NCAA MEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP: FIRST ROUND - WEST VIRGINIA VS MARYLAND

March 16, 2023

Kevin Willard

Legacy Arena

Maryland Terrapins

Media Conference

Maryland - 67, West Virginia - 65

THE MODERATOR: Coach, if you will give us an opening statement and then we'll go directly to questions. We're going to go directly to questions.

Q. Kevin, what did you see from Jahmir early on, and how much did his kind of turnovers contribute to you guys falling behind there?

COACH WILLARD: Yeah, I think it's one thing to practice against that defense for a couple days. It's another thing to all of a sudden see a Coach Huggins' defense live. For anything, it was just getting him to kind of calm down, see it. We have total confidence in him. And I think once he kind of saw it and everybody saw it, it was like a boxing match. He got hit a couple times, and I think it just relaxed him. He was able to see it. And I thought he was pretty good the rest of the game.

Q. Kevin, the fact that Jahmir may have had his troubles but then had three of the starters contribute double digits. What does that say about the diversity of this offense?

COACH WILLARD: Yeah. I think it's been like that most of the year. You look at, obviously, Jahmir has had a tremendous year. But Hakim's in 56% of our pick and rolls. Our scoring has been pretty balanced all year. I think the way JuJu played over the last month and a half, ever since he recovered from his shoulder surgery. And I think this is a team that understands if one guy is not playing well, you know, okay let's step up and give that guy some help. And I thought Hakim and I thought Don Carey's leadership in the huddles, especially early on, was huge.

Q. Congratulations on the win this afternoon. What was it like getting your first win with Maryland after the long good year that you had down there at College Park?

COACH WILLARD: Yeah. I'm more excited for the kids than I am for me. This group, I've talked about a lot. This group, they have come together, they have asked to do everything that I've asked them to do. They have had a great attitude. They have had an unbelievable work ethic. You know, we have been down all year at certain points in the game. They have never turned on each other. They just have a great attitude. We practiced yesterday morning at 9 a.m. for close to two hours. And they were upbeat, they were positive. So I'm more excited about this group, Jahmir is a transfer in, Don comes in, transfers in. Ju, Hawk and Donta stay. It's not easy putting together a group that's going to be so together. But, you know, you have to give credit to these young men. They have worked hard and they have had a great attitude, and I'm just excited for them.

Q. When you took over, can you just recount the early conversations that you had with Donta, with Hakim, and kind of those times of, you know, you putting it down and them having to kind of be rerecruited?

COACH WILLARD: Yeah. I think me being, you know, so close down the road. I had played against Donta and Hawk. I had seen JuJu play in AAU. I think the fact that they knew me and knew who I was, I think that really helped the because because I had recruited Donta pretty hard. I was a huge fan of him in high school. I knew his high school coaches, his AAU guys. We played against Hawk. So I think the fact that they knew what I was going to do, you know, I couldn't go in there and bull shit them. Excuse my mouth. I couldn't go in there and BS them. I just told them what I was going to do. I wanted this year for them because it was extremely difficult year last year for the kids. I told them we're going to have a whole lot of fun, we're going to work hard, and we're going to win. I was only three hours away, they knew, you know, they knew who I was. I think that really helped.

Q. Just in the second half, what's the balance with Jahmir in terms of holding him out until 7 minutes left and knowing he's the best option to get your offense going?

COACH WILLARD: I have a lot of confidence in Jahari Long. There's a reason he's here. When he decided to transfer from Seton Hall, there was no hesitation from me. And I thought Jahari did a phenomenal job. He's one of those guys that's not flashy. Doesn't do anything. And again, I think the fact that I can move Hakim over into the point guard spot, we've worked a lot on that this year. There's times we've had to get Jahmir times. So we fought back into it, we cut it back down to 4. So I was a lot more confident trying to buy as much time as possible. I didn't want him sitting too long. That was why I put him back in when we did. If he had gotten his fourth foul a little bit later, I probably would have sat him a little bit more. I didn't want to put to try and put him back in at the 5-minute mark and he's been sitting for that long. So that's that was a reason I put him in when I did.

Q. Julian down the stretch had 13 points in the second half. What did you see from him especially after Bell fouled out? He had 7 points in a row just kind of leading a bit of a comeback in the second half in his first NCAA Tournament game.

COACH WILLARD: Yeah. I think anyone that's watched us over the last month and a half, two months understands how good Julian Reese is. We were struggling. They were doing a good job trapping pick and rolls. And I have a lot of confidence and throwing the ball down the JuJu. I told him, "big fella, I need a bucket. Go get me one." He looked at me and said "I'm going to get ya, Coach." He's had to play Hunter twice, Zach twice, Crowell twice, Derrick Walker. The bigs in our league are brutal. So although, you know, the big 10 just prepares you for big teams. This was a big team. I just thought JuJu, he had been through the battles. I just have so much confidence in him that I was just kind of throwing him the ball.

Q. Coach, one of the previous starts at home you mentioned you told the guys a joke to calm them down. When you called a timeout down 11 almost 10 minutes in what was the message to kind of loosen everyone up and get them going.

COACH WILLARD: I told them, I said let's not get down 20. You know the sideline reporter asked me. She is like, are you worried? I said we're only down nine and we have 4 points. That's a celebration on the road. So we've gotten off to slow starts on the road. But you know when you look up and you have 6 turnovers and it's only 13-4, there's reason to be excited. I'm a guy who looks at everything in a positive way, so I told the guys. Guys, it's 13-4, we have 6 turnovers. If that's the best they can do then I think we're in pretty good shape.

Q. Kedrian Johnson I think scored 4 points in the latter half the second half. Did you do anything differently defensively against him?

COACH WILLARD: No. That's a bad man right there. He's a tough matchup. I'm a big fan of his. We went zone. We tried to take away the iso. Huggs runs the little stagger and he clears and brings off Stevenson . You are such a good player like Stevenson and you're trying to jump out and he clears the whole side. We decided to stay in zone and keep JuJu down low to close up the driving lane.

Q. Coach, your view of the last play. Sort of a scramble. Did you get the defense you wanted? Was your heart in your throat when the ball goes up? What's your thought?

COACH WILLARD: Yeah. If he made both, we still weren't going to foul with 4.2 seconds you have to play it out. You have to hope, you know, and I thought, you know, when he missed it, that's a lot. 4.7 is a lot of time. But we match up. If you can give up a 1-foot runner at the end of the game, you'll take it.

Q. I wonder of all those guys, who presented the biggest contrast in personality that you kind of had to work through the process of being that individual's coach?

COACH WILLARD: Probably JuJu. Just because I saw in JuJu what everybody sees right now. And Ju was a little bit more soft spoken. He had a good work ethic. We just had to get him to have a great work ethic. Once he saw my personality, how intense I am from the individual instruction side, I said this, I think I said this in December. He had a huge game against Compton State. I told everybody, "You haven't seen anything yet." As I saw his personality grow, as he became a little bit more outgoing, I knew his game would become, because he is just a fantastic young man. And he has an unbelievable work ethic. I just needed him to believe in it. So it took me a little bit longer with Ju to get him to understand, once he understood, he's a monster. Thanks, everybody.