NCAA MEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP: SECOND ROUND - AUBURN VS HOUSTON

March 17, 2023

Kelvin Sampson

Marcus Sasser

Jamal Shead

Jarace Walker

Legacy Arena

Houston Cougars

Media Conference

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THE MODERATOR: We will now take questions for the Houston players.

Q. Can you give us an update on your status, how you are doing with your injury, chance to play tomorrow, that kind of thing?

MARCUS SASSER: I'm playing tomorrow, 100 percent. I've been doing a lot of rehab treatment since I got back to the hotel yesterday, and, you know, it's going good.

JAMAL SHEAD: Yeah, I'm good. 100 percent going tomorrow.

Q. Jarace, Bruce Pearl was just telling us about his recruitment of you. Do you remember that, and what do you remember from that? He joked about how he finished second, and tomorrow will be a fun opportunity to face off?

JARACE WALKER: Yeah, I definitely remember the whole process. He is a great guy. It's a great program over there, but I felt like this was home, and I feel like I made the right decision, although they definitely have a lot of good things going over there. I definitely respect him and the program a ton.

Q. For any of the players: What impresses you most about what you have seen in Auburn on tape?

JAMAL SHEAD: You know how together they play. You know, they hype each other up. When one person gets going, they try to go back to him. You know, they play together. They're a really good team. They've got a lot of good pieces. Especially K.D. Johnson coming off the bench. They have a lot of things you would want in a college program, so they're a really good team.

Q. Marcus, is there any kind of different approach as to the way you play or how you play? You say you only know one way to play, that's 100 percent. Defensive or offensive, how do you deal with your injury as you play?

MARCUS SASSER: Just really not trying to think about it. That's really all I know how to do is go out there and play 100 percent. Just really got to try to go out there and not think about it because I feel like you favor, it I think about it, you just won't be yourself. I just really want to go out there and be myself 100 percent.

Q. For any of you guys, what's kind of been Coach's message after last night's game, and really how Northern Kentucky was able to find success on the offensive glass against you guys?

JAMAL SHEAD: That our approach has to change. You know, he brought up Eastern U. He brought up Memphis, the last game. You know, we come out with the wrong mindset, and we don't play the right way. We have to change our approach coming into tomorrow's game because, you know, if we don't, we could be going home early.

Q. Marcus, when you are talking about wanting to be yourself and wanting to play and all these things. How difficult did that make last night to not be able to kind of get your hands on things?

MARCUS SASSER: It was real tough. I was good throughout the whole game until that moment. So really just got to try to go out there and, like I said, not think about it. Go into the game with the same mindset like nothing is wrong and just have that mindset that I've been having the whole season really. Just being healthy and going out there trying to get the W.

Q. Jamal, you mentioned about the mindset and changing it. Is it surprising considering you guys are such a veteran team? What do you think the reason is behind that? Is it the injuries, fatigue? I mean, a lot of teams I imagine are battling through a lot of the same things, so can you pinpoint why you feel like you're at this mindset right now?

JAMAL SHEAD: I think it's because we're nervous. You know, this is my second real NCAA Tournament. Marcus has been in college for four years, but this is his second real NCAA Tournament. First in front of a real crowd. Jarace's first. J'Wan with his new role, first. Tramon with his new role, first. Then you've got three freshmen coming off the bench.

So I think we were just nervous yesterday, and I think our jitters got the best of us. But I think we'll come back a lot stronger tomorrow.

Q. For both Jarace and Marcus, Bruce Pearl called Jamal the best defensive guard in college basketball. Also mentioned the heart and soul of this team. For you guys what does your point guard mean to this basketball team?

JARACE WALKER: I mean, like he said, like Jamal is basically our leader. We kind of follow as he goes. Go as he goes. When he is playing hard, that's when we're at our best.

I mean, just kind of follow him and just try to stay tight on the rope and just play through him.

