BIG EAST CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENT

March 4, 1998

Ralph Willard

COACH WILLARD: Both teams did a great job fighting coming back. Both teams made great plays coming down the stretch and they made the last great play and they won the basketball game. I am very proud of our kids. Proud of their effort and how they hung in and being down 12 at halftime and battling back, it was just a great basketball game.

COACH WILLARD: Yeah, I think -- obviously I told them I said, you know, you made great plays the whole game; you put your hearts out on the floor. It is a shame our team has to lose a game like this, but as long as you throw your heart out on the floor and play 50 -- I don't know how many minutes it was, but when you do -- when five, six guys do that for 50 minutes and lay their hearts on the floor, that is what this is all about. So, sure it is difficult. It hurts. That is what competition is all about. I think that you saw the beauty of college basketball tonight in this basketball game, two teams just fighting and getting after one another and never surrendering. Neither team surrendering; every time making great plays coming down the stretch.

COACH WILLARD: No, I think obviously one of the keys coming into this game was to guard the 3. They shoot it exceptionally. They have three, actually four guys when Caouette is in the game can shoot the 3. The time we played down in Villanova they made 8 threes in the first half. They made 8 threes in the first half. When you do that, it is going to be very difficult to be up or even close to them. We just did a better job of guarding the threes the second half.

COACH WILLARD: Yeah, we wanted to set something up, give him an option of bouncing the ball to the baseline. We figured they would step up. We were going to have him try bounce the ball to Attila at the baseline, really we wanted Isaac to -- after Vonteego came off of Isaac, we figured they were hedging out the last couple of times with Zeffy Penn, we wanted to have the option of throwing the ball back to Isaac because Isaac can knock that 15 footer down. Unfortunately Vonteego saw him as he spun - I was blocked out by the official - one of them deflected the ball away. Isaac was free on the trail. I think he would have gotten a good look -- they made a good play and deflected the basketball.