NCAA MEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP: FIRST ROUND - MARQUETTE VS NORTH CAROLINA

March 16, 2022

Justin Lewis

Greg Elliott

Darryl Morsell

Kur Kuath

Dickies Arena

Marquette Golden Eagles

Media Conference

THE MODERATOR: Marquette student-athletes are about to enter. Welcome to the student-athletes from Marquette. Congratulations on getting here, guys.

And we will start with questions in the room, and we will go to ZOOM after that. Please remember to make sure your cell phones are silenced. Even if you think they may be, please double-check right now. I don't want to embarrass you in here. We'll have the student-athletes for 15 minutes, followed by coach Smart for 15 minutes.

We will exhaust the questions in the room first. And we'll go to ZOOM after the questions in the room. For the first question, identify yourself and your affiliation. So we will begin by letting you know who's here with us from the far-end, Kur Kuath, and then it's Greg Elliott.

All right. And then we have Justin Louis, followed by Darryl Morsell. And apologies for the printing issues, but we do appreciate Coach Smart taking care of that for us so we can identify Mr. Louis.

Questions from the room for the student-athletes, starting right in front.

Q. Kur, obviously, rebounding is what everyone's going to be talking about with this matchup. After studying Bacot the last couple of days, when do you need to do to kind of mitigate them on the glass? Occur?

KUR KUATH: You know, I've got embrace this challenge that I haven't had. I know he's a great player. Great offensive rebounder, one of the best in the country. So I'm going to have to battle him from the jump to the end. So I know it's going to be a big battle. But, you know, I'm excited for this challenge.

Q. This is for Greg. What can you take from last year's game in Chapel Hill that kind of helped you prepare for tomorrow?

GREG ELLIOTT: It was really just knowing about their personnel, mainly. It's not -- usually you come to the tournament, you have no basis on who you're getting ready to play. I got the chance to play against a couple of those guys; so I know what they like to do, how aggressive they are in the way they guard. So I know what shots will be available for me and my teammates, and I made sure we knew about that.

Q. For Darryl and Justin -- and Greg and Kur, you guys can jump in as well. But you guys talked about being connected on defense and being connected to try to find that groove from in the middle of the season, can you feel that in those first couple of days of practice after the selection show or is it something you have to trust in the work leading up to the point that it will be there come game day? Either Darryl or Justin can start.

THE MODERATOR: Darryl, go ahead.

DARRYL MORSELL: So a big thing about us defensively, it's just being ready. That's one of the main things we really focus on. So I feel like as long as we, you know, got that readiness, communicating with each other and, like, engaged into the game, I feel like we are locked in defensively and we can be connected.

THE MODERATOR: Justin, you can follow up on that.

JUSTIN LEWIS: I would say one of the main things that will help us get better with our defense and be who we were in the middle of the season is just being off serve. In off serve, I feel as though that takes care of everything. So...

THE MODERATOR: Second row on the right.

Q. For Kur, you went against Brady last year, obviously, being teammates at Oklahoma. How much does that help going into this preparing for North Carolina and what have you been able to give insight bias to your teammates?

KUR KUATH: It's been a big help, you know. Just being able to play against somebody I've played against -- I mean, played with the last three years, you know. It just -- it's helpful for my teammates because I'm able to give them the insides and outs of, you know, how he likes to play, what are the tendencies, his weaknesses, his strengths. So that's a big help for everybody, you know, anybody guarding him tomorrow.

THE MODERATOR: Back from the front row.

Q. Darryl, as much as people think that rebounding is just about the big guys, I know Shaka talks about it. It's everybody's job to chip in on the offensive or -- either offensive or defensive glass. What do you guys need to do as guards to help out Kur and Oso?

DARRYL MORSELL: So we know about Bacat and North Carolina, just in general, how they score a lot of points off offensive rebounds. So as guards, we know it's our responsibility to come down and help our bigs. We know they going to be fighting with them the whole game. So they might not be able to get the rebound; they might be tangled up with them. But we know if we want to win this game, it's got to be a team rebounding effort.

So in practice, we've been focusing on guards coming down and help rebound. And it's something we talk about often. Every guard, you know, trying to get five/six rebounds in this game coming up. So that's our mindset.

THE MODERATOR: In the middle on the left back here.