MARCUS SASSER: Just as a point guard, he is the point of attack, so he is always going to point guard the opponent's point guard, so the amount of pressure he puts on the ball, his energy, that's all we see coming. He started off jumped it off, and he with just follow him.

The way he plays is basically the way the team plays.

Q. Marcus, I apologize for getting here a little late, so if you have already been asked. How do you feel today? What are your chances of playing tomorrow? Was it a specific time in the game, you said a play, that you hurt it last night?

MARCUS SASSER: Yeah, it was the pull-up. I pulled up for a midrange jumper, and I think I just planted too hard. Yeah, I'm 100 percent playing tomorrow. I've been doing a lot of treatment and stretching and massages and things like that to get ready for the game tomorrow.

Q. I'll ask one follow-up to that. Is there any concern, though, about reinjuring like you did last night? And you sounded like I think you were 7 out of 10, which sounded pretty painful.

MARCUS SASSER: Yeah.

Q. Any concerns about that, that you could knock yourself out by trying to play again tomorrow?

MARCUS SASSER: It's always going to be a concern when you know you can reaggravate or reinjure, but, you know, it's win or go home. Tomorrow is not promised. The next game is not promised. I just feel like I don't want to just sit a game out. I just want to go out there and give it my all because you never know when your last game is.

Q. Jamal, when you hear that, "how he plays is how we play," you know, that's obviously a degree of pressure on that. How do you kind of carry hearing something like that and the weight that comes with it?

JAMAL SHEAD: It's kind of an honor. You know, they look up to me and look forward to following me, so it gives me something to do every game. Gives me something to take pride in every game, just getting us started the right way where are.

If we don't, then I take full responsibility of that. So just hearing that, them giving me the confidence to do a lot of things because he says he follows me, but he also leads in his own way with his own effort and tenacity when we go out there.

We all feed off of each other, and they follow me a little bit more, but I do feed off of them a lot.

Q. Jarace, I want to ask you a follow-up as well. Bruce just told the media that Kelvin beat him in recruiting you. What is it like going up a team and a coach that really wanted you there?

JARACE WALKER: Yeah, I try not to think about it. I try to just take it as any other game, but obviously, I do have a lot of close relationships with the guys. I did take two visits there. They were close with my family and my parents. They still contact them on their birthdays and things like that. Obviously, we're close, but, I mean, it's a basketball game that we're trying to win, so you can't really focus on your friends and people who you are close with and things like that.

I mean, I'm a Houston Cougar, so I'm going to try to win for my team.

Q. And what does it do you for you and your teammates to hear Marcus say he is going tomorrow night?

JAMAL SHEAD: That's a tough dude. I felt like he was going to go because I know him as a person, not just as a player, and I know he is tough. You know, he fights through a lot of things, and he doesn't really miss a lot of days unless he has to. So I knew that he was going to push through because he is a tough dude.

Q. Marcus, you've told us in the past how you get up a little extra for road games. With tomorrow essentially being a road game with Auburn fans, does it give you that little extra adrenaline going into it?

MARCUS SASSER: Yeah, definitely. We think tomorrow is going to be probably 75 percent, 80 percent of Auburn fans, so just go in. We're just going to treat it like a road game. When we go into road games, we always say it's just us versus everybody. That's one of our sayings that we say before every road game, and that's the saying we're going to say tomorrow to try to go out there an get the W like it is a road game.

Q. Jamal, just piggybacking off of being a leader.

There's being a point guard, and then there's being a point guard for Kelvin Sampson. How much have you learned from him as being a point guard under his tutelage?

JAMAL SHEAD: Kind of taking his mentality. You know, he doesn't miss any days. Coach is the same person every day, regardless of the day, no matter how early, how late. You know, I have never even seen the dude yawn. Y'all can back that. I'm so serious. He doesn't ever look tired. He is always the same person when he steps on the court.

I just try to be that myself. I try to be his person on the court and just try to do what he does every day. So he inspires me every day just by being himself and being the same person, so I try to do that.

