NCAA MEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP: REGIONAL FINAL - FLORIDA ATLANTIC VS KANSAS STATE

March 25, 2023

Dusty May

Vladislav Goldin

Bryan Greenlee

Alijah Martin

Madison Square Garden

FAU Owls

Elite 8 Postgame Media Conference

Florida Atlantic 79, Kansas State 76

DUSTY MAY: Extremely rewarding to see a group give as much as these guys have all season, shots, playing time, minutes, everything you could imagine, grit, everything 100 percent every day in practice and then be rewarded because there's never a guaranteed. You're always relying on faith that you believe it's going to happen, but you never really know. In this era where everyone wants the whole pie, these guys continued sharing the pie every single day, and this was the result.

Couldn't be more proud of a group who did it really together every single day.

Q. Alijah, you guys are now in the Final Four; what does that feel like for you guys? When you guys committed, it was more of a plan and now it's actual reality.

ALIJAH MARTIN: It feels amazing. You know, this is a group of guys that just loves to work, loves to compete. Also we love to serve each other. We love being around each other, and it shows on the court.

Q. Bryan, I know you guys pride yourselves on having a 1-0 mentality for every single game, but can you go through the emotions that you're feeling right now as you're advancing to the Final Four?

BRYAN GREENLEE: Yeah, it's pretty surreal. It's a lot of excitement. Just happiness for the unit that we have that everyone gets to experience this together, and also a little bit of just hunger to go finish it off.

Q. This is the transfer market era, teams look different every single year. Why did you guys stick together when you had some success but not a ton of it before this year?

BRYAN GREENLEE: We just have a lot of faith in our coaching staff and the players alongside of us. We knew that the grass isn't always greener, and really it just comes down to how much work you put in.

We already had a good chemistry last year, and the pieces that we added just complemented everything we had going on, so there was nobody that took anything away from the locker room. Just one unit of guys who just love to work and compete.

Q. Vlad, you had a really good first half and it was sort of an opportunity for you guys to sort of feed you and get you involved. What do you feel like was working for you in the first half for you to have such a successful first half?

VLADISLAV GOLDIN: It was working because we have such good shooters, so teams cannot like over help. That's what makes me more open than I would be in other situations. So it's basically just because we have so many shooters around me, so I can work in the post like with more freedom.

Q. Alijah, can you sort of talk about how to start the second half you guys were playing a little bit sloppy but then you guys went on a big run. What was the mindset in the second half?

ALIJAH MARTIN: Just slow down and really take care of the ball and be decisive when you penetrate. Sometimes we'll get down there too deep, try and make a decision and it led to turnovers and no scoring. We just had to hold off on that.

Q. Bryan, for all the things you did, you fouled out with 3:49 left, four-point lead, and you had to sit and watch that 3:49. Was that one of the toughest things you've ever done?

BRYAN GREENLEE: It was tough, but I think Alijah was on the court when I fouled out. I just huddled the guys up and said finish this thing off for me, for the team, and I had so much faith in everyone. It was just a joy to see everyone compete. It was just awesome. I wasn't too worried.

Q. What turned the game around in the middle of the second half you were down six points?

ALIJAH MARTIN: Our defensive mindset, also limiting them to one possession. That's about it.

BRYAN GREENLEE: I think just continually chipping away. A lot of times people might try to hit home runs to close that lead, and we don't really get rattled in situations where we're down. We've been in too many of them. So just taking it one possession at a time and focusing on getting stops.

VLADISLAV GOLDIN: I think that basketball is a game of running, so they score, we score, they score. They made a couple threes, we just knew we're going to make it eventually. We weren't worried about the shots not going in at the time. We just keep playing our basketball.

Q. Was there ever a point where there was definitely a little bit of a chip on the shoulder, a lot of conversation about Markquis Nowell coming into this game? Was there ever a point you guys put a little bit more emphasis and wanted to show the world that it wasn't going to be all the talk about Markquis Nowell but you were a team that could challenge some of that?

BRYAN GREENLEE: Yeah, first off, I just want to shout out Markquis Nowell. He's definitely a very, very talented point guard. We game planned for him, and he still put up numbers.

But we just know it's a team effort, and it's going to take the whole unit to really win this game, and it's not just one guy who can shut somebody down. It's just a group effort.

ALIJAH MARTIN: Yeah, we came into it with a chip on our shoulder, and of course shout-out to Markquis. He's a great player, and going into it we just wanted to shut him down, but he still put up crazy stats. And we were just able to overcome that because we've got eight guys over here that's -- eight, ten, whatever, I can't count. But eight guys that's contributing and can step up any night.

