NCAA MEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP: FIRST ROUND - UNC GREENSBORO VS FLORIDA STATE

March 20, 2021

Leonard Hamilton

Florida State Seminoles

Bankers Life Fieldhouse

Postgame Media Conference

Florida State - 64, UNC Greensboro - 54

THE MODERATOR: We'll now begin with an opening statement from Coach Hamilton, then we'll go to questions.

LEONARD HAMILTON: You got to give Coach Miller a tremendous compliment because I thought he had his guys very well prepared. I thought we executed their game plan. We got out on them early. They fought back.

We had a stretch there where we were defending and getting stops, then a stretch where we turned the ball over four out of six possessions, and that gave them a chance to get back in the game at halftime. We came out the second half, and we extended the lead, and they fought back again.

That just tells a lot about what he's instilled in his team, the confidence. They believe in their system. When I look at the stat sheet, I'm really surprised that they only shot 25 percent from three because if someone had asked me, without me looking at the stat sheet, I would have thought they were raining threes from the parking lot. Different than us. We're the number one three-point shooting team in the ACC, and we were able to win a game going 0 for 9 from three.

We've had some challenges of late. We turned the ball over 25 times at the Georgia Tech game. We came tonight, and we didn't shoot the ball well from three. So I'm looking at it as a positive. We have been able to be competitive, not winning the game in the ACC Tournament, but I thought we bounced back and were able to overcome a little bit of adversity.

I think it says a lot that our guys are real anxious, but we had a lot of uncontested threes. I thought the guys were not really settled down. I thought -- they wanted it so bad that I thought that mentally, emotionally we tried just a little too hard. Hopefully, we'll settle down and relax a little bit better and be better going into our next game from our standpoint.

But University of North Carolina Greensboro gave us all we wanted today. It was a handful, and they ought to be commended.

THE MODERATOR: Thank you for that, Coach Hamilton. Now we'll go to questions from the media.

Q. Leonard, you talked about the three-point shooting. Was that something -- seeing the success you were having inside, you maybe moved away from it more in the second half and there was more effort on pushing the ball inside? You only took one shot in the second half from outside the arc.

LEONARD HAMILTON: I'm going to have to go back and watch the film, but I'd like to think that maybe North Carolina Greensboro understood we were a pretty good three-point shooting team, and they got to our shooters pretty good. But I also think in the second half we got stops and got deflections and got out and got to the basket attacking the rim. It was one of those games where we were not -- we did not decide we were not going to attack from the perimeter. I thought we were taking what the defense was giving us, and we attacked more on the dribble drive and post-ups and went to the boards and got some offensive rebounds, got to the free-throw line, and we were able to get some of these baskets. Sometimes that makes up for when you're not shooting the ball very well.

But I think our defense was what won the game for us today. When you're not shooting real well and you turn the ball over, your defense can carry you in games like this, and this is what happened for us today.

Q. Raiquan was saying that you're walking around practice in that boot as if nothing is wrong with you, and they borrow their toughness from you. Are you in pain? They said on TV today that you didn't want to use one of those scooters. Why is that?

LEONARD HAMILTON: Well, they say pain is temporary. It's not something that's going to last all the time. And we have a job to do, and we're going to work through whatever challenges that we have.

I mean, I've never had -- I have been injured very few times in my life. We're in the NCAA Tournament. My guys depend on me, so I want to -- if I'm going to ask them to work hard and challenge themselves, I have to do the same thing to some degree.

This is part of -- and to be very honest with you, I didn't even know I had the boot on once the game started. So it's something I've just got to -- it's a nuisance. It's a challenge, but there are more important things than worrying about me having a little pain. (Laughter).

Q. Are you going to have surgery?

LEONARD HAMILTON: I'll wait and let the doctors -- we'll have that conversation when I get back to Tallahassee.

Q. Leonard, was that as well, for most of the game, that you guys have played defensively this year or close to it? I mean, I know they hit some shots, but even some of the shots they hit were really well contested.

LEONARD HAMILTON: I thought the guys were locked in almost to a fault. I thought we were really anxious, wanted to get that bad taste out of our mouth from losing the game last week.

Our guys have got a culture. They challenge each other, call each other out. And there was no doubt that they were very, very hyped up, so to speak. I think sometimes, when you're hyped up like that, you can want something too bad.

