESSUP: Yeah, you said it right there, just packed the paint. We knew that wins or losses, they make seven threes, so it's really all about just defending that box like we talked about all week and they're going to make some, we knew that, and we were just going to stick with the plan the whole game, and that's what we did. Q. RJ, you fouled out last time you played these guys with 8:03 left. How much did that motivate you and factor into your performance today? RJ WILLIAMS: It just made me want to play harder for my teammates, to be there on the floor and help the team out wherever I can, and that was staying on the floor tonight. Q. What does this mean for you guys, to be moving on, to not have the season be over and be playing another game tomorrow? DERRICK ALSTON JR.: Definitely huge. I mean, for us, like I said, nobody wants to quit playing. We've got a 20-win season, got a great opportunity versus a really good team tomorrow. We've got guys in our locker room who are very excited to keep playing and want to keep winning. Q. Derrick, what allowed the defense to be so effective today? DERRICK ALSTON JR.: I think just really locking into the game plan. Obviously like I said, they kind of torched us in the paint last game, and we knew that was going to be a big factor, and just trusting the game plan, trusting each other and just faith in each other knowing that we can get it done. Q. Could you tell me about the unique challenges of facing the Aztecs tomorrow? DERRICK ALSTON JR.: I mean, they're a good team. Like I said, don't have a lot of losses. They can do -- 1 through 5 they're very strong, have a good bench, so it's going to be a great match-up. They're a really good team. JUSTINIAN JESSUP: Yeah, I don't think they have any glaring weaknesses. Like he said, they're strong 1 through 5, got good guards, good bigs, so like he said, it'll be a good game. RJ WILLIAMS: Yeah, like J said, they're a great team, just got to stay connected like we did today, and the results will handle themselves. Q. RJ, big game today; what do you do to stay focused and have that duplicated tomorrow against San Diego? RJ WILLIAMS: Just have the same mindset coming in today and just staying connected. Leon harps on that for us and just staying connected as a team. We have this thing called 23 strong, so just come in 23 strong connected, and it should be fine. Q. You guys obviously had the lead and then they hit a couple shots and the crowd is getting into it and you're only up two points with about three minutes left. I think all three of you hit some big free throws, but just to pull it out at the end and make some key plays and key free throws and get a couple stops in the last couple minutes, how were you able to do that and how did it feel? JUSTINIAN JESSUP: Yeah, the whole mantra this year has just been finish, and I think we did a good job of that today. We had some lapses defensively, let Antonio get going a little bit, but yeah, we did a good job of finishing, keeping our cool, especially with a lot of UNLV fans there. It's going to be the same thing tomorrow; San Diego State is going to have a lot of fans, so we've just got to keep our poise and play the whole 40. Q. J, you're a senior; what's it mean to you to have another opportunity at San Diego State? JUSTINIAN JESSUP: It's great, just another opportunity, playing in a Boise State uniform, really. That's the biggest thing. We're just one game away from playing for a championship, so that's exciting. Q. RJ, you had the pass right to Hobbs; was that you that had the bounce pass on the lay-up there? You obviously did a lot offensively in terms of scoring, but in that spot to make that pass and then to have Alex hit that shot at that time, I think it was his only bucket of the game, how big was that play? RJ WILLIAMS: It was big. Hobbs, credit to him. He's a great scorer, just natural scorer, so I knew they were going to overplay him, and then we practiced it in practice, just throw it to him, he was open, he scored the bucket. All the credit to Hobbs for sure. Q. Derrick, you're a legitimate NBA prospect; you're in a lot of mock drafts as a late second-rounder. I know you want to right now focus on beating San Diego State tomorrow, but what can a win against them and potentially a win in the tournament do for your draft stock? LEON RICE: Let's just focus on the games and talk about the teams. He doesn't want to talk about that right now, so I'm intercepting that. I'll let him talk about the game tomorrow. Do him a favor, let him focus on that. Q. Derrick, Coach alluded to it, talking about what happened last time you guys played these guys here. How much of an extra emphasis kind of a kick in the backside did that give you guys going into this match-up today? DERRICK ALSTON JR.: Definitely, for sure. My big thing is just continuing to play with these guys. We have great seniors, and they need to go out on the right foot, so for me it's just doing anything I can in my power to help them win, and like I said, we've got a big opportunity tomorrow to get a great win and have a chance to play for a championship and go to the NCAA Tournament. I mean, you're not holding anything back at this time. Everyone is kind of hurting and tired, but at this time, it's March, this is the best time to play basketball and we're going to go out there and compete and go out there and try to get a win. Q. Leon, the defensive game plan, going to pack the paint there, and obviously you were kind of secretive when we were asking you the other day what was going to change defensively, so you obviously had a plan and it worked. How did you guys decide to go that route and how effective was it? LEON RICE: Well, that's the beauty of my guys because it was on them. They bought in, they worked on it really hard. It was nice to have the bye to kind of get refreshed, and then we had maybe three of our best practices, and credit to our scout team, too. We've got one of the best scout teams in America, and they couldn't get to the paint on us. It helped us. But again, all the credit goes back -- my staff did a terrific job, obviously, but it goes back to these guys going out and doing it. And then UNLV comes out first possession and hits a three, and they could have been like, oh, no, this isn't going to work, but they stuck with it and they kept grinding all game, and that's what it was going to take. We knew that that's what it was going to take to be a 40-minute game to finish this one. Q. Leon, RJ with 23 and 15 today, what did you think of his performance? LEON RICE: How about that? Like you said, that pass at the end of the game and drawing nine fouls, and he just -- they have a plan. Those guys are good rebounders. They're one of the best rebounding teams in our league and in the country. He gets the ball somehow