MOUNTAIN WEST MEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP

March 8, 2023

Joe Scott

Jake Heidbreder

Carter Murphy

Thomas & Mack Center

Air Force Falcons

Postgame Press Conference

UNLV 78, Air Force 70

THE MODERATOR: Joining Coach Joe Scott will be Jake Heidbreder and Carter Murphy.

Again, we'll have coach make an opening remark, and then we'll take questions for the student-athletes.

JOE SCOTT: I mean, it was a March college basketball game. That's for sure. A lot of progress for us to do that. Like I told our guys two years ago, we got obliterated. Last year we got obliterated, and this year we're different, and it was important that we show that today.

Our guys know that. We've made tons of progress. No pun intended, we're climbing a mountain, and, you know what, this is stuff you have to go through, and the first thing you have to do is do what we did today.

You have to give them credit. It's a college basketball game. It's March. Every little thing counts. You can point to anything at the end of the day and give them credit for figuring out how to win a game in March where it's never pretty. It's never perfect.

Like I said, give our guys tons of credit for growing and developing where, you know what, we don't need it to be perfect and pretty for us anymore. We just have to learn how to sort of take that next step, which is part of our -- part of the mountain we're climbing right now.

You know, but, again, give them credit. Obviously, the kid Harkless, hell of a player. They're all over this league, so it doesn't matter. That's another thing you have to keep learning and dealing with. As we get older and stronger and tougher, then I feel really good that we will get better in that area.

THE MODERATOR: Questions for the student-athletes.

Q. Carter, the second half of the year you seemed to find a groove, whether it was the UNM game or today. What changed for you that second of the year that allowed you to be so successful, especially scoring?

CARTER MURPHY: I mean, it's just sticking with it and continuing to run the offense. These guys are great. We set each other up. We play hard, and it leads to easy points. So just playing hard. That's nothing really changed. Just continuing to stick with it, so...

Q. Jake, similar question for you. It seemed like towards the end of the year you started to drive a lot more, really be aggressive to open up your shot. Was that something you kind of thought about doing, or was it just kind of a natural progression of your sophomore year?

JAKE HEIDBREDER: I think just getting better every day. Obviously, guys guarded me pretty hard. I think learning how to drive a little bit better and just working on my game in that aspect can open up other things for other people and myself.

So I think it just comes along with the growth of my game.

Q. Carter and Jake, this is for either of you. What makes it so difficult about guarding EJ? Because in both games you guys faced him he had a lot of success. What makes it so difficult to guard him?

CARTER MURPHY: He can score from all three levels. I mean, he can shoot the three, shoot the pull-up, and get to the rim. So he is a tough cover, and you've got to try to cover him with everyone on the team, not just one guy.

We just didn't do it quite enough today to get the win, so...

Q. That last sequence that happened, I mean, it started to get eerily similar to the last time you guys faced UNLV in that late lead situation to get the ball inbounds. What was kind of the plan for the end of the game? What went right? What went wrong? For regulation, I should say.

JAKE HEIDBREDER: We had a play drawn up. It didn't go as planned like we thought as well as we thought it would, and just got a little chaotic and we just didn't take care of the ball like we should have.

JOE SCOTT: To add to that, we wanted to get the ball to Carter in the post. Wanted to have Jake be the post feeder. We did it. Again, to me it just didn't go our well. We got the ball to Carter. Jake was the guy. Jake was going to come off another screen after that, and I heard somebody in here say about -- I can't say his name -- zero. But zero definitely came in and had an impact on the end of that game. Again, give him credit for that.

Just didn't -- that possession just didn't go our way. I'm a little bit more of the one before in the out of bounds, I wish that would have gone better. Like I told the guys, I have to do a better job in that area.

We've been pretty good with that, but I'll take that in those two situations, because that's where the game could have been won by us.

Q. Carter, this being kind of the last -- you know, the last stand for you, Nikc, for Camden, what do you feel like you guys left behind in kind of keeping this final one close, reversing that kind of big, big losses in these tournaments? What do you hope you kind of left behind with this one?

CARTER MURPHY: Yeah, we've made a lot of progress, and I hope the younger guys have seen that we just -- we have to come to work and work hard every single day and progress will be made.

It takes time, but we've made a lot of progress over the last, you know, three years we've had with Coach Scott. I wish good things for these guys in the future. Just have to keep working and, yeah, good things will come.

THE MODERATOR: Gentlemen, thank you for your time.

We'll dismiss you and continue with Coach.

Q. Joe, I mean, with the line-up change today bringing in Carter, taking out Jeffrey -- Jeffrey and Corbin didn't really play today -- what was the idea behind some of those adjustments, and what worked, what didn't?

JOE SCOTT: Well, I think you alluded to it. Carter has played really well. Like I said to the team after the game, possibly the most important thing for us that our team and program was able to see was the value of having seniors, the value of having seniors who stick with it.

Like Carter said, stay with it, because when you behave that way, it's like a human being quotient thing. Like right now we're to the point where I've told our guys, we're fast enough, we jump high enough, we shoot well enough, we dribble well enough. Because how do you know? Well, the score is tied. We're playing in these games in this league like everybody else is, right?

