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NCAA MEN'S 3RD & 4TH ROUND REGIONALS: ST. LOUIS

March 22, 2007

ST. LOUIS, MISSOURI

MODERATOR: Student athletes from Oregon, the Oregon Ducks are with us. And I'm going to ask each of the players to just open up and tell me what you know about UNLV and what kind of game you expect, and then we'll go to questions.
Malik, we'll start with you.
MALIK HAIRSTON: I know UNLV is the team that gets up and down, very similar team to us. Play small, four guards, able to penetrate and create a lot of open looks for each other.
AARON BROOKS: We know they're a very good team, great guards. Four guards, one post. They like to push the ball and get transition buckets just like we do. They like to trap the ball and force turnovers just like we do.

Q. Question for Aaron. What has the presence of Tajuan Porter done for you and what kind of impact has he had on your team?
AARON BROOKS: "Little big man" we call him. He's been a great presence for this team. He relieves a lot of pressure off of me. Kind of freed me to roam at the 2. But he's just been big shots, hitting big shots all year and really stepping up when we needed him in the clutch and he's a little engine that keeps this team going. And just been a great asset to the team.

Q. Has a Pac-10 team -- is there another Pac-10 team besides yourself that you compare these guys to and where do you think these guys would be if they played in the Pac-10?
MALIK HAIRSTON: We'll compare them to a mixture of two different teams. With Kruger at the point, in a way it's Arizona, the way they push the ball up your back and just try to create open looks off of that.
And also Cal the way they spread you out, penetrate, kick and get a lot of open shots.
AARON BROOKS: I'd say Cal, a better version of Cal, because they're in the Sweet 16. So they're a little bit better than Cal. And like they shoot it well. They shoot it well plus they got great presence in the middle.
And I think they really play hard. Their intensity is good.

Q. Where do you think they'd be if they were in that league?
AARON BROOKS: They're not. So I don't know. I haven't played them yet to say where they would be at.

Q. Starting with Aaron but for both of you guys, you made so many comparisons, you said they do this just like we do, they do this just like we do. What's going to separate the winner of this game? What's going to declare the winner?
AARON BROOKS: I think who works the hardest. You know, you've got two teams that pretty much do the same thing. It's the team that works the hardest and executes their game plan the best.
Another thing could be boxing out off rebounding, we want to keep them off the offensive rebounding, and we also want to shoot the ball well, the team that gets hot can definitely make some noise in this game.
MALIK HAIRSTON: I definitely agree with Aaron, and also just defense. Defense has gotten us to where we are today. And just our rotations and communicating on defense and kind of just taking pride in us shutting our opponent down.

Q. Are you guys kind to Tajuan Porter about his lack of height or do you get on him about it?
MALIK HAIRSTON: First name is Tajuan Porter. We're a basketball team, we're family. Of course we talk a little bit of trash, but it's all out of love. When we're out on the court you definitely don't notice his height. He plays with his heart. I just think he does an exceptional job for this team.
AARON BROOKS: I think he's really short.
(Laughter)
I mean, that's my guy. We always make fun of him and call him our little brother. When he's walking it's funny because we walked to the arena, you look at him, you think he's the ball boy or something.
And nobody really thinks that he even plays on the team. But he makes such an impact in the games. And like I said, we wouldn't be here without little guy.

Q. You guys talk about -- a lot has been made about the guard play in this game, but can you talk about what Maarty does for you guys as far as being the lone big man on the court for you?
AARON BROOKS: I think Maarty has probably made it possible for us to go small. He has to guard some of the big guys in there and he's kind of undersized himself.
He made it all possible for us to make the transition to four guards and one big guy. He's really stepped up and locked down some big-time players in the post.
And all I can say of Maarty, he's been a major contributor to this team. And offensive rebound and defensive rebound and shutting down big guys, stepping out and making matchup problems. I think he's definitely been a key part to what we're doing now.
MALIK HAIRSTON: He's done a great job in terms of sacrificing, because Maarty is 6-9 but he has guard skills. So the fact that he's having to defend a post is definitely tough. But he's definitely made a sacrifice.
We've been able to help him out.

Q. You're on target to graduate this summer; is that right?
MALIK HAIRSTON: Yes.

Q. Being able to graduate in over three years, how much extra work has that taken and how much of an accomplishment is that for you how proud of that are you?
MALIK HAIRSTON: It's definitely been a hard -- taking 19 credits or so each time. You've got guys to help you. They provide tutors. And it's definitely been enjoyable. I've been in a lot of classes with my teammates.
I've had the help necessary but it's definitely a great feeling.

