NCAA MEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP: FIRST ROUND - USC VS DRAKE

March 20, 2021

Darian DeVries

Bankers Life Fieldhouse

Drake Bulldogs

Postgame Media Conference

USC - 72, Drake - 56

THE MODERATOR: We have Drake head coach Darian DeVries. We will start with an opening statement from Coach and then we'll go to questions.

DARIAN DeVRIES: First of all, congratulations to USC on advancing. Obviously, we're disappointed that we have to go home, but certainly proud of our guys' effort not only tonight, but this entire season. You hate to see it end, but I felt like we fought to the bitter end today and came up a little short.

Q. Darian, congratulations on a great season. I mean, I know it stings today. Can you put any kind of perspective on really what is a historic season in Drake Bulldog basketball history?

DARIAN DeVRIES: Yeah, as I've told people all year, I just love these guys. I love what they're all about and how they've had to be so resilient all year to get to this point, to get to this game. They're an incredible bunch of guys to coach and be around every day. I couldn't be more proud of them.

Q. Tank, 16 minutes in the first half, looked like he was moving good early. Did something tighten up at halftime or anything?

DARIAN DeVRIES: Our plan, he wanted to play a little bit longer in that first half and see, instead of coming in and out, he felt like it got sore the other night. So we let him go a little longer stretch basically right through halftime. It was pretty sore coming out of the halftime locker room, and we just made a decision to not push it any further. So we decided to sit him that second half.

Q. Second half, I think you missed 21 of your first 24 shots. Was that their length catching up with you there or maybe some fatigue? What happened?

DARIAN DeVRIES: I think it was a combination of both. That zone really bothered us. That length was hard for us to get in the interior and finish. We were trying to get it inside to anywhere around the rim where we could get some scores or some easy baskets.

They just did a nice job. They're extremely long, and we couldn't get to the spots we wanted to and finish over them. We weren't able to get maybe as clean of looks as we would have liked on the threes against the zone.

I think it was a combination of all those things. Yeah, we certainly got fatigued in that second half a little bit. But like I said, I thought the guys continued to fight, and we just didn't have quite enough to get back into it.

Q. Darian, what was the impact of not having Tank in the second half, do you think?

DARIAN DeVRIES: I think the impact was Tank's such a good finisher on the interior, and in the first half, we were able to get it in there on their zone, and Tank was a big part of it. So not having him and then not -- maybe not having that luxury of subbing some guys a little bit more, which we would have liked to have done and kept us a little fresher.

But definitely in that zone is where he's so good, on that interior finishing and elevating up at the rim.

Q. Darian, talk about Garrett Sturtz's game today. I think he has five points, seven boards, five assists, five steals, four or five steals. He just for me epitomizes what you guys are about.

DARIAN DeVRIES: Yeah, I agree. He left it all out there. He was trying to make every winning play he could in that second half to keep us in it, getting steals and offensive rebounds, diving for loose balls. Again, he was tremendous, as were a lot of the guys.

You look at -- we had 17 offensive rebounds, and it was Garrett and everybody else just trying to go find them, go get them on a night where we couldn't score consistently in that second half. But they continued to try to pursue the ball and give us extra opportunities.

Q. Can you just kind of summarize what these last couple days have been like? I mean, all of the -- you're sitting on a Zoom call wearing a mask at the NCAA Tournament. Like it's kind of surreal, this whole experience. Can you just kind of put into words kind of what this has all been like?

DARIAN DeVRIES: It's been awesome. We've had a blast. We've really enjoyed this opportunity to be in the tournament, to win a game and advance, and we don't mind wearing the masks. We'd love to wear them for another week here, if we could have.

From our standpoint, we're just thankful that we got here and got this chance to play.

Q. How much time do you take before you start recruiting in your off-season program?

DARIAN DeVRIES: Recruiting is pretty much year round, so you continue to do that. We'll give our guys some time off for sure. They need a break, deserve a break, and let everybody heal up and get away for a while and enjoy being college guys here for a few weeks. Then we'll start back up sometimes down the road here.

Q. Darian, I know a couple weeks ago, you had said everyone's coming back for next year. Do you anticipate that's still the case?

DARIAN DeVRIES: Yeah, we do. I mean, as far as we know, that's everybody's intentions. We'll meet this week to make sure that is still the case. Like I said, we're really excited about this group. It's a very close group, and we're excited to see what they can do this off-season to get ready for another run at it next year.

Q. Darian, in light of that, what do you hope these guys learn from that experience that's going to help them in the off-season and going into next season? It seems like a big luxury for you.

DARIAN DeVRIES: Yeah, I think we'll take a lot from this, playing both games. I think there were some things that just going through it is an experience, and that experience, if we are fortunate enough to make it back, it will be something very, very helpful for the guys that are returning for sure.

In these cases, it's a win or go home at the end of the year. It's even different than a conference tournament if you have postseason. So the urgency that you have to play with, and I thought our guys did that in both games and really fought.

Again, I'm excited to see what we can do and improve on heading into next year.

Q. You mentioned most guys are coming back. Obviously, you're adding more talent coming in from recruiting, notably Tucker. Fans are going to have high hopes. What should fans' expectations be, and what are your expectations of the team going into next year?

DARIAN DeVRIES: From our standpoint, you're starting over. Nothing carries over from one year to the next. So you've still got to go work on it. You have to stay hungry and get better. We've got a lot of really good guys in the program. They love to work. They love to be in the gym.

I think each individual still has some growth that can take place, which is a good thing. We want to always continue to try to get better and better, both individually and as a team, and I'm looking forward to doing that here this spring, summer, and fall with them to see what type of progress we can make.

Q. Darian, they just announced that Oregon's going to miss their next game with COVID protocols and all that. I just want to go back to that issue for you guys. Just how difficult was it, once you got to Indy -- obviously, I've known -- we've talked about it. It's been tough all year long. How difficult or how different was it there at Indianapolis for you guys once you got there?

DARIAN DeVRIES: I thought it was all set up very well here. I mean, we were certainly isolated once we got here for about 18 hours, each in everybody's individual room, while we waited for two different sets of tests to come back. Once you got those tests, then we tested every day, and you weren't allowed to leave the hotel.

So it was seemingly a pretty secure bubble that we've been in this last week.