The difference is we don't have a history of success, so now what's going to change that is going to be keep doing what we're doing, and then these younger guys saw the benefit of these three seniors and how they played and how they played the last months of the season and how it wasn't always great, but when you stick with it and you get to be a senior and you play that way, you saw those guys play that way.

I think Cam and Carter have done that consistently.

Nikc, to go with what Nikc went through, to do what -- how well he played last Saturday, how well he played there, the contributions. Like I said to our guys, well, that's what happens when you get seniors. We don't have any juniors. They're the only guys. If there were some juniors there with them, you know what? We would have taken a bigger jump this year.

But we don't have those guys, so now that's where we're at for the younger guys to see a senior and see the affect of a senior and the impact they can have. That's huge for those guys because they have something to know -- to have seen what we do, who we are, and when you get to be like that with all that experience, well, like Carter said, you're going to keep making progress, and I feel strongly we're going to.

The other thing was they've just been playing well. At this time of the year I think all over, you go with the guys that are playing well. That was really the whole idea behind it.

Q. I know it's a tough juggling act with three seniors, lots of freshmen, lots of sophomores, especially when it comes to a tournament like this. There's not a lot of experience for some of those guys. Seeing how it all played out, is there any regret that maybe the seniors didn't play even more down the stretch, especially someone like Nikc? He was the only one with a positive plus-minus tonight.

JOE SCOTT: I don't think so. I think when you are building a program, when you are doing what you are doing, you know, I know for me you go with your gut. You go with what you see every day. You go with what's the long-range plan? How are we going to get there?

We're not going to skip steps. When you do it that way, I think you get a couple of these situations, and that's the credit to Nikc Jackson. You know, things went well and freshmen, as they go through the year, okay, they gave us -- we got to February, and you know what's required in February and March? Strength, experience.

So, again, that's why I say for our guys to see that, because we haven't had that to see that today, that's something that every one of these younger guys can take with them as they go into the offseason and next year. How much stronger is Jake Heidbreder? How much more developed strength, physical strength, age, experience? Ethan, I can name numerous guys.

Well, that's what we have to do, and that's what makes a season a season. Who keeps developing, who keeps coming along, who doesn't fall back, you know. Again, when you are juniors and seniors you see guys be able to sustain that. When you see younger guys, you see ebbs and flows.

We went through that, but that's why I give these seniors so much credit. Now what they've shown all the younger guys is, man, there's so much room for us to keep improving.

Q. Obviously, you never want to lose three seniors, especially three guys like that, but is there any sense of relief knowing that next year it's I can focus all of my attention on the future in developing those juniors, those sophomores, these incoming freshmen, and not maybe have to worry about a senior class as much?

JOE SCOTT: Yeah, I don't know. I'm not going to have any seniors next year, so I spent all this time talking about seniors. I wish I was going to have some seniors next year.

I already alluded that in that we don't have any juniors. If we had four juniors this year coupled with those three seniors, I know how much -- these little overtimes and one-pointers, well, that's usually the thing that turns that. You know what I mean?

Next year we won't have any seniors. I don't know if that's a good thing, you know, but we're going to make it be a good thing. We're going to work hard to do that and we're going to keep making progress, because we've made unbelievable progress in the program, and it's a credit to all the guys.

We're going to keep doing it and we're going to keep climbing the mountain.

Q. Last one. When you go into this offseason and you're kind of putting things together, I mean, what's the vision for what you would like this team to be in the future? What would you like the team to be next year, the following year when you have seniors once again? What do you want this to look like?

JOE SCOTT: Well, that's a good thing right now. I want it to look exactly like it looks like right now, but when the horn goes off, we got one more point than them.

That's the thing. Where does resilience come from? I don't wake up the next day after a one-point loss thinking less of myself because the other team had one more point than us.

You know what I do, is I look at what we have, who we are, how grateful -- how lucky we are to do what we do, and then try to impart that to our guys every day. Because when you have that kind of attitude, you keep getting better. You value the opportunities that you have.

We have an unbelievable opportunity. You know, to have that gratefulness, that's what makes guys be tough. It creates toughness. It creates the resilience needed that we need, and that's why I feel really good that we're going to keep making progress.

That's really what it comes down to, us learning how to continue doing what we're doing and then how do you learn, right, and it's usually the hardest thing. How do you learn?

Well, I'm talking about learning to winning the Mountain West. We already learned how to win nonconference. I'm talking about learning to win for real in the Mountain West.

We won more league games. We won more road games. We wish it could have been more. I know it could have been. That's all part of this journey. That's all part of this process, and I feel really good about what we have and how we're going to keep making that.

I know from personal experience, right, that it can be done, and we're going to keep working to keep riding up that, and we're not going to let anything get in our way. We're not going to get deterred because we're fortunate.

You know, when you know you're fortunate and grateful, you don't get deterred. When you're not like that, eh, stuff gets in your way, and you'll give up the chase. But, you know what, I know we're not going to.

THE MODERATOR: Thank you, Coach.

JOE SCOTT: Thank you.