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NCAA MEN'S 1ST & 2ND ROUNDS REGIONALS: SPOKANEMarch 18, 2007Aaron BrooksErnie KentTajuan PorterAdam ZahnSPOKANE, WASHINGTON THE MODERATOR: We'll have an opening statement by Coach Kent and then go to questions for the student-athletes. Coach? COACH ERNIE KENT: First of all I just want to make a couple comments. One about Winthrop. Because they were a basketball team that we heard Cinderella, we didn't feel that. We thought that they were a great team and they certainly brought out our A game because it got our attention just how well they had been playing coming into this tournament. Secondly, Spokane has done an outstanding job of hosting us. People have been superior, it's been great being up here. The fans have been great and there couldn't have been a better venue for college basketball in this great part of the country. And the last thing is, you know, we heard quite a bit over the last couple days about our defense and we feel like we're really a good defensive team. Particularly in the last six or seven games we held people under 40 percent shoot with the matchup and the man defense and this team did a great job of rising to the challenge and really defending a very good basketball team at the other end of the floor and that was the difference in the game today, it was just our defense. THE MODERATOR: Questions for Oregon student-athletes. Q. For any of the guy, what did you guys say in the huddle out there at the end when you celebrated after the game? AARON BROOKS: We get together and said The Lord's Prayer. We're thankful that we are here and just to be able to play the game of basketball and we just got to give thanks. TAJUAN PORTER: He pretty much said it all. We just thanked the Lord for giving us the strength and ability to go out on the basketball court and play and showcase our skills. Q. For Tajuan, you came out in the second half on a mission, can you just comment on all those threes you nailed right off the bat? TAJUAN PORTER: Just confident. I tried to take good shots and give my team energy from the start. I felt we started off a little flat. So I just brung a different type of energy to the team in the second half. Q. Just to follow-up on that, what was different for you in that second half? Were they defending you differently or did something change for you and also how is your hand? TAJUAN PORTER: Well the defense opened up. In the first half they were keying in on me a little bit, but the driving lanes opened and I was involved in more ball screens, so I was able to get my shot off. And my thumb is okay. Q. Aaron, did you feel disrespected personally and did you guys feel disrespected as a team in this matchup today? AARON BROOKS: I think we just took it as a challenge. Analysts are going to pick who they think will win and we just got, we took it as a challenge and a chip on our shoulder and we came out and played like that. So we can't let that -- we got to be able to play like that every game without analysis dissecting us and telling us what we can't do, we got to be able to come out and play like that every game. Q. You were very quiet yesterday, you didn't come to be interviewed, what was going through your mind? AARON BROOKS: I wasn't asked to be interviewed, so you know, I can't just come down if they don't ask me. Some days I'm quiet, some days I'm not. I think that, I don't know, I was a little outspoken, I think we -- I didn't like the way we came out in the first game. We came out and played like we were tired and quiet or whatever, so I didn't like that. So I knew that our team needed a little boost and so I had to kind of switch modes and get guys going a little bit and as a leader on the team I felt that's what was needed. Q. Do you think conditioning of the team showed in the last 10 minutes? ADAM ZAHN: Yeah, absolutely. I think it showed all year. We really made a decision just to work hard this year and through the summer spring. We really dedicated ourselves to being in good shape and I think it is showing to be really helpful. Q. Yesterday I asked you Adam about having, you having five fouls to use up today you were out there you didn't use any of your fouls up, but made a presence and got a standing ovation. ADAM ZAHN: Right. Well, yeah, I guess I yesterday I had just some built up energy, just came out a little too aggressive. Didn't work out like that today. So, yeah. Q. Tajuan, back to the start of the second half, did you feel like you could get a shot just about any time you wanted either off the dribble or from the jumper? TAJUAN PORTER: Yeah, that's pretty much I feel that way all the time I'm out there on the court. The most important thing is just take good shots and keep my space. Q. From the first time you drove the lane, Aaron, they hit you with the body, I know you can't comment on officiating, but did you have to adjust your game the way they were calling it? AARON BROOKS: I think you always have to adjust your Guam the way they are calling