BIG EAST CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENT

March 8, 2001

Tommy Amaker

Andre Barrett

Darius Lane

COACH TOMMY AMAKER: Certainly it's a heck of a win over a team that's been one of the better teams in our league all year. They're very deep, very athletic, and have posed a lot of problems for us in the two previous times we had a chance to lock heads. And I was real proud of our team. I thought we did a phenomenal job of withstanding the pressure. They put so much pressure on you with how many players they can rotate in and out of the games. The two players up here, in addition to Ty Shine, I thought they handled it very well and enabled us to come out with a hard-fought win.

COACH TOMMY AMAKER: Well, I think any time that you get some quality wins and you get the wins the way we were able to get them, which was effort, hard work, defense, unselfishness, all the things that we've lacked sometimes this year, I think our kids have vowed to do those things and we've been rewarded. We've deserved some wins. It's been a nice ride here for the last couple of -- I don't know if it's been two weeks, however long it's been -- but three games. I think our kids have earned it and have worked hard for it.

COACH TOMMY AMAKER: I think we played it very well this afternoon. I also think I'm not sure Georgetown is going to shoot the way they did all the time. I mean they missed some shots. I have to be very honest about it, we were fortunate that they did. I thought our kids obviously dug in and made some really good defensive stops and we dug out some loose balls and then you have these two guys who were pushing the ball, making plays, getting rebounds and controlling our team.

COACH TOMMY AMAKER: I wish I could. First time I had a chance to just watch them play was a little bit of the game this afternoon. As I just told our kids in the locker room, they very well could be the best team in our conference. I think they've had a great year, playing very, very well obviously. Playing very confidently. I haven't had a chance to review that many tapes and watch them that much but just watching a little bit today, you know, we're going to have our hands full. Especially with having played two games in two days.

COACH TOMMY AMAKER: Honestly we haven't even had a chance to talk about BC at all.

COACH TOMMY AMAKER: I thought back to one of the earlier games in the year, maybe in Walsh Gym (phonetic spelling), when he ran a few shots down and showed that kind of hustle. Those are the kind of plays that we have been making as a team. Darius has been on the floor for loose balls, Eddie's been blocking shots, Andre's been digging out loose balls, getting rebounds. When you do some of the little things like that, the hustle plays, effort plays, you get rewarded. We were certainly rewarded. But that was a great play. We've seen it before out of Eddie.

COACH TOMMY AMAKER: Sometimes it isn't up to any of us to try to judge what the timing of things should be. And, you know, like we're grateful we're in the position we are right now. We wish we would have done a lot of things early. I'm sure a lot of teams who maybe have 25 wins wish they had done things earlier in the year that they may be doing now. We can't look back and regret those kinds of things. We just know that things are moving forward with us, and it's funny how things can come around. Funny how can they turn around quickly. It can go either way. We've seen it on the other side. We're fortunate to be on this side, to see things turning for us at this point.

COACH TOMMY AMAKER: I think it says a lot about how competitive this league is. It shows you that from day in and day out, night in, night out you can't really predict what's going to happen. I think it speaks very well, I think, for the entire league, the two teams, one for us having a great season, coming into the tournament. And certainly with BC having a tough year last year, two teams that are playing for -- one game away from playing for the championship of our conference.

COACH TOMMY AMAKER: I think that's a good combination for us. We're looking at two kids who can handle the ball, make plays for us. When they take away one of the other, the other can run our team if we need that. I think based on the matchups we had the last few games, we've needed that with St. John's putting a lot of pressure in the back court and pressing. Certainly with Georgetown, they can run so many people at you, you need more ball handlers. I'm anticipating that's going to be the case tomorrow night.

COACH TOMMY AMAKER: I think, you know, when you look at that, it's not technique. Can't say it's a heck of a lot of coaching and things that we've done, I think it's been effort. I think it's been desire. I think it's been a team effort. That's the first time I had a chance to even look at the stats. I don't know who had a high rebound for us, looking right now, it looks like everyone contributed. Darius Lane getting six rebounds, Andre Barrett getting six rebounds. That says a lot. When you get team rebounds, I think that's the way we've played the last three games.

ANDRE BARRETT: I think that we never gave up in the first half. We were down a little bit. We talked about it throughout the season like just getting down 10-2, 11-2, not giving up. I think we made a strong run at the end of the first half. We got the lead within ten, we just needed to control the game.

ANDRE BARRETT: (Inaudible). They had beaten us and they beat us bad, and we were kind of embarrassed about that. But, you know what? As Coach said, things turn right back around and we had a chance to play against them again.

ANDRE BARRETT: No, I'm not tired at all. I've been playing basketball all my life, I'll just keep going and going.

DARIUS LANE: I mean we're getting better every game, every practice. I think the best is yet to come. We're just playing good ball right now, we're trusting one another. That's what we didn't do at the beginning of the season and in the middle of the season. Right now we're just trusting one another and we're playing together well.

DARIUS LANE: Probably after the Villanova game. You know, we knew we embarrassed ourselves and we knew we had to play together if we were going to win games, if we were going to make a run in the Big East tournament. I think guys were embarrassed and we finally realized we have to play together to win games.

ANDRE BARRETT: Definitely. When we've just put things aside, just come out there and listened to Coach and give the effort we've been talking about since the beginning of the season, it comes easy. Everything comes easy, the win, you're laughing out there, you're just having fun. Basketball is fun but we took it as a business, like we were getting paid for this at the beginning of the year. Now we just going out there, playing.

ANDRE BARRETT: Excuse me?

ANDRE BARRETT: I think against Notre Dame. Like when we win respectably, giving the effort and doing the things Coach wanted us to do, it becomes fun because we're listening to everybody. It's not you just listening to Coach; you're listening to your teammates. It's easier to be a leader. Things just come easy.

ANDRE BARRETT: It's all right. I'm all right.

COACH TOMMY AMAKER: You know, we were just thrilled to be where we are right now and have an opportunity to be in the semifinals of a great league. This is a great tournament and a great forum, a great atmosphere. Obviously I think it goes without saying that to participate in the NCAA tournament, we'd probably have to win this thing outright. We still have an opportunity.