NCAA MEN'S FINAL FOUR

March 27, 1998

Allen Edwards

Cameron Mills

Jeff Sheppard

ALLEN EDWARDS: I mean, it is always difficult when you lose a loved one. As far as me playing basketball, it is something I love, as much as my mom missing me. I know I had to continue with my life, and the players, the coaching staff and people around me made it a whole lot easier for me not to worry about her as much because she is in a better place right now and looking over me.

JEFF SHEPPARD: When Coach Smith got there last summer, he got to know us, being around all summer, and you could tell right away he wanted to be a part of our lives. As the season progressed, we got into practice, started playing games. We had some good moments and some bad moments as far as winning and losing games. But through it all we continued to grow together as a team and stick together as a team. That's what's been special about this season, how we have grown as a team no matter what happens. And that pretty much sums up our whole season.

JEFF SHEPPARD: A totally different team this year. We had some guys that played on last year's team. We were happy to play in the National Championship last year, and it was tough to lose, but we had to start all over again in the beginning of this year and work hard to get to this point. We realize that hard work and positive thinking and teamwork is what's got us here. So that's going to be our attitude going into the game, to try to do the same thing we have been doing all season.

CAMERON MILLS: Well, obviously Stanford is a big team. They are a physical team. As far as quickness goes, I don't know if we necessarily have the advantage when it comes to that. They have got some very quick guards in Lee and Weems. They are obviously a great talent. Just like Sheppard said, we will have to come out and be ready to play. We will take the rest of tonight, tomorrow and continue to get ready for them, especially for the way, the kind of physical game they play. I think that's probably going to be the one thing that we will have to overcome more than anything else, just how physical they are and the way they post up and the way they box out and the way they basically just play the game.

CAMERON MILLS: Well, I don't know. The whole, I guess, sequence from the time that game was over until even a day after that game, just a lot of support from our fans. We got back to the airport in Lexington and there was 6,000 fans out at the airport waiting for us to get home. And you know, everyone talks about the revenge factor, beating Duke after they beat us in '92, and yet there was a lot of media hype over that but that wasn't our concern as far as getting revenge. We were just happy to go out and to play for a chance to go to the Final Four again. I think that was what made that game so exciting. You take a Duke and Kentucky game and put it anywhere else during the season, maybe other than the National Championship game, and we win, yeah, it is exciting because we exercise it to the past. But it wasn't as exciting to go to a Final Four, and that's what made it, I guess, as much of a dream as anything else, the fact that we won that game to get to this point right now.

CAMERON MILLS: I think they understand what we have done but don't understand how difficult it is. It is so difficult to sit there and think, if we go back three years ago to the National Championship year, at the start of that tournament with those 64 teams, and you sit there and think, what are the chances of us being the final team standing at the end of the year, you know, it is difficult to see that. It is difficult to see any of those years. But the great thing about this team, and in part it goes to our coaching staffs, but Coach Pitino's staffs and Coach Smith's staffs, in getting us ready to play each game one at a time and not to look at the tournament as a whole. That's the reason we have been so successful. But again, you look at the NCAA Tournament. Those are the 64 best teams in the country. And to be able to go out and to be like in '96, the last team standing, and last year one of the last two standing, and hopefully to be the last this year, it is an amazing accomplishment I don't think the three of us or any of the rest of the guys on the team, we really have a good idea of what it is we accomplished years and years down the line.

ALLEN EDWARDS: I think it is very beneficial being there. Most of the guys on this team have been last year and several of the guys have a National Championship under their belt. And I think that maturity and being on those two previous teams gives us a lot of advantages as far as what to do when we get out on the floor. That's what I said when we played Duke, knowing what to do, when the game is on the line. You know, Duke is a great team and had a lot of freshmen. And the best team I ever played on as far as a team, but I think knowing what to do in certain situations. Stanford is pretty much new to the situation, but they still have a very talented team, great big men. They have a great point guard and shooter on the outside. It is always whoever wants to do the most on the court.

JEFF SHEPPARD: The score at the beginning of the game is zero to zero, no matter how many trips we make to the Final Four in the past and no matter how many trips they have made. Both teams are here because they won games and because they worked hard all season. I think that's what both teams realize. Both teams will be ready to play and we will see what happens.

CAMERON MILLS: I don't know that there is one thing that sticks out in all four games. I would say it was probably different each game. I think if you go back to the Arizona game, we didn't come to play the first ten minutes. In the Louisville game, I don't know if we came to play at all. Each game there were certain things. If you wanted an easy answer to that, I would say it was the little things, the little things being boxing out, setting men up to come off screens, hedging the right way on pick and rolls. Just a whole bunch of little things that we didn't do well which is probably the reason we lost those four.

JEFF SHEPPARD: I have a lot of confidence in Wayne and his ability to stop people and his ability to penetrate. He just goes out and plays ball. He doesn't worry about the significance of the game. He just goes out and plays. That's an attitude that carries over to a lot of our teammates and that's helpful, especially this time of the season. You just go out loose and play and see what happens