it. I think the good thing was I was able to get to the hole and that was a good sign for me early in the game. So that you can get to the middle I knew that would be open whenever I needed in the game and that kind of just opened up my game a little bit and got me a couple of shots because they were playing me soft a little bit. So I think you have to adjust your, adjust to the officiating. We haven't met these officials before, we haven't seen them, so that's a big key to the game is adjusting. Q. The help defense that they seemed to be pretty tenacious every time they looked into the low post it seemed you had two or three bodies immediately collapsing down. Did you feel like they were settling for jumpers as this game progressed or do you think that maybe you just flustered them so much they just stopped looking inside? AARON BROOKS: I think we really took it as an initiative to play defense and play hard. We have a great rotating defense. We work on that all the time. I think our help side was great and I think they wasn't settling, I think they had to settle for 3-pointers because we were locking the stuff up in the middle with our switching and our help. So we were playing great D and we was ready for them today. Q. Adam, can you talk specifically about the approach defensively against Bradshaw? ADAM ZAHN: Well, we talked a lot about the screens that they have and switching. And I think that the communication was just incredible today. He's a good player. We knew we had to stop him. Keep him from getting off on us. And, yeah, we just the switching and the communication really helped today. Q. For Aaron. Tajuan certainly has been hot before this, in this season, is there a look you see in his eyes, is there something when you guys know that he's hot we got to get the ball to him? AARON BROOKS: You can see when he's about to shoot the ball because he gets a little step in him and he starts shaking it. When that ball go up you just want to get back down the court and play defense, because sometimes you can tell when he's feeling it and he, you just got to go ahead and play defense and let him do his thing. But he's an outstanding freshman and he made big shots for us and that's what we expect out of him. He's a great player. Q. Ernie, did you envision this team as a Sweet 16 team when the season started. THE MODERATOR: Let's direct questions to student-athletes. Q. Aaron Brooks, Adam Zahn, did you envision this as a Sweet 16 team when the season started? AARON BROOKS: We definitely envisioned we had a great basketball team. We knew that the sky's the limit with this team. We knew we had to put the pieces together and the seasons before this we didn't put the pieces together. We got everybody, we got, that we need to make a 16, be a Sweet 16 team. We just didn't put the pieces together, wasn't playing together, and I think in the summer when we made the effort to bond together and condition and stuff like that, that's when I felt like that we had a chance to be special. ADAM ZAHN: I felt that we could definitely play with any team in the nation. We have had goals all year. One was to win the Pac-10 tournament. And now with each game it's just when you see more and more how much talent we have on this team, and how good we can be, if we just really play together and play unselfish and make our shots. Q. Question for Tajuan. In the early part of the game there was a turnover by Bradshaw at the baseline and you were covering him. TAJUAN PORTER: Yeah. Q. It looked it was kind of a Kodak moment where I couldn't quite tell what happened, the details of the play, what happened and how did you feel defending him? TAJUAN PORTER: It was just rotation help. They threw it over the top so I wasn't going to be able to get the ball so I stood my ground and took the charge. He didn't see me so he walked. (Laughter.) Q. For any of you guys, what do you know about UNLV? ADAM ZAHN: They look like a very athletic basketball team. We got, we're going to have our work cut out for us definitely. Yeah. TAJUAN PORTER: I really don't know too much about them. But I know they are a great basketball team. They beat a good team today. Every team in this tournament can play, so we just got to be prepared to play. AARON BROOKS: I know that they're in the Sweet 16 and we got to be ready to play because they deserve to be there. Just going to come out and I think we'll go over film and get a better understanding for them. But we didn't really know Winthrop until we started studying them. So I think we just got to do that and then we'll be fine. THE MODERATOR: All right. Thanks, gentlemen. We'll take questions now for Coach Kent. Q. You found Tajuan while you were recruiting Malik, is that right? COACH ERNIE KENT: We found Tajuan and we went back and we were after Malik and I'll never forget the day that Coach Duncan said, you need to come in and take a look at Malik and when you do there's another guy I want you to look at and sure enough we watch him and there was this little guy