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BIG EAST CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENTMarch 10, 2007Jeff GreenRoy HibbertJohn Thompson IIINEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK JOHN THOMPSON III: Oh, boy. That's another thing off my to do list I can scratch off. Questions? Q. About a minute left, you were waving at your dad saying something, what were you saying? JOHN THOMPSON III: He was yelling something at me for the prior two minutes and I couldn't hear what he said. I finally turned around and said, "For the first time in your life, you can't talk loud enough that I can hear you what the hell are you saying." He was screaming something. I was just asking what he was saying, just sit down and be quiet. Q. Did he tell what you he was saying? JOHN THOMPSON III: No, not yet. Q. You guys were able to frustrate Aaron Gray to the point of 1 of 13 shooting and he looked very frustrated even on open looks; how were you able to contain him and control the game from there? JOHN THOMPSON III: Well, it's a couple of things. One, Aaron just had a bad day. He's one of the best players in the country, he's extremely talented. They do a good job of getting him the ball in different situations and it was just one of those days where the stars were not aligned for him; the stars were not aligned for them. They are a significantly better team than they looked tonight, and everybody knows that. That said, Roy did a very good job on them, just knowing and understanding Aaron's tendencies and staying attentive to that. ROY HIBBERT: We just focused on making sure we do what we have to do, playing help side defense, my teammates really had my help, so I just took it from there. Pat played a real good job on him when he was in there, so we just had each other's back when we were up there. Q. Roy, I noticed after the game in the handshake line, you and Aaron had a nice hug, very sportsman like; what is it like when you dominate a man so much in a matchup like that, and do you feel bad for him? ROY HIBBERT: We're both competing out there, so, you know, we're going extremely hard. We have respect for each other and off the court, we're two human beings. So I just told him, you know, "good work out there, you're a really good player," and we'll see him again, hopefully, if we keep working. But he's an extremely good player. Q. Not every basketball program has the kind of history that Georgetown does and you got to play this great game with all of these people who are part of the past -- JOHN THOMPSON III: I'm sorry, does anyone have stats? I haven't seen stats. Sorry. Q. All of these people from Georgetown's illustrious past are in the arena and watching including your coach's dad, including Patrick Ewing; can you describe whether or not you enjoy having those kind of guys around when something like this happens? ROY HIBBERT: I got an e-mail from Mike Sweetney before the game and said, "going to play hard, going to play Georgetown basketball and going to communicate on defense and help each other out." It's nice, it's a family atmosphere. We had a couple former players come in the locker room and talk to us and shake our hands. So I feel grateful that I get to be a part of that and that I get to wear Georgetown across my chest. We won this tournament together and the regular season together and we did this for all of the former Hoyas and ourselves and especially Coach Thompson. Q. Can you just talk about Jeff played well all year but really elevated his game here this week in the brightest lights; can you talk about how well he played in the moment this week? JOHN THOMPSON III: Well, I said this after the last game, you know, this is the time of year where good players, good teams play well, and there's no doubt that Jeff Green is special with what he can do on the basketball court. He can do so many things at such a high level, and he played extremely well this weekend, there's no doubt about that. Q. You said you would address seeding tonight. Now that you have this behind you, do you guys think you made a case for a No. 1? JOHN THOMPSON III: I may be the only coach in the country -- I haven't thought about it. You know, once we go back to the hotel tonight and I'll start to think about it. I don't know. I have not looked at any other team. I have not looked at what other people around the country are doing, and maybe that's a bad thing. I've just focused on Georgetown and this Conference tournament. So now I can sit and look and see where we stand. Where we're seeded, I have confidence in the selection committee where they put us, and we'll see what happens. Q. You have to feel good about the way you're going, I think you've won 16 of 17 now, one loss since January; do you feel good? JOHN THOMPSON III: Oh, there's no doubt, I think we're playing well right now. You come out of the gate, and one thing I learned from Pops and from coach, Coach Carril, is that NCAA bids, it doesn't matter how you play in the beginning of the year. So we come out of the gate, we lose a couple of games. I think people forgot about us, which is fine with me; which is fine with me, forget about us. We had a chance to improve and our guys worked extremely