BIG EAST CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENT

March 6, 2002

Jim Boeheim

Preston Shumpert

COACH JIM BOEHEIM: This is the way we played over the last eleven, twelve games. We just haven't played well enough to win. I thought we had great effort tonight. I thought we got some good opportunities, but I just don't think we've played well over the last twelve games, is the bottom line. This is, you know, offensively one of our better games but we're just not playing well enough to win these games.

COACH JIM BOEHEIM: We missed a lot of shots the last few games. That's been a part of it. We've improved our rebounding. We've, I think, worked harder defensively. We're forcing about the same number of turnovers. We led the league in forced turnovers. We've taken care of the ball, first, second in the league. But tonight we made some very bad -- James made some very bad plays when we were up 13. He gave them 6 points. Just bad passes. Got them back in. But we missed a lot of layups. We missed a lot of easy shots. That's been part of it, probably a big part of it. Because, I think we've worked hard. Our defense has been pretty good, and our rebounding has gotten much better over the course of the last few games. But, you know, we haven't scored enough points. We haven't been good enough offensively. You know, we get it to two or three tonight, we missed two layups on the same play. And, you know, you just can't do that and win. Villanova's a good basketball team. You know, everybody that we've played and lost to, they've been good teams. We just haven't -- the first 18 games, we shot 48 percent from the field. 38 percent from the three. And the last 13 games, we're shooting 38 percent from the field and 28 percent from the three. And that's, you know, that's not going to win games that way.

COACH JIM BOEHEIM: When DeShaun did?

COACH JIM BOEHEIM: I mean, it was a big play. Just hit, you know, hit the foul-line shot, hit the three-pointer and makes a steal. And, you know, just one of those plays that didn't go our way.

PRESTON SHUMPERT: I don't know. I think like Coach said, we came out and we haven't been shooting like we, you know, we needed to be shooting to win games in this league. I think the emotions are always high. I think, you know, you're always disappointed. You're upset. You don't know how to adjust your feelings when you're losing. I think it goes for everybody, from the guy that doesn't really play to your starter, I think you're just as upset. As far as emotions, you're just really upset and frustrated.

COACH JIM BOEHEIM: No. You know, they played good defense. We scored 35 in the first half, 29 in the second half. First half we shot 51 percent. Second half we shot 31 percent. Is he I don't know if they did anything different, but we certainly did. If anything, I'd say we got the same or better shots in the second half than we got in the first half.

COACH JIM BOEHEIM: They were good shots. They were tough shots. Tough shots. They were good shots.

COACH JIM BOEHEIM: No, we started out in the second half with a two or four-point lead. When we had the two and four-point lead, we missed, I don't know, two or three layups maybe. You just can't do that.

COACH JIM BOEHEIM: It's out of my hands. It's out of my hands. It's out of my hands. It's out of my hands. Whatever I think doesn't matter.