Q. There's a lot of talk about Markquis Nowell, but at the same time the leading scorer is Keyontae Johnson who's limited to 18 minutes tonight due to foul trouble. How much did the pace of the game and the tone of the game change when you're able to keep a guy like Keyontae on the bench?

ALIJAH MARTIN: Yeah, I mean, once he got in foul trouble, it was much easier on the defensive end. He's a guy with a strong frame, a freak athlete, and it was easy to just limit them to one possession and get stops.

Q. Two days ago a few of your guys said you don't consider yourselves a Cinderella. How do you think people should look at you if not Cinderella?

ALIJAH MARTIN: You know, they're going to label us whatever, but we're some pit bulls and rottweilers. We go out there and show it every night. Just label -- just call us beast boys, you know, because we're going to come out and show you how it's done.

BRYAN GREENLEE: We don't really listen to the outside noise too much. Honestly, all the things people say just fuels us to go out there and play even harder. They can say whatever they want, say we're a Cinderella team, say we don't belong, but we've constantly proven people wrong all season.

VLADISLAV GOLDIN: I like what B.J. said. It's like nobody likes us, it's okay, because we know puts work before that, we know who stays in the locker room whether we win or we lose, so I think it's more important how we approach each other.

Q. Dusty, you kind of have -- throughout the season you've told us the keys to victory, rebounded well, protect the basketball. You guys did have 22 turnovers but out-rebounded them 44-22. Can you talk about those statistics and what went into the game?

DUSTY MAY: Well, we've done that pretty consistently all year. I believe we're top 25 in the country in defensive percentage -- percentage of getting the rebounds. So it's not anything that we haven't done. We have a physical group. They're quick to the ball, and they're really bought in to all five guys pursuing it, and they've done it all year. So this wasn't a surprise. They do it every single day in workouts and practices, as well.

Q. When you think of the mid majors that have made the Final Four, you think of George Mason, VCU. Now you guys are on that list. What does that mean when people remember this run that they're going to remember Florida Atlantic did it this year?

DUSTY MAY: Well, I said earlier that -- there are no such things as dictionaries anymore, I don't think, but if you Wiki our team, it would be -- the word "team," it would be a picture of our guys. They're going to have a special bond forever, but this group would have had a special bond forever if we would have gotten knocked out in the conference tournament and not made the tournament.

It's who they are. Like I said before, it's awesome to see a group of guys that deserve this 100 percent for it to happen for them.

Q. Nine days ago as a program you never had an NCAA Tournament win. Now you're going to the Final Four. Have you been able to put that in perspective at all?

DUSTY MAY: No, not at all. There may be two or three games -- probably two games, maybe the first round game, or the second round game, one of our guys made a mistake, and I went to the staff and I said we've really got to fix that issue this off-season.

So during the games I'm thinking about we've got to get that fixed, we don't have time now, but we've got to get that habit fixed by next season. That's kind of how I'm wired.

I'm just happy for our guys and our staff. These guys, man, for five years, I've been a head coach and I've never felt for one minute I didn't have a group that was trying to help and support and make me better than what I am. And that's kind of how our guys are. Their teammates make them better than what they are. We've done it together.

Q. Dusty, you guys have been building this for five years, and when I spoke to you earlier in the season, you had said, we're not done after we beat Florida. For you guys to now be in the Final Four, what had to go right this season to get to this point?

DUSTY MAY: Stayed healthy and the guys never changed. The foundation was laid, and they stayed with it. A lot of times these guys get so much attention, they're all so accessible, it's easy to stray because you have outside influences. And our guys knew that what was in that locker room was real.

Q. You ask any guy on this roster, they're not really surprised that they're here right now. Thinking back to Thursday, they were talking about getting in the top 25 gave them a different level of confidence than before. Can you speak to maybe when the group had the expectations change that this is what's expected and not a Cinderella run or some of the other notions they've rejected?

DUSTY MAY: Pivotal moments. And the first was when we were able to go into Florida and beat a really good basketball team.

And the second was when Mike Davis -- we played Detroit Mercy, and he coached for a National Championship, and he came in the locker room -- and this is early in the season -- and told our guys, we haven't seen a team like you in years. This group could be special, you guys could go to the Final Four, and our guys are looking at me like, who is this guy?

But what it did, as we started to win and generate a little bit of buzz, I think we always kind of referred back to maybe we're a little bit better than what we thought.

The other moment was we played -- I don't know if we're allowed to say this -- NCAA, I'll take the level 3 violation.

