NCAA MEN'S FINAL FOUR

March 27, 1998

Mike Montgomery

COACH MONTGOMERY: I think he's okay. It was a pretty bizarre situation that occurred. We practiced on Tuesday, and he didn't have a great practice. He wasn't feeling real well. He is actually run-down a little bit but that wasn't -- Wednesday morning I got a call from the trainer and it wasn't until practice because we practiced early because we left, that Pete couldn't move his knee. And so he missed practice on Wednesday. We took him down, got him an MRI, got the results back, and they weren't all real rosey, definitely some damage in there. Actually there was some damage from a previous injury because he didn't do anything in practice that would indicate any kind of an injury. But whatever, he may be pinched a meniscus, and we weren't sure -- the doctors wanted to keep him home to be sure whatever he needed to be done, he could do with his own people and not put him on an airplane and get it swollen. We left him there, not knowing whether we would have him this weekend. But he got in early this morning, late last night, and we got to practice this morning and he doesn't appear to be feeling any ill effect. But he has a bad knee and some stuff in there that will probably need to be corrected when the season is over. Our feeling right now is that he can go.

COACH MONTGOMERY: I'm extremely happy for one of them. I don't think western basketball has really gone anywhere. We have had two national championships in the last three years out of PAC Ten, specifically, which is obviously west. We had four teams reach the 16 of the regional level this year and four teams reached last year. So I think basketball, and even prior to that it has been alive and well. But the obvious measuring stick is the Final Four or the NCAA Tournament, and there has been some poor results. And as a result, people had just assumed that basketball out west wasn't any good, but I never really thought that was the case. The thing that I think is the best news for the west, maybe, is that it's not the same teams that you always see, which means there are other teams playing effectively. Certainly everybody knows that Arizona could be here. But we are here, and Utah is here. And Arizona won it last year and UCLA won it two years ago, three years ago. There is a lot of good basketball being played in the west from a lot of different schools other than the ones I just mentioned.

COACH MONTGOMERY: I'll know more after Saturday but it could. We have gone along. The two tournaments prior to this, the subregion and the region, with the idea, that, A, let's take one game at a time because that's the only way we could advance through, and if we win this one, we play some more. If not, you are out and the level of play and everything. This is different. This is different. And I'm sure the kids can sense that and feel that, but I don't really see them reacting differently. But like anything else, whether it be myself or the people on the staff or the University or the kids, having been here, your familiarity with how to react, what to do, is going to be better. You know, for a team perhaps like Kentucky who was here last year and set a goal to be here again, maybe in their minds this is not different and they expected it. So they are able to relax a little bit more. Dealing with relatives, tickets, phone calls, media, maybe you have been there, and maybe that helps you. But I don't know yet how that affects you when you get on the floor on Saturday afternoon. It may not affect us at all.

COACH MONTGOMERY: I think tempo will be a factor not from the standpoint so much that we will not prefer to run as much as getting ourselves in a position offensively to be comfortable with the pace, the shots that we take. In other words, if they're going to press, which they will, I don't think it's something they do maybe like Kentucky teams in the past. I think they pick and choose. But if we are moving faster than we are normally used to and taking shots out of context, that will hurt us. We have got to get shots that we are comfortable with with board coverage, shots that we anticipate and shots that we can make because we are used to taking them. So from that standpoint, tempo will be important. The second thing is, if we are not taking care of the basketball, I think Kentucky is very good in the open court, getting into seams, getting to open shooters, on the move, and I think they are as good as if they had to play half on offense in every single possession. From that point, tempo is important.

COACH MONTGOMERY: I think a lot of credit has to be given to those two respective people for the influence they had on their respective programs. Brevin had a tremendous influence on our program. He helped us develop the confidence that we could do this because in a lot of ways he was directly responsible for us getting to the round of 16 last year. And now, all of a sudden, he got four sophomores along with him that say, this is doable, something we can do, and they got a taste and wanted to do it again. I think that probably can be said about Utah. The flip side of that is, of course, that this group now has gotten to the Final Four as a result of their own abilities and talents. So a tremendous amount of credit has to go, in our particular situation, to Brevin and the development of our program, getting it to this level, the recruitment of some of the athletes we have in our program because of his personality and shear dynamics of his abilities. And there is no question about that.

