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BIG EAST CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENT

March 9, 2006

NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK

THE MODERATOR: Jeff Green and Brandon Bowman with Coach John Thompson III.
COACH JOHN THOMPSON III: I said yesterday, any win in March is good. We hung in there. That's a very good team. They force you to figure it out, they force you to think, they tweak and they change and they do so many different things. I thought our guys did a good job, while we were in the court, of trying to figure out the best way to attack what they were doing, of not getting panicked and of sticking with our stuff. Eventually, we settled into a rhythm.
Q. Can you talk about Brandon again, eight straight free throws down the stretch.
COACH JOHN THOMPSON III: And he got a couple of big rebounds, too, and a couple of big deflections. Took him a couple balls loose, steals down the other end.
I thought he was very good again for the same reasons as yesterday. You make your free throws, come up with loose balls, get big rebounds. I thought he was terrific at doing the things that help you to win. As I said, same thing I said yesterday, people have a tendency just to look at points, but Brandon did all the things in the game today to help us win. And he made his foul shots.
Q. Maybe the third or fourth time you guys have been shaky with the margin down the stretch. Pittsburgh, Duke. It seems like that's a very...
COACH JOHN THOMPSON III: Come out on top. Yeah, I mean, we have to tighten up a few things. They made some very good plays, you know. A couple times with the press they got some key turnovers. It happens. Once we got the ball in, we held on to it, we made our foul shots.
Q. Brandon, what did you do differently tonight that forced them out of that man to man and you created some offensive opportunities?
BRANDON BOWMAN: We were putting the ball in the hole today. I mean, we hit some key shots down towards the end, kind of stretched the zone a little bit. We let Jeff go to work down there. By stretching it out, by keeping everyone else on the outside, you know, Jeff got some good post moves down there, couple (inaudible) ones. It made him go man.
I mean, after that, it's pretty much what we do, back door cuts, you know, hit threes, you know.
Q. You were talking to Jeff. When they went man, I mean, against this team, that's been a real recipe for disaster, the way you played this year. When they went man, did your eyes light up?
COACH JOHN THOMPSON III: We felt that if we can get them to a point where they were chasing us, man or zone, we could have some success. We got them out of the zone because we had that working margin, and most possessions, I thought our offense looked pretty good. Our guys did a good job of cutting and looking for every option within our offense.
Did our eyes light up? I'm not sure about that. They're too good of a team, they're too well-coached and they're too poised to say our eyes lit up. At the same time, we felt if we could get them to go man, we could get some easy baskets.
JEFF GREEN: Well, stuff was just open. We made hard cuts. Like Coach said, we had them chasing us. The back door was open and we just made some key plays down the stretch.
Q. Looking back to the first time you played Syracuse, what was the key in that game? Did you see any part of that game playing out?
COACH JOHN THOMPSON III: You know, even though it was, what, a week ago, I don't know how long, two weeks ago, it wasn't that long ago, it's different. I'm sure that they're going to go and they're going to make adjustments. We're going to see some things we can do better, we can do differently, we're going to make adjustments. You can't look at that and say, "Okay, that's the blueprint, let's duplicate what we did then and they're going to duplicate what they did." We just have to come ready to play. Obviously, they're playing very well right now. Obviously, they're a poised team playing with a purpose.
I don't anticipate that game, you know, the way we try to attack things or the way they try to attack us, you know, I don't think it's going to be the exact same carbon copy. Obviously, we're going to go back, look at it, see some things that we did well and see some things that we need to improve on.
Q. (Inaudible).
COACH JOHN THOMPSON III: I tell you what, every time -- I agree with you. When he takes it, it's going in. Steve Novak is terrific. We try to be attentive to where he was, we try to make sure we're jumping out and switching out hard on him. If you relax just for a second, it doesn't matter where he is on the floor, it's going in. He does not need space. Like you said, we do a good job for 16 minutes and then all of a sudden for 4 he goes off. That's what good players do, and he's a good player.
Q. I know you haven't had much of a chance to digest what's to come tomorrow night. Obviously it's an old-school BIG EAST matchup. What does it mean for you to be going up against Coach Boeheim?
COACH JOHN THOMPSON III: It's Georgetown-Syracuse in The Garden. That says it all if anybody knows anything about the history of this league. We'll see what happens once we throw it up tomorrow.
Q. Ashanti made two three-point shots today. It seemed to come where the other side (inaudible). He did that at least once yesterday, too. Does he look to see that shot when it seems like there's momentum?
COACH JOHN THOMPSON III: We have different guys all year that have been able and have stepped up and done that. Without a doubt, Ashanti had the ball in his hands and hit a couple of key, big long shots today. He did the same thing -- he did the same thing yesterday. As I said about Brandon yesterday, Ashanti is a senior. Ashanti is a senior that's playing, that understands what we're playing for, what he's playing for right now.
But we have confidence, I have confidence, our team has confidence in anyone who has the ball in that situation. He just happened to have it. He, as expected, as I expect for all of our guys, stepped up and made it.
Q. Can you talk in general about how the team has responded. After coming here, there was a little bit of disappointment. Your best players are playing Did their best.
COACH JOHN THOMPSON III: You know, I don't know whether we needed to prove anything or get anything back. As I said to these guys, and I may have said it to you, it's March. This time of year, you can't dwell on that South Florida game, you know. It was a bad loss. We needed to go, move on. We can't dwell on it because the next game is so crucial, the next game is urgent.
And, you know, I think that, you know, we're doing what we need to do. Our guys need to keep relying on each other, keep having faith in each other, and keep working hard. We'll see what happens tomorrow.
Q. With these two wins, how much does this help you guys now to get the look at the tournament coming up? I know you still have this to deal with. How much does this cement what you've accomplished?
COACH JOHN THOMPSON III: That's too big-picture for me. I don't think big-picture. You know, we'll figure that out once this tournament is over, we'll start thinking about the NCAA - hopefully, the NCAA tournament.
But right now, it's not time to sit back and say, "Oooh, look at what these two wins did." Hopefully, we're sitting here on Saturday saying, "Look what these four wins do." That's what we want to do.

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