Q. What's your major?
MALIK HAIRSTON: Political science.

Q. Wendell White on their team, listed as a guard but goes inside quite a bit, similar to you. Can you talk about you guys may match up a little bit tomorrow, have you seen him a little and your thoughts on his game?
MALIK HAIRSTON: I haven't seen any of them but we're definitely going to watch more film. I've heard he's a very good player. Strong. Athletic and good on the outside and on the inside.
But I'm sure it will be a good matchup. Don't know too much about him yet.

Q. Aaron, you guys have had some really good individual shooting performances, starting back in the Pac-10. When one of you guys hits a couple 3s early, could you talk about how the team -- does the team do anything special to keep feeding that guy?
AARON BROOKS: We've got great players on this team. I think the good thing about it is that once we spread out we can find everybody that's open. I think everybody can shoot 3s. Everybody can shoot on this team. We have special plays where we'll try to find people to get 3s in if they're hot.
But, you know, it's weird because once one person hits, it trickles down to everybody else and everybody else starts hitting you get the good feeling good rhythm basketball. But we definitely try to find the high guy we don't force the issue at all. I think that's the good thing about this team.

Q. Malik, you mentioned you haven't seen any film on them yet. Are you watching less stuff now than you would during the Pac-10 season?
MALIK HAIRSTON: Actually, excuse me. We actually watched -- we had a brief film session this morning and we just focused in on some key plays, not too much personnel because we're still focusing on what we need to do in order to be successful.

Q. Are you watching less than you would during the Pac-10 season, do you think?
MALIK HAIRSTON: Not necessarily, because during the Pac-10 season you play these teams more than once. So you generally know what to expect. But we just generally make a lot of adjustments.

Q. Can you talk a little bit about the similarities between the Ducks and the Rebels and the differences also for both? Aaron, start with you?
AARON BROOKS: The difference?

Q. Similarities and differences.
AARON BROOKS: The similarities is we're both start four guards and we both shoot it pretty well. Both undersized a little bit. And the difference is that I like our guards a little bit better. I like Maarty. Maarty's -- I think we have five guys that can step out and shoot it. And I think they have four.
So I just think we just gotta bring our intensity. I don't see that many differences.
There's a couple of things we can definitely try to exploit. But for the most part there's a lot of similarities.
Just going to come down to who plays the hardest.
MALIK HAIRSTON: I agree. There are a lot of similarities. And I'm not too sure what they take their pride in but we take pride in defense.
And if our defense is clicking, we have our rotations. We're communicating. We're looking out for each other. I think we're a very tough team to beat.

Q. I was going to ask a follow-up, have you played in the dome in this season in the Pac-10 somewhere maybe nonconference or whatever, or maybe the differences in a dome, perception, depth perception and so forth?
MALIK HAIRSTON: We haven't played in a dome but we've played on a basketball court. So we're going to be playing basketball. As long as they don't throw a football or baseball out there I think we'll be all right.

Q. Malik, back to the graduation thing again. Just political science, what drew you to that? Are you interested in news and current affairs? And I know you want to play basketball for a while. After basketball are you interested in a career in politics at some point?
MALIK HAIRSTON: It's interesting to me now. My dad does a lot of things with politics. He has a radio show back in Detroit. And it actually stimulates a lot of conversations between us.
But it's definitely interesting.

Q. Would you run for office or anything?
AARON BROOKS: No.
MALIK HAIRSTON: I guess Aaron Brooks is answering for me, but I kind of got goals going in different directions.
MODERATOR: Thank you very much.
Our final session is with the head coach of the Ducks, Ernie Kent. We're going to ask him to make a statement about being in St. Louis and about his opponent and then we'll go to questions.
COACH KENT: Being from Rockford, Illinois, I'm very familiar with St. Louis and I'm happy my guys have the opportunity to come back here. There's history here and it's a tremendous city and I'm anxious for them to get out this afternoon and walk around a little bit and see some sights.

Q. Since we're going to stick with the familiarity thing for just a moment, you have a player on your team who is from Las Vegas in Mitch Platt. Can you talk a little bit about the fact that he's actually had limited minutes this year? I know he doesn't fit into the plans the way you have things set up, but what does he contribute and how do you view him in the overall plan?
COACH KENT: Mitch is a part of a bench that I think is a tremendous part of this basketball team and a big reason why we've been so successful. I think in this day and age it's very difficult for people who sat on the bench and don't have an opportunity to play a lot of minutes to sit there in harmony with everybody else and be a part of a team. And those guys have been fantastic that sit down on that side of the bench. They're supportive, worked hard in practice.
We made some adjustments this year to go small with our basketball team, and it's allowed us to be very successful. Will that stay the style of play at Oregon? Probably not. But this year it was the best direction to go. My hat is off to Mitch and Ray Schafer and guys that have sat down here and done a really nice job in keeping us focused and headed in a positive direction.