THE MODERATOR: Thank you.

We're going to start a little early with Coach Sampson. We'll start with your questions.

Q. Jamal mentioned that he thought maybe the guys were nervous being that it's only his second tournament, Marcus's second tournament, first for Jarace, et cetera, et cetera. Is that what you think maybe caused some of what happened last night with the way your guys performed?

KELVIN SAMPSON: I don't know. I'm past that. That was yesterday. We're getting ready for Auburn. That's what's most important. If that's the way he felt, then I'll go with him. I trust Jamal.

I know Northern Kentucky didn't have any freshmen. We had three. You sit around long enough, and you watch this tournament. It's almost a surreal feeling for freshmen to be in it the first time. Your toughest game is always your first one. Look around.

Over the years I've had the games that I thought we played well in. We just didn't play well enough to win. Yesterday I didn't think we played well, but we played well enough to win. Sometimes that's -- looking around the country, I know a lot of teams that would trade places with us.

Q. Marcus was just saying that you guys almost have to take it like a road game where it's us versus everybody. Obviously, tomorrow night will be different because it's a tournament and Auburn and Alabama, but do you like hearing that from your players that just us versus everybody approach and knowing that the entire -- 90 percent of the arena will very intensely be against you guys in that game?

KELVIN SAMPSON: 90 percent? (Laughing) I'm hoping 90. You know, we've been pretty good on the road. The teams we played this year that Auburn is most like is Alabama and Memphis. Depth, they have really good depth. They bring guys that can score, you know, in a hurry off the bench.

Donaldson last night, Johnson, the big kid. They've got good players. Their starting five is very athletic, great size. A lot like Alabama.

But for us it's -- every game is a challenge. I think everywhere we play in the league this year was a packed house. Hopefully that helps us. You know, I think we'll -- I think we'll play -- I think we're going to play good tomorrow night. You know? That's been our MO. You know, I trust my kids. I really do. I trust this team. I love this team. It's been one of my most enjoyable teams that I've coached.

You know, when the season ends at this stage you're either going to have won it all or you're going to lose. Whether it's now in the second round or the third round or the fourth round, you know, whenever or you win it all, but regardless, you know, inevitably I'm sure I'll shed tears either way.

But sometimes it's not because of the finality of it. It's because you don't get to coach those guys again. You don't get to sit in the room and laugh and joke, hear their crazy putdowns of each other.

I've always thought you can hear a good team. You can always hear a good team. Bad teams don't talk. They don't communicate. They don't share. The good ones do. This one does. You can always hear this team in a good way.

My wife always says her favorite moments of our journey is listening to them sing in the back of a bus. You know, of all the things I'll miss, I think it's that stuff. Not the wins and losses or stuff like that. I've lost enough games for everybody, but the relationship you have with your kids, like tomorrow night's challenge. I'm done talking about whether it's fair or not fair. That's neither here nor there for me anymore. It's not for me to say anyway. It's not Auburn's fault. They didn't ask to be seeded here.

For us it's just getting ready for it. Being ready for the opportunity. Being ready for the challenge. Go attack it and let's see what we can do. That's kind of where we're at with it now.

Q. Kelvin, we all know what your family has gone through to help build this program. Auburn really touts what Bruce has done to turn around its program, and I was curious what you admire most about Bruce, and I asked him this as well. Is there a trait that he has that you wish you had? I asked him the same question, but in reverse. I can tell you what he said if you would like to know.

KELVIN SAMPSON: That's all right. I doubt he said it to be shared. Well, I guess he did if you asked him. Bruce, his enthusiasm for life, his passion for helping kids, his ability to coach. Bruce is a really, really good coach.

You know, he is what the old guys call a ball coach. I can hear some of the old coaches that I grew up admiring or looking up to. They would say, That boy there can coach some ball. That's a North Carolina thing. That's what North Carolina high school coaches would say. That boy over there can coach some ball. That's what I would say about Bruce.