hard. And we're playing well right now. Hopefully we can continue and hopefully enjoy this, this is special. The opportunity to win the BIG EAST regular season and then win the BIG EAST tournament is something that's extremely special and we're going to enjoy it. But then we have to turn that off and focus and get ready for the NCAAs. Q. After you accepted the trophy, you went to the floor and off by yourself for a few minutes; just wondering what was going through your mind and what emotions at that time? JOHN THOMPSON III: You know, as I said, this being here, playing in this tournament, is something that is extremely special to me, you know, in year three, to have won the regular season and the tournament is something that's extremely special. Actually, it wasn't like I was walking off in deep contemplation. I was just kind of letting the guys enjoy themselves and kind of sitting back and watching, because they worked hard. I mean, these guys worked extremely hard. We have an extremely unselfish group and I'm just happy for them. I'm happy for the sacrifices that everyone made individually for the collective unit to give us the opportunity to be here right now. Q. You gave up 24 offensive rebounds last night, 17 tonight; you win both games -- JOHN THOMPSON III: We got to box out -- Q. Do those numbers concern you going into the tournament? JOHN THOMPSON III: Oh, come on, I don't want to start to break down -- I'm not going to look at the tape of tonight's game tonight. We have to do a better job. Pitt -- both Notre Dame and Pitt are very good offensive rebounding teams and we cannot give up that many -- that many second shots to teams. You know, but yes, it's a concern, we'll start to address it, at least think about it, in a couple of days. Q. During the cutting down of the nets, after your coach cut down the last one, he led the whole group in the end zone of, "We are Georgetown"; what do you think when you see your coach doing stuff like is that? JOHN THOMPSON III: He doesn't see me doing stuff like that. JEFF GREEN: It's funny to see him out there doing stuff like that. I was just enjoying the moment seeing our fans cheer along with us. Q. How badly did you want to win this tournament; you played this week like you were possessed? JEFF GREEN: I wanted to win it bad. It's something we wanted, to work hard from day one and we wanted to be No. 1 and to win the BIG EAST championship to go along with that. From the first game of the season, I've felt that I wanted to be on top of the BIG EAST after it's all said and done. I wanted it very bad from the start. Q. You just brought it up, you wanted to be on top of the BIG EAST, winning the regular season, winning the tournament. I mean, do you feel that right now, you're on top of the world and when you get to the NCAA Tournament, how are you going to prepare yourself for that? JOHN THOMPSON III: I'm taking care of that for him. (Laughter). JEFF GREEN: Yes, he will. We still have some more work to do. We're not on top yet. By the end of April we can see we're on top. We have to keep our composure and stay focused and take it one game at a time and start looking at what we have to do tomorrow during Selection Sunday. Q. You told us yesterday that you would rather win by 20 to 25 points; so, was this more fun and at what point did you say, I'm about to be champion -- JEFF GREEN: I didn't say until the clock hit zero because you never know what can happen in the game of basketball. When the clock hit zero that's when it finally hit me that we just won the BIG EAST title. But you know, it is fun to win by 20 but Pitt is an extremely good team. They just had one of those nights where they could not make shots. We got lucky and now we can say we're on top of the BIG EAST. Q. Your mom said that they initially tried to get you interested in tennis and golf then in piano. JOHN THOMPSON III: When did you talk to his mom? (Laughter). Q. Right after the game. (Laughter) And basketball was like a struggle for you early; did you ever think about -- JOHN THOMPSON III: Early? (Laughter) Oh, I'm sorry, I'll sit back. ROY HIBBERT: I started growing real tall at a young age so I tried to use my height. I wasn't too good at the other stuff. So I tried to be good at what I was, being tall. (Laughter) If you want to ask me questions about tonight, I can answer that, but any other time ask me questions about my past. (Laughter). Q. When a school has a legacy, sometimes it can be a lot of pressure on players, how are you guys able to thrive on the legacy and not let it wear you down? JEFF GREEN: Because we're a different team from the legacy from when his dad was coaching. You know, they were known as a defensive team and with us our offense is pretty much our offense, we run it through our offense and on the flipside of that -- JOHN THOMPSON III: Our defense is pretty good, too. (Laughter). JEFF GREEN: Our defense is pretty good. JOHN THOMPSON III: Most nights. When you keep in front of your man. (Laughter). JEFF GREEN: We just can't think about that. That's the past. We have to worry about what we have to take care of now. We don't go into the past that much. End of FastScripts |
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