PAC-12 CONFERENCE MEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP

March 10, 2023

Dana Altman

Rivaldo Soares

Nate Bittle

Oregon Ducks

Postgame Press Conference

UCLA - 75, Oregon - 56

THE MODERATOR: We'll go ahead and get started with an opening statement from coach and then take questions.

DANA ALTMAN: Yeah, we didn't hit any threes, which we needed to hit a few of the open ones that we had. So that, I thought really hurt us. The difference, they went 9-19, we went 3-19. So that has been a problem for us all year and it really was a problem today. I thought we had some really good looks and just didn't get 'em.

I liked the way we battled on the boards. They had given us problems on the boards. We out-rebounded 'em 40-30. I thought our guys really did a good job of competing there. But Tyger got it going and we did a poor job of adjusting on him. He really got it going there. We just didn't stop him. His one-on-one, he created a lot of shots for himself and did a really good job one-on-one.

THE MODERATOR: Questions?

Q. Going with that, for 30 minutes you guys really did basically keep them, relatively speaking, contained. What happened in the final 10 for Tyger and for Jaime to rattle off and it's the third or fourth time this year where one of the best players in the league has done that?

DANA ALTMAN: Yeah. No, we just didn't get stops. Like I said, he kind of got whatever he wanted. He hit some threes. Like I said, the difference 9-19 from three, and a few of 'em were guarded, but a few of 'em we didn't get to 'em.

So you know Singleton is going to hit buckets. He was 3-3 from three. That was the difference, our defense not pushing out and getting on those shooters. We made some mistakes in the first half, but we were able to cover 'em up a little bit better.

Second half we just didn't cover up any mistakes. We lost our energy when we missed some shots. I thought the only time we really showed some energy, they outscored us 12-6 in the first four minutes there to start the second half, and we were down eight, got down 10, and then we had a little spurt. We finally hit some shots, and then that was kind of when our energy was the best. But we didn't respond very well when we missed shots. Our energy level just wasn't good enough.

Q. Second half did you like the offensive shots you took and then just a cold night or did you guys kind of get out of what were you looking to run?

DANA ALTMAN: A few of 'em were out of rhythm. We weren't able to go to Dante quite as much. He was bothered a little bit by that ankle, wasn't quite himself. So we didn't really have the inside out that we've had.

And just going in my head, I'll have to look at the film, but of the 19 threes 16, 17 of 'em weren't bad looks. You know, rhythm threes. We had a few good looks. So that's disappointing.

But at other times, we didn't make plays. We got to the rim, their shot blockers came over. I'm not sure how many blocks they had, but they saved, sometimes we got to the rim and they did a really good job. At times I thought we got sped up a little bit and took a few quick ones trying to get back.

Q. Halftime 32 to 30, you guys are in a good spot, what's the vibe going into the locker room at that point? What are you guys thinking moving forward?

RIVALDO SOARES: By halftime, just emphasizing competing and being tough. In the previous games, in the second half, our energy level had gone down. We was just trying to emphasize coming out and continuing to play tough against 'em.

Q. You mentioned, Dana, Dante's not really himself. It looked like he was in pain a little bit during warmup. He was energized, but can you assess just what he was actually -- (feed shut off.)

DANA ALTMAN: (Feed shut off) -- himself, but he's a competitor and his ankle was just sore, and when you're six-eleven, 250 pounds, it's probably a little sorer than on most guys.

He wasn't himself the first half, 0-4, just you could tell he was tentative. Second half he got a couple shots down, but he was only 3-7. It's not his usual percentage. And don't, UCLA's defense had a little bit to do with that. He got some shots right to the rim and just wasn't able to finish, didn't look like himself.

Q. You were both here last year as well and you both over the course of the season had individually improvements in a big way from last year, especially you, Nate. But to still be bound for the NIT back-to-back years when you make personal improvements and in the second half of the season I think the team showed at times some improvements, how does it sit with you that you can improve individually and maybe even as a team at times, but it's ending in the NIT again.

NATE BITTLE: I mean, you know, it's not how we wanted to finish and stuff, but it was a great opportunity for us to come out and just compete more and play more, and I think it's a great way for us to improve our own games. It's not where we want to be, but we got to go from there.

RIVALDO SOARES: Yeah, any time I get to put this jersey on, it's a blessing. So it's not the way we wanted it to go, but got to keep competing and there's plenty of good teams that are going to be playing in the NIT, so got to be ready to compete.