But Bruce is one of those guys that never has a bad day. Upbeat, positive. You know, just a good guy.

Q. Coach Sampson, Bruce was joking when he talked about how if he was you, he would try to rally the Alabama fans who will be here to root against Auburn. What would that pitch be if you wanted them to root on your side against Auburn?

KELVIN SAMPSON: Well, from what I know about Auburn-Alabama, I don't think I have to. I think I just did. We're playing Auburn, 6:10. Let's go. We need some help. Roll Tide. They're good enough. How do you say "Roll Tide"? Roll Tide. Yeah. Well, Roll Tide (laughter), 6:10. I don't think I have to go much further than that. That's pretty good. Call my old buddy Wimp. Wimp, get them fired up.

I've known Wimp a long time. He still doesn't know how to pronounce my name. Every time I talk to Wimp, he says, Kevin. Nope, nope, it's not Kevin. It's Kelvin. Eh, don't matter, Kevin.

The Wimpster. Him and his Sonny still do the radio show? Podcast, I bet it's popular, isn't it? Those two guys there are a piece of work.

Q. You may have already answered this before, but on to the basketball, when you look at Johni Broome, what do you see as trying to defend him, but also what he does defensively?

KELVIN SAMPSON: Yeah, he is very versatile. Great instincts to block shots, obviously. You know, when Bruce runs his flex actions, not a lot of centers these days, and he is a center. Not a lot of centers can make those flex cut passes. He is pretty good at that. That tells me Bruce trusts him.

Then making threes. You know, he doesn't shoot a ton of them, but you look at his percentage. It's pretty good. I'm sure one of the things Bruce sold him on when he got him to transfer is that he would develop his game. I don't know if he shot threes at Morehead State, but he looks good shooting them now, and I think that's a credit to Bruce and his staff.

Q. Bruce was mentioning that he had recruited Jarace, and it pretty much came down to you and him. Obviously, he choose Houston. What is it like recruiting against a guy like B.P.?

KELVIN SAMPSON: I don't know if it's like that. The deciding factor for Jarace was his father, and I know his dad liked Bruce a lot, but we don't really recruit against another school or another coach. You know, we try the best we can to sell them on our program. I forbid my assistant coaches from being negative about other schools because I know what that's like.

If we're not good enough to get a kid based on our school versus running another school down, not interested. We sell Houston. As far as recruiting against another school -- I know Bruce -- and they would have told me -- he was always positive about us in recruiting Jarace, and we were very positive about them. So I don't get into the negativity thing or running people down. Maybe it's my experience and age. I don't know. But a kid wants to come to Houston, we'll take him, but we're not going to go do ignorant stuff to do it. We'll get kids based on whether we're good enough or not based on what we have, not what the other school doesn't have.

But I haven't recruited against Auburn or schools that Bruce coached at a lot, but then again, I don't know half the schools that is recruiting the kids we're recruiting, so I don't really pay attention to that stuff too much.

Q. Marcus came in here and said that he is 100 percent going to play. Where do you think he stands right now from where you sit, and also, do you need to be a little bit more cautious with him after he aggravated the injury obviously last night?

KELVIN SAMPSON: Well, he didn't reinjure himself. Let's make sure we get that straight. It's the first time I've had an injury discussion about one of our kids. Most of the time nobody knows about it. So it's not the first injury I've dealt with.

I deal with his injury like I've dealt with every injury of a kid that we've had for 34 years. It's up to him and the trainer. I don't make any decisions. People say, why did you play him? I didn't. I play him if he is healthy. If the trainer thinks he can go and the kid thinks he can go, I trust Marcus, like I trust Jamal. I trust them all. If Marcus is hurt, he will say, coach, I can't go. Then I won't play him. If he is out there and can play, that means he can play.

So he will play as many minutes as he can tomorrow night. I don't know how many minutes that will be, but that will be up to Marcus. You know, he is our best player. I know that.

But I don't treat him any different than I treat anybody else if they're injured. I treat them all the same.