someway, and he's undersized and he just plays with so much heart, so much passion, and sometimes he goes over a little bit, and that happened tonight. We've got to correct that. But I just love his passion and energy. I like those guys to play with that kind of fire, and when you do, when you rub up against that line, sometimes you go over it a little bit, and I've gone over it myself once in a while. But we've got to be smarter about that. We got two of them tonight, and can't do that. Q. Earlier today it was Jordan Schakel for the San Diego State Aztecs; at times it's Malachi Flynn, it can be Yanni Wetzell, it can be Matt Mitchell -- LEON RICE: I'm familiar with them, yeah. Q. Where do you begin when it comes to game planning for this team? LEON RICE: Yeah, and in such a short turnaround, it's tough, because another one that last time we played them -- both times we played them they handed us our hats. They have that record for a reason. When a team is that highly ranked this time of year, when a team has got that kind of record and who they beat and the circumstances they beat them, I mean, they're -- don't underestimate that because I've lived through this time and time again in my career, don't underestimate how hard it is when you have a target on you night in, night out. As they went down the stretch, everybody is trying to play their best against them, every arena is full against them, and that team has responded. I mean, time and time again, they've responded. It's been an impressive, really, really, really impressive team, impressive team, and the job Dutcher has done certainly is deserving of the Coach of the Year in the Mountain West but maybe the National Coach of the Year from what I've seen. You know, you can't -- all those things are accurate that I just said. It's not just a coach up here, this is who we play tomorrow. Those are all true. Like you said, you go down each one of those guys and they've done tremendous things for that team at some point in this year, and pretty darned consistent, too. It's not like, well, one guy just had a great night tonight and then another. Those guys have been -- I mean, you talk about consistency, it's been so impressive. Q. Coach, big win obviously today; when do you get together with your guys and shift the energy from celebrating today's win to getting ready for the biggest match-up of the season? LEON RICE: You know, that's the nice thing about playing in preseason tournaments and that's the nice thing about having veterans. They know. They're turning the page. You know, I mean, these guys -- it's so funny, they just -- not an expression, not a -- but they're happy, but they're not overly exuberant. We've got five seniors and we've got guys that want to keep playing, so they get it. They know that we're not just going to go back and celebrate. They'll turn the page. I think they already have it looks like. That's why we came here. We want to keep playing, and they want to keep competing, and we've got a huge challenge tomorrow. They also know that. They're not dumb. They watch -- these kids, players these days, they watch everything. They know the team we're playing. They know who we have in front of us. Q. When you're putting together your defensive game plan, were you taking into account that Mitrou-Long probably wouldn't play? LEON RICE: No, you know, I -- you never can count on that or think about that. They always seem to show up and play. That's a tough deal that he got hurt. He's a great player. But credit to their team. Those guys battled, and that's what it's about. You hate to focus anything on that because that team we played battled, and those guys, the five they had on the court were great. My guys did a terrific job with what was out there and what we had to do. But yeah, he was -- we planned like he was going to play. We didn't know. Q. Leon, there's good and bad to every win; what are some of the -- LEON RICE: There's no bad to wins. Q. What are some of the positives you can take away, and what are some of the biggest negatives you want to correct going into San Diego State tomorrow? LEON RICE: Well, this time of year with however many hours, 16 hours we have to play, it's not about like hey, we're going to go correct a bunch of things. If there's things that need to be corrected, we probably have worked on it this time of year. You kind of are who you are at this time of year. Like I said, the greatest thing about that game was the response from the last game, I think, if you want to take away one thing that -- I mean, we were down 27 last week, and I think there's a lot of people that didn't give us a chance in this game, and I got good -- not good, I got great character guys that respond the right way to adversity. They respond to getting -- you knock them down, they get up stronger, and that's kind of one of our things. So I think that's my biggest thing that I'm really, really pleased about is that they took what we were trying to do. They went out on the floor and executed and they played with passion and heart and togetherness and all the things you want your team to be about. They looked great doing it. When you've got a team that's this hungry to keep playing, that helps you and gets you over the hump when the going gets tough because I knew that would be -- like I said, I said it over and over again, I knew how good UNLV is playing, I know it was home atmosphere, all those things that were going against you, you're going to have to stand up to and get through. Q. San Diego State switched pretty much everything 1 through 5 against you last time they played. How much have you seen that this year, and obviously there's counters to everything, but is it something that you can do in 24 hours or is it really difficult when it's a switching situation? LEON RICE: You know, the switching to me is not the biggest part. The biggest part is how good they're defending and how they defend -- at our place, they defended without fouling so well. I mean, I don't know if I've seen one that well. So the switching, it was -- I guess what I'm saying is it's a lot harder to play against really, really good defenders everywhere you turn than the scheme, and that's the most important thing, and that's the thing that they do best is -- and that's no surprise. I mean, every year you play San Diego State, there haven't been many I walked away and went, they're not very good defensively. No, that's been the cornerstone of their whole program in the Fisher era, and now Dutcher is the Fisher era, too, so it's not like it changed. It's about their commitment to it, and it's about how good they are at it, all those things that they're doing. It's never really about the scheme to me. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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