But on the defensive end, I thought we -- you know, we were energetic. We contained the dribble. We stuck with the game plan. We knew that, if you didn't contest shots, they were going to knock shots down. But they had such an uncanny strength of ball handling and the ability to get into the lane and create for each other. It's as good as any teams that we played this year.

So not only did we have to contest shots, we had to contain the dribble, and we had to shrink the gaps when the guys got by you, at least deterring them from getting in and getting the kick-out jumpers. In the first half, they got a few in the lane where they got in and kicked out, and they made us pay.

I thought we made some adjustments the second half, just enough for us to get a spread or two, to get a little separation and pull the game out toward the end.

I think you see there are a lot of what you guys label as mid-major teams that are playing Power Five and major college teams right down to the wire. That just says a lot about how the game of college basketball is evolving -- the high school, AAU -- guys are developing. Players at every school, they really, really got this unique opportunity to get a scholarship, get their education.

A lot of guys are benefitting from this unique and special opportunity we have. It says a lot about where basketball's going and how it's growing that on any given night, anybody can win. That's why I'm so thankful that we're able to pull this out today because this team played almost well enough to win.

That just says a lot about the state of college basketball, the parity and the development at the high school and AAU programs that are developing kids at an accelerated rate. No one really talks about the positive aspects of development.

Q. Balsa has had some of his best games down the stretch. Another one today, nearly a double double. We saw the improvement early in the season from year one to year two. How much has he improved throughout this season?

LEONARD HAMILTON: Well, Balsa told me the other day that what he's trying to do is play to exhaustion and then come out of the game. He thinks that sometimes he paces -- not necessarily paces himself, but that's not -- but this has been his focus here the last several games, and he seems to be more productive when he's really going to exhaustion and then actually coming out of the game. He's blocking shots, rebounding. He's running the floor, giving us an inside presence that I think is really, really showing his capabilities.

And he's only a sophomore, and I think his best basketball is ahead of him.

Q. Hey, Coach, first off, I want to say congratulations on winning the game. I wanted to ask how it was coaching against Coach Miller, who, he mentioned a couple of days ago, he played against you. Now he's coaching against you in the tournament. How is that -- you know, you're coaching against someone that you played against. What was said after the game about Coach Miller and just overall?

LEONARD HAMILTON: I made a facetious comment about him in some media outlet. When we played them, when he was a senior, I believe, he was a walk-on, and seldom used walk-on, and we were leading the game. I thought we had -- the game could have gone either way, and we were defending, I think, Carolina, when they had one of their better teams.

They put him in the game, and I believe he hit three threes in the last five minutes of the game, and I told somebody I was going to have to give him a knuckle sandwich for cutting our heart out in that particular game.

So the first thing he said to me tonight is, well, Coach, I heard your comment about the knuckle sandwich, and he started laughing because that was truly one of the most disappointing games that I've participated in. I thought we had everything planned. We had everybody guarded. He wasn't even in the scouting report. And he came off the bench, and Roy used his Hall of Fame magic to put him in the game, and he knocked down I think it was three threes, and they were able to come away with a victory, and that just broke my heart.

We laughed and joked about that. But he's done a tremendous job at Greensboro. I mean, I can't say enough about the job that he's been doing. Gosh, I don't know if, with all the jobs that are open, someone's going to realize the outstanding job that he's done and be trying to steal him away from Greensboro because he's done a fantastic job, great game plan, kids played hard, they were disciplined.

We had to work hard to win this game, and that says a lot about the great and fantastic job that he's doing with that basketball program.

Q. Coach, a great tournament win is always good, whether you win by one or by 30. Can you talk about the tournament win today and what you see so far?

LEONARD HAMILTON: You just want to survive and advance. We probably could have played a little better, and that's a positive. I know we're going to get back in rhythm. Not very many teams have this opportunity to move on to the next round. Every team in America starts the season off, all with 387 teams wanting to be in the NCAA Tournament, and everybody would love to be able to stand on that ladder and hold that one finger up and say we're number 1.

So in order to be number 1, gosh, we've got to be one of 32. So now we're moving on to being one of 32, and it's a tremendous privilege and an honor to be in this position to have this opportunity, and we're going to do everything we can to take advantage of it.

THE MODERATOR: Coach, thanks so much for your time. Congratulations again. Best of luck now moving on.