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BIG TEN COFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENTMarch 9, 2007Earl CallowayKelvin SampsonD.J. WhiteCHICAGO, ILLINOIS COACH KELVIN SAMPSON: First of all, congratulations to Illinois. I thought their team defended and rebounded. I thought they showed great toughness tonight, and I thought our team did, too, two teams that just really guarded each other. We hold them to 35 percent, we shoot 31 percent. Both teams only turn it over ten times. It's just hard to find a good shot. Both teams are good defensive teams. When you have two teams that play this way, it's going to be a low-scoring game. At the end of the overtime, at the end of our regulation, a couple thoughts. One was to throw the ball to D.J. (White) and run something for him. But the only thing clean we probably could have gotten for him was maybe a -- they were trapping the ball screen so hard, maybe pick and pop, release him off the screen for a jumper. But the way they were clogging the lane and defending ball screens and doubling him on the posts, we felt like if we could push everybody to the baseline and give our man some space on top that he'd get a good look and he did. He had a clean look, but just missed it. We had our chances. Second half, Illinois made a run, they went up, we came back, went up four. Then we had the foul I think that was called on us on the post when the kid made the three. He missed them both, right? I thought that was a big play. It looked like we'd get the ball back up three. If you have the ball and a three-point lead with a minute to go or around a minute to go, I thought that would have been huge for us. But still, we had a chance to win the game, just couldn't get it done tonight. Another big possession in the overtime was I think (Shaun) Pruitt had three offensive rebounds and a put-back there towards the end. But both teams played hard and both teams competed. We came up a little short. Q. Earl, how much is your shoulder still bothering you? It looked like when you were heading to the basket you kind of held up except for that last drive. Is it a concern going to the rim and making contact? EARL CALLOWAY: No, it's not a concern. Certain holes I can see and certain holes I can't. I try not to force it. If it's a clear lane I take it, but the main thing was to create for others because my shots were not falling, so I was trying not to force anything. I'm fine. Q. D.J., can you just talk about the physical battle tonight? You were obviously involved with a lot of rebounds, just a defensive battle. What was it like being involved in that for 45 minutes? D.J. WHITE: Well, it came down to the wire. I just tried to go in and help my team rebound. We came up -- the possession Coach talked about at the end, we didn't come up with a critical rebound when (Shaun) Pruitt got three offensive rebounds and a put-back. We just didn't find a way at that point to get the rebound. THE MODERATOR: We'll finish up with questions for Coach Sampson. Q. How do you feel about your team going into the NCAA Tournament? Are you okay with the way you're playing right now? COACH KELVIN SAMPSON: I just think we struggle making plays, but we're capable. If we defend like we have defended the last few games, I think we'll be okay. We can't survive when Rod (Wilmont) and Earl (Calloway) go 2-for-17. We're not good enough to overcome that. We were good enough to win this game and I think we're good enough to win games in the tournament. But I've said all year long, where we started and where we finished, we became a pretty good team. But that was it. At no point this year were we really good or very good or great. That's just not who we are. But I'm proud of these kids. We had a lot of opportunities tonight. By about 3:00 o'clock in the morning I'll have this thing figured out (laughter). There's another play, Armon (Bassett) made a great pass to D.J. (White) where it looked like he had a dunk. You've got to make plays. That would have put us back ahead. But we just didn't do that. Rod and Earl -- obviously Rod has carried us the last couple games, and Armon and A.J. (Ratliff) shot the ball well from the perimeter. We didn't turn it over a lot. Just didn't have a lot of good looks. But I give Illinois a lot of credit for that. I thought they defended us well. Q. You touched on this before, but you weren't -- it didn't appear you were able to get the ball into D.J. very much in the second half. COACH KELVIN SAMPSON: Well, we did get it to him a lot, he just didn't get a lot of shots. They did a good job monstering him. It's like (Shaun) Pruitt, we did a good job monstering him too. But he got a lot of his points off the offensive boards. If you look at his nine shot attempts, I'd say five of them came off second shots and in some situations maybe even third shots. But our game plan was not to let Pruitt get to his right shoulder and have his way. But I can't say anything -- our defense was good. Both teams' defenses played well. We just -- if Armon makes the basket, we go home a winner. That was a good look, but just didn't make it. That's the way it goes in tournaments. It would have been nice to win it in regulation. THE MODERATOR: Appreciate your time, Coach. Thank you. End of FastScripts |
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