COACH MONTGOMERY: We are staying downtown. So the kids have had access to being out and about a little bit. We have not tried to sequester them at all. We wanted them to have the opportunity to experience this, and frankly, it has been very manageable. It has been pretty quiet. But it is important to try to have a similar routine as far as our film sessions and our shooting or discussions and giving them the same amount of information we would normally give them about an opponent in terms of the strengths and weaknesses and what they do offensively. But I think the kids have been protected from it just a little bit. Now, the demands on them, press-wise has been a little greater obviously, but we have been careful about that. The demands of tickets, you know, hopefully, we got that out of the way early. But it has been more difficult, I think, for our staff to find the time to look at the tape, to have the meetings that we would normally have. Just because we played Sunday, flew home, tried to organize ourselves Monday. The logistics of the thing has just been huge, and back on the floor on Tuesday and out of there on Wednesday night. The magnitude of this, unquestionably, is so much greater. But we had a lot of people working hard and helping. I think the kids have got a pretty good routine and good feel. I think the best thing that's happened to us so far is walking on to this floor and just all of us, here it is, instead of this thing that's out there, not knowing what it is. Here it is. This is the dome. Here is where we are going to play. I think now the kids are okay. Hey, two baskets, 94 by 50, and we have been in big gyms before. I think now it's about playing basketball.

COACH MONTGOMERY: I've kind of told the kids all the way along that in the tournament, whether it be the first game against Charleston or this game against Kentucky, at some point it's about performance and some people will have to step up, and for us to realistically think that we would have a chance to win on Saturday -- we kind of try to treat it this way all along, we feel that we have to play play well, have to defend and somebody will have to shoot it. It may be that at some point, and it may well be Saturday, that everybody will have to shoot it; everybody will have to do what they are capable of doing because this is the National Tournament, the Final Four. We have been fortunate to find other people step up. We have defended relatively well. We have been pretty strong on the boards, we have not had any major breakdowns, and that's allowed us to get here. But there will be a point, and we said it right from the get-go, from the first game, that it may happen at any time, if you don't play well, you're not going to win because the other team is too capable. Part of what's happening, of course, better athletes saying, hey, don't let Weems get going, don't let Weems get shots.

COACH MONTGOMERY: Speed and quickness hurts everybody because that's the name of the game, in a way. To typecast us as not having speed and quickness will be incorrect. We have lost four games, two to Arizona, one to Connecticut, two of those on the road. And they have good speed and quickness, no question. But they also have premier athletes. And so I think a lot of people are focused on the losses rather than on the wins. Truthfully, Kentucky is athletic, but in a way they are a little bit like us because they are big and they pick and choose when they elect to

use -- certainly Turner is very quick and athletic, no question about it. I think Padgett is a very good athlete but maybe wouldn't be put into that category. I think Sheppard is a great athlete but maybe you wouldn't focus on the speed and quickness necessarily. Edwards is a great athlete, Evans. The point I'm making is that I think Kentucky -- I would almost typecast Kentucky more as powerful than I would -- the way I would Arizona, definitely, speed and quickness that you focus on there. I think Kentucky is powerful. They move at a very high level. In a way it is the strength rather than the quickness that they are using. But when you get to this level, when you're talking about Kentucky, you are always talking about very good athletes.

COACH MONTGOMERY: Similar but not, again, I think most teams are going to have quality point guard play or guard play when you get to this level. I think Turner is a key for Kentucky because he creates a lot of things for others. Wheeler was more of a guy that was creating things for himself as well as others, whereas I think Turner certainly is a capable scorer and can hurt you that way, but I think this job is to run their club, try to create help situations where he is kicking to Sheppard, kicking to Padgett, kicking to Evans or Edwards on the perimeter and allowing those guys to be more successful. So I think the key here is containment. I think Arthur got to keep Turner in front of him, got to keep him away from penetration, got to stay out of foul trouble, and I think that works both ways. So it is a key matchup. But I think, again, at this level, guard play, you are always going to have key matchups.

COACH MONTGOMERY: I don't know if I have time for this question.

COACH MONTGOMERY: That would be a pretty boring story, frankly. I am like a lot of guys born into an athletic family, so athletics has always been a major focus in my life. Usually what your dad does is typically what your son does, and that was me, two older brothers, very good athletes, and that was just always what was going to happen. Trying to pick what I was going to be good enough at was the question, or whether I was going to be anything, and that was close. Very mediocre athletic career, but got into college coaching right out of college as a result of a break, really, the military. And I have been in college coaching ever since. I've had a background that allows me to have a pretty good feel for athletics and its place, and I've been extremely fortunate to be in the right place at the right time in a lot of different situations that allowed me to have opportunities. Certainly, I guess, I would have to say that I made something of those opportunities, but I'm just like a lot of guys out there that have been very, very fortunate, and to have the chance to coach at a university like Stanford is probably beyond my wildest dreams, given what Stanford represents as a university and the excellence in every area. But we have been very fortunate with great kids and I think slowly but surely we've been able to get better athletes as a result of some exposure. We are not as unknown, probably, as people would think, although twelve years ago when I got there, we had never been on National television, didn't have anybody at the pros at the time, hadn't been in post season basketball for 47 years of any kind. There were barriers that needed to be broken down and things that needed to happen, but it happened very quick with a great group of kids that we have. And now here we are. So I don't want to be maudlin or anything, but to me it points out to a lot of people in coaching that it can be done. You just got to stick at it and be true to your convictions and who knows, it can happen.