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BIG 12 CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENTMarch 10, 2006Billy GillispieJoseph JonesAcie Law IVDALLAS, TEXAS MODERATOR: Coach Gillispie, your thoughts on today's victory. COACH BILLY GILLISPIE: It was a great performance by our team. I am not a bragging type, but our guys really played well against a really good team, a very, very, very athletic team that makes you play -- you have to be right on everything or they are going to get you. They have so many athletes they play so hard and so well coached. They were a very, very hungry team and for us to be able to perform the way we did was -- that's the best one we have had here at my two years at A&M. You always look better when the shot goes in the basket. Made shots. I give a great deal of credit to Colorado, but our guys played about as well as they could today. MODERATOR: Questions for our two student athletes. Q. You guys have a lot of Dallas area guys on your roster. Did you Dallas guys get together beforehand, say we need to step it up here in our hometown? ACIE LAW: No, it wasn't filling like that. We just wanted to continue to play well. We felt like we have been playing well, playing with a lot of confidence. We just wanted that to carry over into the tournament. Were able to come out today and play well and get a good victory against a very good team. Q. Was it the defense that got it started for you guys? ACIE LAW: Able to get stops. They missed a lot of easy shots that they normally make and then we got a few shots to go down, Joe got going, just went on from there. They never got going. We was able to get going. Ran away with the victory. Q. What was your sense of urgency? You a big lead in the second half but hard to play hard? ACIE LAW: We always, whole time we were out there on the court -- you want to give your best effort. That's what Coach stresses to us. When you are out there playing, give 110%. We always feel like the score is 0-0 no matter if we're ahead or they are ahead. We continue to battle hard and don't pay attention to the scoreboard. We did a good job. We had to play hard and get stops and ran away with the victory. Q. How good does it feel to get that monkey off your back as far as not winning a tournament game? ACIE LAW: Feels great. I mean, I am like speechless, just finally get a Big 12 tournament win it feels good. But we're here grateful to get that victory. Still continuing to play, can't dwell on the victory. We play a really good team tomorrow in Texas so we have to continue to play well. Q. You hit 3 point play, then on the next position hit another 3 going against the shot clock. Did you feel those threes early were the turning point for you all? ACIE LAW: Our goal coming out was to get stops. Take first open shot we could get. Our main objective is get it into Joe. They did a good job of sagging in the beginning and stretch their defense out, then Joe got going. Dominique, he made a couple of big shots. Like I said, just made plays, got a big victory today. Q. You were to be able score 21 points in only 29 minutes of play. I noticed y'all had new shoes. Was it the shoes or what did you eat for breakfast? JOSEPH JONES: It wasn't the shoes. Just my teammates gave me the ball. I was trying to do everything I could to give my team a low post presence. That's what Coach stresses every game. I just tried to come in, give my team a great low post presence. Q. What do you think about your next opponent? It's no strange face you will be facing again? ACIE LAW: Texas is a great team. I know they are going to want to come in, having a little extra motivation after what happened last week, that game last week in the past. We have got to focus. Very talented team. It is going to be a tough game for us to get a victory. Real good competitive game. We're both going to come in and play hard. We'll see what happens. Q. Could you also chime in on the matchup tomorrow against Texas? COACH BILLY GILLISPIE: I thought we had to finish with all the players first. We have so much respect for them and we lucked out last week and, I mean, got a magical win for us, we have so much respect for those guys. They have great players, they got a great coach. Got a great program that's capable of winning a Championship, the Championship this year, and we'll try to muster up enough energy to try to be as competitive as we can. But we have so much respect for those guys and I don't know, I mean, we're just going to try our hardest and see what happens. Q. Do you think Sunday is going to be a little less stressful now? ACIE LAW: I really don't know. We just want to continue to play well and just try not to focus on NCAA last year. Major, major goal of ours, to get there, but we still got games to play in this postseason tournament right now, the Big 12. So we can't try to focus on NCAA, see what people are saying. We got to maintain our focus on Texas and focus on that tomorrow and go out and get another victory. Q. Talk about the impact Josh Carter had when he came in? Seemed like you really got going? COACH BILLY GILLISPIE: He was great. Acie made one of the better plays he made all year by freezing the defender for Josh's second three down in the corner. Josh really is a good shooter. He defended well today and he's turning into a good defender and a rebounder as well. But those threes we were able to make in the first half definitely gave us a great deal of confidence. We were able to work inside out, but we also got some things in transition, especially the 3s, and get a little cushion there and as we made those threes