that was just automatic from every where on the floor. And we said then that we're going to many could back and recruit him and his coach talked about a lot of people have been in it gym looking at Malik and everybody saw the same thing you saw and everybody thought he was too small to play at this level and my theory is it has nothing to do with size it's how big your heart is. Because he's a guy that's five six, but he plays six feet tall. Aaron Brooks is six feet and plays six-five when you talk how hard they play. So size was not an issue. Here was a kid that as a unique special player because of his size he has developed himself into just a sharp shooter, knows how to get his shot off over bigger people, he goes inside and he has not hurt us at all defensively this year. He rotated on the weak side and guarded Bradshaw and forced him to travel just because he did a good job of getting position and everything. Q. Aaron Brooks this season obviously has had something of a turn around. What do you attribute that to and what have you seen in him that's different this season? COACH ERNIE KENT: His story has been told often enough and he's just someone who has grown up and matured this year. He's always had tremendous amount of energy, he's always been a gay that had a great passion for the game and worked every day in practice. And he's just grown. Tajuan Porter has allowed him to grow even more because it really has taken the pressure off of him to have another point guard on the floor where he can just kind of do things over the two guard spot and then when we need to take over the game and we put him over at the point guard spot and let him control the game for us. Q. A lot of turning points but any one specific one that really stands out for you? COACH ERNIE KENT: The first game against Miami. I just felt like they needed to get a game underneath their belt and they did a great job on that game playing a different style of play and basically he beating a team at their own style of play. The grind through the game play. I knew we were going to play better this game because you had an up tempo game, a little bit more relaxed and calm, they had a feel for what center stage was like and I just thought they did an outstanding job defensively. We switched at the three, four, five, sometimes we switched two, three, four and five and then this team did a good job of communicating and taking over the low post game. Q. Can you talk a bit more about the switching on defense and you know Maarty said that he thought you guys did more than you had all season and against especially on the big guys? COACH ERNIE KENT: Well, it was just the game plan. This is not a team at this time point in time you need to look at a lot of film on an opponent. We just get together the game plan. We met three times and went through walk through. We watched probably 10 minutes of film and they were ready to go. Because it's really about what they do because at this stage there's no new found offense out there. Everything everybody runs the same stuff across the country it's just a matter of getting your team ready. We switched more in this game, we matched up zone more in the Washington win, we trapped more in the Oregon State win, this was an adjustment in this game, let's switch and take away all their screens because they do a great job of bringing the big fellow to the ball down low and I think the switching defense really took them out what have they wanted to do. Q. What did you say at half time they got a shot right at the buzzer, momentum for them definitely going in but you guys came out on fire, what did you talk about at half time? COACH ERNIE KENT: We talked about a couple of things. Number one, they had six offensive rebounds I believe at half time, that probably gave them six to eight second chance points. We needed to take care of the glass and keep that away. Number two, we felt like we had a couple turnovers that should not have been there and just understanding good shot/bad shot. And number three, they stand between us and St. Louis. I left that team alone and said when you're ready to come out of this locker room you come out of this locker room and let's go get it done. Q. Maarty it looked like started a little slow today. But he really made an impact. You look at the final numbers, 12 points I believe. And he seemed to make an impact on the defensive end also, particularly against Bradshaw. Can you talk about him? COACH ERNIE KENT: I don't think he started slow. I thought defensively he was great right from the beginning of the game. Maarty had Bradshaw at times, Malik had him at times, Aaron Brooks had him three possessions. I thought Maarty was great at the end of the floor. Offensively he started a little slow, but that's because the ball just didn't come to him initially offensively. When we got out -- the difference in the game, is we started to get our stops and we were about an eight to nine minute stretch where we had gotten into transition a felt like we