Q. And this question is for Justin. First, I just wanted to ask: Who generally defends you in practice?

And second, I wanted to ask: What was the key to the improvements -- what do you feel like is the key to you having this kind of a season and making an improvement over the last season?

JUSTIN LEWIS: David Joplin, one of our freshmen, he guards me in practice. He does a pretty good job. I make him better, he makes me better as an offensive player and defender when I guard him.

And I would say Coach Smart and -- like, our coaching staff kind of helped me improve. I remember the first things he said to me when he came on campus, he was just saying "be ready."

And just the way we embraced the work over the summer, I would say that was one of the key things to help me improve.

THE MODERATOR: Okay. Back on the right.

Q. Darryl, you're only guy on this roster that played the 2019 NCAA tournament. You know, when everything was kind of normal and now we're getting back to that, how much are you looking forward to that environment again after the last year, and how different do you think it's going to be getting back out there?

DARRYL MORSELL: So I've kind of just been telling a lot of the guys just have fun with this. Embrace this moment. This is a moment that, you know, as kids we all see the crazy stuff that happen in March Madness, all the great stuff that happens in the tournament, and now we here. So I'm just making sure that everybody embrace it and have fun with it.

But, like, at the end of the day, it's basketball. When the ball go out on the court, it's something we been playing all our life, you know, regardless of the circumstances, what arena we in, who we playing, it's something we been playing all our life. And our coaches have prepared us for the game. So we'll be ready.

THE MODERATOR: Back in second row.

Q. This question's for Greg and Justin. Obviously, you guys had the option of leaving after the last coaching staff left after the season, but you decided to come back. Was something like this, coming into March Madness, one of the things that you saw in the horizon when Coach Smart and his staff came to Milwaukee?

THE MODERATOR: Let's start with Darryl. I'm sorry. I apologize. Justin go ahead.

JUSTIN LEWIS: I would say Coach Smart's future definitely engaged me to stay. He's been around for a while, he knows what he's doing. And coming back alongside to play with Greg and playing for Marquette kind of made me stay, too.

GREG ELLIOTT: So for me, when Shaka first got there, there was a lot going on. And once we got to meet a little bit, I knew our goals really aligned with what I wanted to see happen at Marquette and what he wanted to see in Marquette.

And then the fact that I got a chance to play with Justin again. And we had actually talked about it a few times, like how we was going to figure out what was going on. And once we got to figure out what Shaka's vision was, and me and Justin already knew what we really wanted to do, we stayed, stuck around, and put the work in, and now we're here.

THE MODERATOR: Okay. Go back to the front row.

Q. Kur, are you still in touch with Brady? Have you guys had a little back and forth leading up to this game?

KUR KUATH: No, I haven't talked to Brady since I left OU.

Q. Greg, Oso said yesterday that you guys played better when you have that underdog niche. Do you agree with that? And what exactly does that look like for you?

GREG ELLIOTT: I agree. I feel like it's not an underdog, I would say. I would just say we're playing with a chip on our shoulder. We going out there and being aggressive, violent. Just going to prove that we're better than whoever we step out against. I feel like when we play with that chip on our shoulder, we can beat any team in the country. So...

THE MODERATOR: We have a couple minutes left in our time with our student-athletes.

Let's go back to the back row.

Q. Brady question for you. In watching film, it seems like to me his assist numbers have been really high at North Carolina compared to what they were at Oklahoma. Have you noticed anything different in his game from what you recall when you played with him?

KUR KUATH: No, I haven't noticed anything different in his game. Playing with Brady, you know, he's always been a good passer, but I guess guys are just hitting shots.

THE MODERATOR: More in the back.

Q. This is for Greg and Justin. Were you guys tight at all with Dawson Garcia? And since this matchup was announced, obviously he's not playing. But have you had any correspondence with him?

THE MODERATOR: Go ahead, Justin.

JUSTIN LEWIS: I haven't talked to Dawson pretty much since after, like, he left Marquette. So...

GREG ELLIOTT: So when it came out, we was playing North Carolina, I hadn't talked to him. I would say I talked to him in the middle of the season when I found out he wasn't playing anymore for UNC. So that's really about it.

THE MODERATOR: One more question, if anybody has it.

If not, we'll let the student-athletes goes. Thank you, men.