our confidence just continued to grow defensively, and defensive rebounding even though they are hard time to defend rebounds against. I guess I would add a lot words there, but Josh played great. Good to see Josh. He's a Dallas guy too, and good to see him make those shots. If he gets a shot, he can usually make it. Q. Talk about what you guys were to be able to do defensively against Roby today? You had him frustrated pretty early? COACH BILLY GILLISPIE: We tried our hardest and he's a great player. He's an NBA player, and hopefully he will come back next year and play in our league to make our league even better than it already will be. They do great job of running a lot of stuff for him, but we try to help as much as possible and be there right on the catch and get your hand up on the shot and we were just lucky to be able to be in a help position a lot of times and contest most of his shots. Some days those shots go in and some days don't. He got 18 shots up, we were just fortunate that more than he made went in. Q. I know a lot of us in the media kind of had the sentiment that a win today would put you in. Feel like this kinds of locks you in? COACH BILLY GILLISPIE: Are you on the committee? Q. No. COACH BILLY GILLISPIE: No, I don't think this win locks everything up. I think we have been in for a while and if you win a bunch of times in a row in a major conference tournament, we're not bragging, not confused as to who -- we're a hard-nosed blue collar team and if you do what we have been able to do at the end of conference, in the Big 12 Conference, I don't believe -- we haven't -- our team has been great about that stuff. They haven't listened when people say a lot of good things, they haven't listened when people say a lot of bad things. What they do is they show up with their hard hat on every single day. That's why they are continuing to get better. We have always focused on the next practice, next practice to the next game. I really believe that's why we're continuing to improve at this point. Q. Against Texas this year, Acie Law, there was a noticeable difference in his stat line from Austin to College Station. He played much better at home. What was the difference in play there that you hope would carry into tomorrow? COACH BILLY GILLISPIE: His stat line wasn't near good at home as it was at Texas. He played much better at Texas than he did at our place or he scored a lot more points and he made a lot higher percentage shots at our place. He made a shot that they will never forget in College Station, and so it made it look like he played a great game. He played a really good game, I am not saying that. He probably played better against Texas the first time we played him than he did the last time. Q. What was the difference? COACH BILLY GILLISPIE: From -- what do you mean? Q. First game to the second game. COACH BILLY GILLISPIE: They do a great job defending. It's one of the better defensive teams in the country and they are not going to give Acie anything. They are not going to give any of our guys nothing. We're going try to do the same with them. It is a team that can win the Championship and if you don't play your absolute best you are in big trouble, and they played great man-to-man defense, great zone defense, because they are so long. They are great offensively inside, great offensively from the perimeter and best rebounding team in the country so it's not easy to do anything against those guys. Q. Would you say that your team seems like it's kind of peaking right now at the right time? COACH BILLY GILLISPIE: I think I don't know -- I know for a fact we haven't played better than this in two years than we did today against a real, real, real, real good team. And I mean as far as everything working right, some days we have played better defense, some days we have played better offense, but today was one of those magical days where everything just seemed to go right for us, shots went in, free throws went in, defended well. We could rebound better, but it was a magical day. I do think that our team is getting better because they have taken the right approach to the day-by-day practice and games, and I think all our teams that I have been a part of, either as an assistant or whatever, I think that we have always had that philosophy. We're a fundamentally based group, we're going to spend a ton of our time on defense and rebounding. We're going to get better and better as the season goes on. But we usually hit our stride right around February and hopefully into March and try to play the best in the conference to play the best conference tournament and then hopefully in the postseason play. Q. How much do you think that it would mean to your players and this program for a win tomorrow against a team as you say could win the National Championship in a postseason setting and win the season series from them? COACH BILLY GILLISPIE: We're not into winning a season series or -- we're into our next opponent which we have unbelievable respect for. It's very difficult for anyone to beat the University of Texas. We got lucky last week in throwing a shot at the end, but we don't -- our guys are really good about not worrying about anything else except their next opponent. We don't worry about what we have done. Don't worry about what we haven't done. We don't listen to a lot of people. Fortunately they listened to me sometimes, and I listen to them all the time. But we have a real unique group that just focuses on the task at hand and I really believe that's the reason we have been able to improve.
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