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SOUTHEASTERN CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENTMarch 9, 2007John BradyDarnell LazareTasmin MitchellATLANTA, GEORGIA THE MODERATOR: We're ready to continue with LSU. Coach? JOHN BRADY: Let me see, I'm 52 years old, and I've been coaching since I was 21, so that's 31 years. I don't know if I've ever experienced a 20 minutes of basketball, from an offensive standpoint, that I saw tonight. I mean, we missed every shot imaginable, lay-ups, open three-pointers, good shots that we normally make. There was nothing special our opponent did or anything that was out of the ordinary. But I don't think -- and I believe it goes back to a mental approach of maybe concentration or preparation, because you can't play as well as our team did 24 hours last night, and then come out tonight and offensively be almost anemic. I don't fault our effort, I don't fault -- we outrebounded this team. We had 17 offensive rebounds and that is a stat of hustle and doing the things that you're trying to do. It just didn't happen. I felt bad for our team. I felt bad for -- you know, sometimes when you try to do some things right and execute, you like to end them with made baskets from time to time. But tonight, the first half, 4 for 29? Come on. 1 for 13? You know, it wasn't like people were up in our face every time we shot the ball. I've never experienced that. Hopefully I don't experience it ever again. In the second half we got a little bit better, we scored 43 points, and scored 17 -- at least we got it to the rim, started playing with a little more involvement. But it seemed overall, I don't know if we didn't prepare ourselves mentally to expect, whatever the case may be, when you can't make lay-ups or open jumpshots, or open three-pointers. It's baffling when you do it the night before so well. 53% against a team I think is as good as any in our league, and then tonight, you know, you just miss open shots. Hopefully, we'll get a chance to play again. I asked the players in the locker room, all the guys, if they wanted to play another game if we get the opportunity, and they all said to a man, "Yes, that's what we want to do." So we're not going to pass up an opportunity to play again. It's not where we'd like to play or where we want to play or where we're expected to play. We don't like that, but we want to play again, if we're given the opportunity. Q. Guys, the Ole Miss players said they were aware of the fact you guys wanted to play them again. They've considered that a challenge and made it a point to win this game. Could you have a response to that. Do you think it affected the outcome? DARNELL LAZARE: You know, we were ready to play those guys too, just because of how we lost that game in Oxford. I thought going into the game we were prepared to play against them. Like Coach said, mentally we might have been at the same way we were the night before last. But, you know, they hopped out on us early, got a couple of offensive rebounds back to back. They made a couple shots early, we couldn't get the ball in the basket. We let the gap get too large early. So that hurt us a little bit. But I think at least we kept competing. We kept giving the effort. The baskets were just falling and they seemed to make some baskets, so give credit to them. But I definitely feel that we were a better team than what we displayed tonight. TASMIN MITCHELL: Well, reflecting on what Darnell said, I'm not going to say we weren't mentally prepared for the way our season went. We didn't take nobody for granted. We couldn't take nobody for granted, but we just probably didn't come out with the intensity that we'd like to and, Ole Miss came out and a maxed our intensity. Therefore, they wanted the game more than us. You know, they came out with intensity, ready to play some ball. That's what they did. They're a great team. Q. Tasmin, the perimeter shots, were they there for you all tonight and you just didn't put them down, or was the offense not in a rhythm? TASMIN MITCHELL: Well, I don't think -- well, you know what I'm saying, they showed a little mannish in the zone. We had a couple of open shots, they just didn't fall. You know, we would have liked for them to fall, we weren't missing intentionally. You know, but they just didn't fall at that particular time. Q. Were you guys tired at all, or mentally drained from that game last night? TASMIN MITCHELL: Well, I wouldn't say that, but I know we played hard last night, and then coming back 24 hours again, like Coach said, you got to be mentally prepared, and I think our minds were more tired than our bodies. Q. Knowing what you've been through a year ago, and what happened this year, how much more difficult was it to keep the focus on just what's in front of you, when you know what you really want is to win not just this game, but the next game, because that's what you have to do? I mean you guys know what you had to do to get where you were a year ago, is that something that could be part of the issue of focus, not living in the moment, but