BIG EAST CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENT

March 12, 2003

Andre Barrett

Louis Orr

COACH ORR: First off I just want to give all the praises and honor to God who has been a pleasure to me and to this team, and we just want to thank him and I just want to praise him for being so good. Great. You know, this is a game where we had a chance to get out and run up the tempo of the game, something we hadn't done in a few games and we got a chance to get out in open court. I think that was good, but the key was our defense. Holding them to 19 points in the first half, our guys were ready to play and that made a big difference but when we're able to run and score and play defense like we did, usually good things happen.

ANDRE BARRETT: Today we came out loose, I mean everybody was doing things they are accustomed to doing. I think that got everybody a lot more comfortable than previous games. Ten assists, everybody was touching the ball and scoring. I think it was well-balanced scoring between everybody.

ANDRE BARRETT: Well, I hope. I am not on the committee so I can't be the judge of that. But I mean, all we could do is sit back and play on Sunday. Right now we have some business to take care of right now in the BIG EAST tournament we have got more games to play. That's what we're here for we want to do; continue to advance to the next round.

COACH ORR: I have to give credit to the players. They took it upon themselves individually and collectively, I thought we did a real good job on Jones and Rice and also the pressure on the ball by Andre, Donald Copeland John Allen, I just think we played with a lot of energy. But Andre was terrific today. He got everybody involved. He made some great passes, when he's distributing and he's -- he's one of the few guys in the country that cannot only be our leading scorer but can also make the players around him better. Everyone can't do that. I thought he was at his best today. And it made our team better, but it's one of those games where you are able to score. I think that even made our defense better. We get even pumped up more when we're scoring some points.

COACH ORR: Again we're playing against a team that's an up-tempo team, that has some weapons in the back court. They like to push the ball they got probably the best big man in our league defensively and close offensively in Okafor. We got to keep doing what we do. We like running also. We like getting up and down the floor also. But defense is going to be our key and we're going to have to defend them and rebound but we're playing well. I thought today we came out like Andre said and we played loose and we played with a lot of confidence and a lot of that has to do with how he distributed the ball. We got to have the same approach tomorrow, just come out and be ready to play.

ANDRE BARRETT: Taliek is one of my best friends. We knew each other since high school probably before high school. It's always good to play against an old friend. As far as a match-up, I am not looking forward to out overdoing him or anything; I am just looking for the lead of my team. Whatever happens happens. I don't care if I don't score or nothing happens on my end of the bargain as long as we win the game.

ANDRE BARRETT: I always had confidence in my teammates. I felt like we had the talent and we all had the ability as a team to be where we're at right now. It was just a matter of us having our heart in doing it on a consistent basis. I think that once we found a way to win close games, it was going upstairs from then on. That Georgetown game was a shinning moment for us. When we won that game in double overtime, and we found ways to make plays at the end of the game that just made us feel comfortable. I think now we when we're in close games everybody is comfortable; we know what we need to do when it is tight with two or four minutes to go, we know what plays to make.

COACH ORR: I think from my viewpoint without a doubt. I think the fact that we're 10 and 6 in the league, in the BIG EAST, speaks for itself. I think I am -- I don't read the RPI, all that stuff, but when I see it on TV it looks good to me and we played a challenging schedule, I mean, the month of February we were undefeated, didn't lose a game in the month of February. We finished pretty strong. So from that point of view, to me, I think we're in. That's my vote. If they give me a vote I am voting us in.