Q. I think you told me a while back all your guys on the current roster are on course to graduate; is that right?
COACH KENT: Every guy in this program is not only on course, there's two or three of them that have already graduated from this program right now. I think in this day and age, that's something to be proud of. Malik Hairston is going to graduate this summer and I don't know if there's another athlete in this country that's graduated in three years and played basketball at this level.
So I'm proud of the fact that academically they're all either on track ahead of schedule or already graduated, and certainly we're taking final exams as I speak. On this trip we'll take final exams when we get back to the hotel. I still have three or four guys that will get through finals.
I found in the past it's really freed us up to get the academics out of the way before the ball game.

Q. How important has that been to you over your coaching career to make sure your guys do graduate?
COACH KENT: Well, it's a thing that you sell when you go into the homes, to be able to do it. It's been huge for us. I think they told me the other day that since 2000, 90% of our players have graduated from University of Oregon. The two have not graduated are playing professional basketball right now.
It's very important for me because when it's all said and done when these kids look back 20 years from now it's going to be their college experience and more importantly just their education and everything. So I'm happy to say we've done what we said we're going to do when we walked in the home and recruited these young men.

Q. Bo Ryan of Wisconsin before he played UNLV last week wasn't happy about having to play a team who had a key player that switched because of the rule 2005-54. You face the same predicament. He did everything within the rules, but does that rule still eat at you, the change it caused?
COACH KENT: Well, actually, I was on the board that talked about that rule initially. And felt like that here was a young man that had redshirted, a young man that had spent five years at an institution, had gotten his degree. I should say four years, had gotten his degree. Now you're in the fifth year and having an opportunity to go somewhere and play without getting penalized.
You know, when you look at some of the rules that have come down, we talk about tweaking those rules, if you put them in see if they're good rules or bad rules. Yet at the same time once we put that rule in we felt like maybe there were some people that are going to take advantage of it in the wrong way.
Here's somebody that had a player in a program that really worked hard and developed that player, now they just want to go to a bigger, better, stronger program.
In this case here's a young man that had an opportunity to go play for his dad. I don't know how it can be a bad thing when it's all said and done. The rule is no longer in. I think the fact that Kevin had an opportunity to do it, I'm sure he's pleased and his parents are.

Q. You're okay with it obviously?
COACH KENT: I'm okay with it where it is now because it's done and it's over with. And the rule is no longer in effect now.

Q. Did you vote in favor of it on the committee?
COACH KENT: I don't know if we voted on the committee as we talked about it on the committee. Then it came out across college basketball to vote for it as it came out to vote against it again. I know I voted against it the second time around, I know that.

Q. Can you talk about the similarities and the differences between the Rebels and the Ducks?
COACH KENT: I think the similarities are that we both love to get up and down and score in transition first and foremost. I think in the half court we both do an excellent job of running some pretty good sets.
I think in the half court we both do an excellent job of being able to shoot the basketball and beat you off the dribble.
And then for two undersized teams, for the most part we both do a pretty good job of rebounding the basketball. Those are the biggest if you want to say similarities there.
There's a difference there, maybe Maarty Leunen as our five man, guard as well, can shoot the basketball really well, particularly when he's on his game he becomes a big threat for us in terms of a mismatch situation.

Q. Who in the Pac-10 other than yourselves would you compare these guys to and what kind of a Pac-10 team do you guys think these guys would be?
COACH KENT: There's a couple of teams I would compare them to. One would be Cal and the other is Arizona. Both of them are teams that love to get up and down. They have five skilled players on the floor. Spread you out, shoot the 3 or put it on the floor, beat you off the dribble. They are kind of undersized teams when you look at them. And UNLV, they're so similar to us. We finished third in the conference. So they're definitely a team that would be an upper-echelon team in our conference, just like we are an upper-echelon team this year.
They've been very, very good this year and won a lot of basketball games. Could they play in the Pac-10? You bet they could play in the Pac-10. That's why they're here right now in the Sweet 16. When you look at who they beat, they beat a very good Georgia Tech team and I thought Bo Ryan's team was one of the best teams in the country for the entire year and had a chance to beat them as well too. So that tells you right there they're a very good basketball team.