We closed scrimmaged Nova Southeastern who just won a National Championship today. They're the best pressing, hardest playing team we've ever seen, and when we beat them in a scrimmage, we said we've got a chance to be pretty darned good. So hats off, Coach Crutchfield, national champion and someone that gave us, once again, more confidence in ourselves.

Q. There were several points in the second half where this game could have gotten away for you guys, namely at the U-12 time-out. It's a 57-50 game, they start the second half on a 19-8 run. What was your message to the team at that point and what gave you the confidence that you guys were going to be able to overcome such a deficit and move on and do, in your words, what you guys were supposed to do?

DUSTY MAY: That if we just stayed the course and focused on what's important, then we would have had a spurt in us. We've had spurts in us all year and we had been on one in the first half. So just staying the course, hang around, hang around, and then we always have a run.

And because of our depth, our guys believe that we can play harder for longer periods of than all of our opponents. And it may or may not be true, but we believe it.

Q. We know you started your career with Coach Knight. How do you think Coach Knight from the '90s would have enjoyed coaching this group of guys?

DUSTY MAY: This is a Coach Knight type of group. We all obviously through out coaching cliches, but I've never been around a group of guys -- and I've been doing this 20-plus years, been part of a Division I team for 20-plus years -- that brought it, the amount of energy, intentionality, focus every single workout of every single day. And if one guy wasn't, then his teammates quickly reeled him in and we didn't have to.

This is a player-led team and these guys have made each other better every single day. It wasn't just the games. It was workouts, practices, weight sessions, film sessions. These guys are committed to being great.

Q. Coach, it was a second-half run that got you past Tennessee and kind of the same thing happened tonight. What is it about your team that always seems to have that run in them?

DUSTY MAY: It's straight tenaciousness and belief in each other and belief in what we do.

Q. Following up on that, this team has played really well in close games, especially throughout this NCAA Tournament. What kind of goes into being able to tell the team not to be moved by those moments that are getting down to crunch time?

DUSTY MAY: Well, there's no replacement for experience, and these guys have been in pressure-packed moments a lot. So you've gone through it, you learn from it. And these guys are trying to get better every day. So they've learned from mistakes.

But these guys, they're not afraid of -- they weren't afraid to lose today and go home. They're not afraid of failure. We our lay it on the floor and whatever happens after that is more than enough, because we've done that every single day.

So there's never a moment when we get tight because we're not afraid of what happens if we don't get it done. We'll still walk in that locker room, hug each other, compliment each other for a great effort, and figure out how to immediately start getting better, and it's been like that from day one.

Q. What did you tell your team in the final seconds of the game, and obviously it worked. What was your defensive game plan for that final play?

DUSTY MAY: Well, we had a smaller group in. We were going to switch all ball screens and make them hit a hard shot over us. We weren't going to foul. Despite the 50/50 data split on that, we wanted to force them to hit a hard, hard shot and finish it with a rebound.

So we had five quick, tough competitive players and we just wanted to make sure we kept the ball in front, and we didn't put two on the ball because there's complementary guys that stepped up and banged in some tough shots.

Q. Did you ever come close to losing any of your guys to the portal? We all know that's just what happens now where you have some success and guys leave. Why do you think your guys stayed together?

DUSTY MAY: Absolutely, you're always concerned because they're getting recruited now. They've been recruited through this tournament. There's so many outside parties. It's part of it. Our job as coaches is to do the best job we can every single minute of every single day to provide the environment that they think this is the best thing for them long-term. Not today, not in a week, not in a month but long-term.

And the missing piece that is very understated is these guys truly love each other, and when you love your teammates, it's hard to go jump into deep waters that you don't know what's out there.

Q. You mentioned Nova Southeastern winning the D-II title. Between the Sharks cutting down the nets, you guys going to the Final Four and Miami still alive in the Elite 8, can you touch on what that means to the South Florida community, the heater that South Florida is on right now in basketball?

DUSTY MAY: Well, I'll talk about Florida Atlantic first. Florida Atlantic is a new university. It's been booming before I got here. One of the reasons I took it was because it was the right place at the right time, and it's growing exponentially. So we've talked about it; we've just never had that moment as a university.

I still remember being a child watching the '87 Hoosiers and because of that, I became a fan forever. So we've never had our moment, and when we made the tournament this year and we won a very tough league -- if you look around and really study our league, a tough league -- we felt like this could be our moment to really captivate an area, a fan base, a student body. And I think we've exceeded that moment, but there's no reason why we wouldn't just continue to ride this wave.