Q. You guys had a bunch of kind of solid scoring contributions, but nobody, obviously Tyger took it to a different level. What's the process second half? Are you guys looking to each other to try to just get somebody going? What was the process of just trying to get maybe just one or two guys really going to try to match what Tyger was doing?

RIVALDO SOARES: I don't know.

NATE BITTLE: Yeah, I don't know how to answer that, honestly.

DANA ALTMAN: We had everybody look at taking shots. If you look at our shot distribution, everybody had an opportunity. We had some shots, we ran some stuff. But you're right, we didn't have anybody really get going. Guys that played 30 minutes and usually give us a bucket or two, Rivaldo didn't have a good offensive game, Jermaine had some good look, didn't get anything down. Keeshawn gave us a big boost last night and didn't get it going tonight. So we had some opportunities. Like I said, I'll have to look at the film, but I thought we had a lot of good looks from three. I know Waldo had a couple good looks and Quincy had a couple good looks, we just didn't get 'em down.

RIVALDO SOARES: To go off that, our main focus probably wasn't really offense, we really tried to buckle down on defense. But that's how you win games. It just didn't go our way on the offensive end.

Q. Looking at the season as a whole the injury bug at the very beginning of the year, some good parts of the year, some inconsistencies. As a growing player one or two things that you'll take out of this season, lessons learned to try and help you be a better player moving forward.

NATE BITTLE: Just from this season I think like as the season went on and stuff the team started to trust me more. Coach trusted me more. That just boosts confidence and once you get confidence rolling it's hard to stop confidence. So I think a big part of that was just the team helping me, coach obviously helping me and that's just how it goes.

Q. You talked a lot about how it's tough for any team to beat any team three times. Just what makes UCLA so dominant and able to do that this season?

DANA ALTMAN: Well, I'm not sure it is. They're more experienced, they're obviously a better team than us. They have proven that three times. So the two individuals, especially Tyger today, back at home and Jaquez, they just took over the games. Again, I thought our effort was good tonight. We battled on the boards, but defensively we just made some mistakes. There was one time where Tyger hit a couple three buckets in a row and really he was the only guy on the floor that had experience, was going to look for his shots, and we just didn't do a good job of getting after him. So our adjustments weren't what we needed to have, so it was all of us. We just, we didn't get it done.

Q. You mentioned the three-point shooting being a season-long issue. When you add Jermaine and Keeshawn in the off-season -- I'm not blaming them, they weren't available for half the year -- but when you add them to address an issue and it becomes worse how hard has that been to accept that this could be the worst three-point shooting team you've ever coached, and how do you go about fixing it for next season and I'm assuming via the portal, but how do you try and go about it when you tried last season and it just hasn't quite clicked?

DANA ALTMAN: Well, first of all, the guys that choose to return they're going to have to make some decisions on how much time they want to spend in the gym. If you're shooting under 33 percent you either will be really selective or not shoot at all. So guys are going to have to get in the gym and really make a decision because equal opportunity doesn't exist. We go to the numbers. So we'll evaluate who gets in the gym and who doesn't and we'll evaluate the numbers. This year we kind of got off to a bad start because we didn't have the guys we want, but Jermaine came in and I'm not sure exactly what his numbers are, but he's around 35. Keeshawn's a little bit above that. But we're going to have to get guys, Jackson coming in can shoot a little bit. K.J. can shoot a little bit. But guys are going to have to get in the gym. There is no replacing that. There's no magic wand to being a great shooter. You see guys make jumps all the time. Chris Duarte went from 34 percent to 42, but he was in the gym all the time. Dillon Brooks wasn't a good shooter when he came, but he was in the gym all the time. Payton Pritchard improved his numbers every year because he was in the gym all the time. Guys think that, Well, I can go shoot around for half an hour or go shoot around with my girlfriend for half an hour and I'm going to be a better shooter. It's not the way it works. I've been fortunate, I've had some guys love the gym, want to be great. There is no shortcut to being a great shooter, you got to get your butt in the gym and you got to shoot all the time. We got some guys with decent strokes, just don't work hard enough at it. So they're going to have to make a decision. And, again, it's not an equal opportunity thing. We really got to evaluate as a coaching staff because that's two years in a row where we went from being as good or better than anybody in the league at shooting threes and being consistent with it. The last two years we've been at the bottom and it's made a difference in our win totals. So it's definitely a priority for us and if guys don't get in the gym and shoot they're not going to be allowed to take threes because if you're shooting under 33 percent it doesn't make any sense for you to shoot the ball.