thinking about the big picture beyond just Ole Miss for both of you? DARNELL LAZARE: It was definitely a different season this year than what it was last year. We put ourselves in that position at the same time, and looked at it as a challenge. I think we were ready for that challenge to come to the SEC Tournament and win four games in a row. We got off on a good foot last night. Tonight wasn't our night. But, you know, I thought the team did a good job of responding to the challenge. You know, every game this year we've played hard. We maybe didn't make the plays down the stretch we needed to make to come out with the victory. But it was a learning experience for myself, for the team, for everybody. It's definitely going to prepare those guys for the season next year, and prepare me for whatever life has ahead for me. But it was still a good season in my opinion, because we came together when we needed to. We had some good wins. You know, we stayed together. We didn't blame each other. We lost our best player for a couple of games and rose to the occasion and competed every game. We beat Florida when they were riding pretty high. We did some good things this year, but if we get the opportunity to play again, we look at that as another opportunity and another challenge to go to the NIT Championship. You know, South Carolina did it back to back, and hopefully we can go and win it also, if we get the opportunity. TASMIN MITCHELL: Like I said, last year's season was wonderful. Coming in as a freshman, and doing it in my freshman year, it kind of spoiled me. You know, I went to the Final Four my freshman year. But I was always the type to always say this is a new season. I hate when people ask me, you know what I'm saying, what y'all got to do to get back next year. We've got a couple of the same guys, but it wasn't the same team. We had guys who led by example, like Darrel Mitchell. He wasn't too verbal, you know what I'm saying, but having him on the court at the same time made us feel more comfortable. It's just a lot different from last year, and I always said -- I mean, last year was great. That was a time you live and remember, but this year was a time we needed to grab some. Like we said, Ole Miss came out and played with the intensity we really couldn't match. Q. Coach, the players alluded to what the difference was from last year, for you, what was the biggest difference from last season? JOHN BRADY: I don't know. I don't know if I want to get into all that right now. You know, you can never take anything for granted or think it's just going to happen. And I think in retrospect maybe the team that we had returning, it never, never was as good as the team a year ago, and the league is better. We haven't replaced or didn't replace Darrel Mitchell and Tyrus Thomas, and for anyone to think we have, for whatever reason, we didn't. And the league's better. So it's maybe too much for this team, with the expectation level and what we accomplished. Most of our preseason accolades were based on a year ago of what we did. And you know, we didn't replace two of our cornerstones on our team. We had some things happen to this team along the way that never brought it along as well as I would have hoped. But on the other hand, you know, we're 3-3 against teams in the top 25, we're 2-0 against teams in the top 10. We have at times played with the best teams in the country. Beat A & M when they were No. 6. We beat Florida when they were No. 3. And we've had three or four other wins against teams ranked in the top 25, and we've lost three games to teams in the top 25. So if you really break down the league, there's not many teams in the league that have that kind of record against ranked teams. On the other hand, we haven't been able to win the games a year ago that we did win. What I said last night, the margin of victory of 6.3, compared to the margin of defeat of 6.7, is four-tenths of a point. If you put Tyrus Thomas, and Darrel Mitchell with this group, then I think that flips. And we never replaced those guys with the guys that we're counting upon to maybe develop, didn't develop as well as we thought. An injury or whatever the case may be, didn't let it progress as well. This team was inconsistent from an offensive standpoint. You know, the glaring is the first half tonight of really how inconsistent it was. I never thought it's be exposed to that point. But we changed offense during the course of the year. We did some different things offensively to give our team an opportunity to score more easily and get some easy baskets. But I think this team from a chemistry standpoint, and the intangibles that make championship teams, it never took place here. It did at times, and it did at different moments, but it never crystallized to make it through the whole season. And the team last year, it worked, and this year we had too many things go on to keep that from happening. So whatever that means, you know, figure it out (laughter). THE MODERATOR: Okay. Thank you. End of FastScripts |
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