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STATE FARM MISSOURI VALLEY CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENT

March 8, 2020

St. Louis, Missouri - Arch Madness

Bradley - 80, Valparaiso - 66

THE MODERATOR: Head coach Matt Lottich is here with his student athletes, John Kiser and Javon Freeman-Liberty, Ryan Fazekas. We're going to have an opening statement from Matt and then we'll have questions for all four participants here from Valparaiso. Matt, please.

MATT LOTTICH: Obviously, this is -- it's not easy. It's not easy because you lose, but it's not easy because you want it so bad for your team. The heart and the determination that they showed, it's something that we ask of them, and very few people are able to do it on a consistent basis. We've got a locker room full of guys that just laid it out on the line. Anytime you lay it out on the line like they did, you give your hearts into something and it doesn't work out, it hurts.

Some of the adversity that we had to face to make this run, obviously, the four in four. That's difficult. Javon coming off of mono to have a performance like that. Ryan really playing with one hand. John Kiser -- I mean, there was a couple weeks ago we thought he might be done for the year with an ankle injury. I guess that's just how our group is made, and this group fights and battles, and it didn't come out our way today. But the future looks pretty bright, and I think John and Ryan really put their stamp on our program, and they should be very proud of that.

THE MODERATOR: Let me say that Javon Freeman-Liberty and John Kiser were both All Tournament selections, two of the five. First question is right here.

Q. Matt and then for the players. Obviously, there was an 11, 10-minute mark in this game where it looked like the shot looks were there but they were a little short. Obviously, fatigue was a thing. How did you have to fight through that, and how much did it impact?
THE MODERATOR: John, Javon, Ryan, in that order, finish with Matt.

JOHN KISER: I definitely think it impacted us a little bit. I'm not going to blame it all on that though because we made mistakes on the defensive end that they capitalized on, and in the end, it was our downfall.

JAVON FREEMAN-LIBERTY: Like you said, I wouldn't blame it all on fatigue. We definitely messed up a lot of defensive assignments that led them to have the lead that they had.

RYAN FAZEKAS: I'm probably just going to repeat what they said. Like they said, fatigue is always a factor when you play four games in four days. It may have affected us a little bit, but we played our hearts out. We made mistakes that they scored on. They executed. So --

MATT LOTTICH: Yeah, I mean, maybe. Again, we got the looks that we wanted. Who knows? I will tell you that a lot of those shots, I thought were going in, and they just didn't. It probably took us a little bit, got a little tentative against the zone, had a couple of turnovers, and I think that got us maybe a little bit tentative.

Overall, I thought we executed for the most part on the offensive end. Defensively, maybe that's where your legs go a little bit and you're not able to close out as good, but credit them. They made some tough shots in that stretch. Yeah, I mean, fatigue is a factor. We played guys. We rode guys a lot of minutes, and I'm just looking at this. Javon plays 32. Ryan plays 32. Kiser plays 33. Donovan plays 36. A lot of these guys, like I said, were dealing with injuries. Javon was dealing with a sickness.

So it might be understandable with a little bit of fatigue, but we can't make excuses. We've just got to go from there.

Q. This is for Javon and Matt. They went to that zone. How difficult was it to kind of try to break that down?
JAVON FREEMAN-LIBERTY: We couldn't get on like a click. Like it was a surprise, but it was like they were backing up off of us, so it was like kind of hard for us to throw it to the middle to spread our guys out.

MATT LOTTICH: Again, I thought we got -- I thought it was a good coaching adjustment for them. They were having a hard time stopping us in man. Again, like Javon said, it was harder for us to get into the middle, but, again, you say that. It might have looked that way, but I thought we got the shots that we needed to get. We got a couple corner threes.

I think early they went to it in the second half and Donovan drove and got Ben a foul. It threw us off our rhythm for sure, but I did think we got shots that we could make.

Q. I guess I want to ask this one to find out if I've got to ask other ones. Matt, have you thought about the postseason, CIT, CBI, anything like that? You think you guys want to move forward, or is this gutting enough to want to lay it at this right now?
MATT LOTTICH: You ask me right now, when you're a little bit heartbroken, it's difficult to say. I will tell you that there's not been one day that I have dreaded going to work, not one day that I haven't enjoyed coaching my team. I think our players would share that sentiment. And when I say that, I think they would enjoy continuing to play. If you ask them right now, probably not, but as we can regroup and rest and kind of get off our legs a little bit, my guess is they'll want to play.

One of the things that the benefit of it is I do think we have a very special group. When we kind of hug and cry there in the locker room afterwards, the seniors both spoke, and their sentiment was this: Guys, this is a special group. Keep it going. They left their impact on it, and they left the program better than when they had it, but they also understand that the group's -- the players are returning, it's a special group.

I want them to get used to playing late into March because I think that this group could have that type of a run in the future.

Q. John, can you just take me through what this weekend has been like? Really, we talked about your journey before, but you really capped it off this weekend. Just talk about this.
JOHN KISER: It's just been fun. Playing with these guys has been fun. I just gave everything I could and yeah. I'm just going to leave it at it's just been fun.

Q. Ryan, can you touch on this journey for what you've gone through this last couple weeks and into this weekend?
RYAN FAZEKAS: I mean, it's just been an amazing journey with these guys, especially this last weekend of the tournament. We surprised a lot of people. We -- like, we tried to make a positive impact to get this team going in the right direction, and I think we left some good footprints for them to build on. The young guys got a lot of great experience this weekend. Yeah, it's just been an amazing journey.

To be the first team ever to play on a Thursday and make it to the championship, that's awesome. I think it's a great statement for this program.

Q. Javon, I don't know if there's ever the right time to ask a question like this, but you built something here that can continue. Your thoughts on playing with Valpo and what this year has meant to you?
JAVON FREEMAN-LIBERTY: If your question is am I staying? Yeah, I am. I just feel like, after this game, we're going to just keep building and building. We're a young group of guys, and it's a long time before we actually all split up. So like I said, we're going to just keep building on it.

Q. Donovan and Ben played so good in this tournament. What do you see from this core that you have that's coming back?
MATT LOTTICH: Well, as you -- it's hard. As you look forward, I think Javon has proven that he's a pretty special point guard, and kind of that new age point guard, able to get in the lane, able to score. He's got that knack for knowing where to pass the ball. So it's a great foundation. You have Donovan, Ben, who got valuable experience. Their talent is undeniable. There's no doubt about it. You've got Mileek McMillan coming back, who was on the most improved team in the league. We've got Nick Robinson. We can get him back from injury. Zion Morgan coming back. Freshman Emil, never disappointed when got in the game. There were plenty of times where I actually wanted to put him in, was just riding with the guys.

So the foundation is there. It's no secret that this group had success, and I said this in the locker room, you know, Paul, you follow us, but about this time last year, it looked like the program was in a bad spot. It looked like it was falling apart, but it was really just coming together. So we're going to continue to build on it. This group put in a great off-season. They were fantastic. And they had a lot of success this year. They got better throughout the year, can't deny that. We've just got to build on that momentum.

Q. Coach, you said there wasn't an excuse, but what your fans are going to say is that there's a difference between an excuse and a reason, and nobody plays four games in four days. You played 3 1/2 games very well, and the last, it just ran out. That's what fans are going to say.
MATT LOTTICH: Well, Dot, love ya, and I appreciate that. It's just a hard time right now. It's just a hard time.

THE MODERATOR: Thank you gentlemen. Best of luck in the future.

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