fatigued them a little bit and ran them pretty good and that was the difference in the game. Q. Could you talk a little bit more about what you emphasized to make sure that your team knew that Winthrop wasn't a Cinderella-type team? COACH ERNIE KENT: Well, a couple things happened along the way. They do watch TV and they heard all the stuff on TV about everybody pulling for them to go forward. The thing I said is they won 19 straight games in a row. They took North Carolina down to the wire, Maryland they played a good game, they took Wisconsin down to the wire. That's not Cinderella, that is a very good basketball team that's well coached. So it wasn't even a matter of Winthrop, it was about the performance we needed to give. It was the fact that Winthrop played so well so much is said on TV it just raised us to make sure we gave our A game and gave our best performance. So it worked out well for us that this was the game that we needed to step up and we did a good job of it. Q. You talk a lot about adversity and just everything that your team has been through the last couple years can you kind of tell us what emotionally you've been feeling just since the game ended and what's going through your mind from an emotional standpoint right now? COACH ERNIE KENT: UNLV is the only thing that's going through my mind. I've seen them, I need to see a lot more of them. I'm thinking about giving these guys a couple days off. How much fun we're going to have on that plane flying back to Eugene. How much fun we're going to have over the course of the next couple of days resting and getting ready. How much fun we're going to have going to St. Louis on that plane and then it will be time to go to work. Q. Coach, your next will be 29 which is what the national championship team won. Is there any significance in that number to you? COACH ERNIE KENT: The significance is that Admiral John Dick is still alive, that played on that team, and traveled with us today. And every time I look at him I realize what a special place this is, the University of Oregon. To see this man still supporting his Ducks. Because people don't understand, once you go through that program and I mean even as a coach, in the long run, I went to school at Oregon. And every time I look back on this I'm a Duck. I'm a Duck at heart. I grew up a Duck going to school here and I'll always be a Duck and Admiral is the same way. Q. Porter started at the beginning of the second half, what do you tell a kid in that situation? Do you say, go out and look for your shot there or is it just a matter of him playing within with the flow and doing what he's what he normally does? COACH ERNIE KENT: I told him before the game to light them up. Because he's a great shooter. I said nothing to him after that. When he gets into that groove, you just let him go. And there's no such thing as a bad shot for him. There might be a coaching moment at some point in time to help him through being a freshman in that but you really just let him go, let him get in that rhythm and everything and these guys have done a good job of allowing that freshman to come in. Sometimes he might take a bad one. He complained about his thumb and dribbled back out and shot a 40 footer, so I thought he was okay after that. But he gets into that rhythm sometimes and he just can't be stopped he's a great shooter you think he's been in double figures something like 17 games here and he's great on the road as a shooter. Q. This will be the first time since '95 that no double digit seed has made it to the Sweet 16. Do you think that speaks to how well the how good the higher seeded teams this year are or how well the tournament was seeded, do you have any explanation for it? COACH ERNIE KENT: No. I think that the committee did a good job and there's is a very, very, very, very tough job. And as I looked at all the games and one of the things I talked to my staff about, do you notice in this round all the games are close. All of them. They were coming down to the wire and teams were closing the gap and you would have to really coach the game up in the last two minutes and here we are in a game where you get a 18 point lead and basically us just manage to get out the game the last sick minutes or so. But I don't know what the explanation is that no one is advancing all I no he is that everybody at this level, once you get chosen in that field of 64 or 65, everybody's good and everybody can beat anybody. You got to show up ready to play because all it takes is for one off night by two or three guys and you don't defend well or whatever and you can get beat and you go home. We're one of these teams that we have been fortunate, this is new stage for these guys, but they're starting to get a feel for it and a that taste for it and I kind of think they like it. So I hope we go back and regroup and get ready to go forward again. THE MODERATOR: Thank you, coach. COACH ERNIE KENT: Thank you. End of FastScripts |
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