Q. Ernie, can you talk about the first time you came across Tajuan Porter on the recruiting circuit and how long it took for you to be convinced that he could be a player for you?
COACH KENT: Well, we went and had an opportunity to recruit Malik Hairston at his high school. He was the guy we were there to see. And Malik Hairston was such a great player and so well known. Instantly you're looking at him you're watching him play what you start to notice was there was a little guy on the floor that shot the basketball extremely well and played with an enormous amount of energy and heart.
And I remember my assistant, Scott Duncan, saying, Coach, this guy can really play we're going to come back and recruit this guy. Sure enough, we came back a year later and got involved with him. And not a lot of people I think believed he could play at this level being 5-6. And I'm a guy that believes size doesn't have anything to do with it; it's your heart and courage. He was 5-6 but he played like 6-5 when you see how he plays and the tremendous heart he plays with.
I'm happy he has an opportunity to prove to a lot of people that he could be successful at this level. And I'm thankful that we were smart enough to recruit him and get him to the University of Oregon.

Q. Question on the dome here, the Ducks haven't played in a dome and the Rebels haven't. From what I understand, the perception may be different in a dome as opposed to a regular college atmosphere stadium?
COACH KENT: It may be and people talk about that a lot. And I'm from the old school where you played outside all the time. I know these guys are used to playing in gyms, they don't play as much basketball on concrete courts anymore. But they've played in a lot of environments throughout the summer and things like that.
When the game starts -- I honestly believe this. When the people are in a dome and the game starts, you really don't focus on the noise, what's going on in the stands and how big; it's a hardwood floor, there's two hoops there and two teams there that are battling it out.
Now, whether or not it's going to be a problem, I don't know that yet. I think guys that are shooters are shooters and whether it's a dome or high school gym, you're going to be able to play in it.
So I don't really see that being a huge problem. But yet maybe I'll think differently as the game gets started and our shots are going up. But I don't think that's going to be the case with this team.

Q. You said going back to February that a lot of your success in this tournament would depend on what matchups you got. Now you're a win away from the Elite 8. With the matchup that seems to be a comfortable matchup for you guys just in terms of style and size. Not saying how they'll play, but just in that regard. Just your thoughts about that?
COACH KENT: Well, you know, we were prepared for any type of matchup, particularly when our name went up on that board and realizing that we beat a very, very good Georgetown team, biggest team in the country on their home floor early on. We did things defensively that allowed us to play with them and rebound on them and defend them. In terms of the matchup in this tournament and everything, I thought it was important that we had favorable matchups where we didn't get dominated on the front line and things like that.
And I feel like we match up well with this team. And I'm sure they feel like they match up well with us also.
So for us it's going to come down to the defensive end of the floor. And that's regardless of who we're matching up against because this team has had tremendous success. Particularly in the last eight ball games when we've been able to defend people.
And we've been pretty good at the defensive end of the floor.

Q. Someone from the athletic -- academic department is going to administer exams today for several of your players?
COACH KENT: The majority of these players have finished their finals. They've been in finals all week. We took Monday and Tuesday off for our finals. We traveled yesterday. We had study sessions. I think some of these guys had them last night even. But someone that's traveling with us from the university will be administering final examinations today for three, maybe four guys today. One tomorrow. And then if we're still here, hopefully we will be, a couple on Saturday as well.

Q. Do you know who those players are off the top of your head?
COACH KENT: Malik Hairston, Maarty Leunen, Chamberlain Oguchi, Churchill Odia and Ray Schafer.

Q. Who is the testing tomorrow?
COACH KENT: Tomorrow is Chamberlain Oguchi. He wants to take his test tomorrow. If he wants to do that we'll let him do that. Otherwise he's able to do it tomorrow or Saturday. I'll let him make that decision.

Q. At the end you referenced Malik being a big time recruit. I'm sure he thought he would get to an NCAA tournament before his junior year when he was coming out of high school. Have you seen him hit a patch where he was not depressed but disappointed about his progress or anything like that, or can you just talk about the mind set he's had and what it means to him now to be in the tournament?
COACH KENT: Malik is a great, great player, and unfortunately he's had some problems with his body. If there's any frustration I've seen in him it's just with his body. Now his body is starting to come back to him. He's one of the reasons, I think, that down the stretch here we've been so good because we've got a key, key cog to our offense. We've got a key player, a guy that can rebound, shoot, pass the ball perfect for our system and he's getting healthy coming down the stretch and it's allowed us to play a lot better brand of basketball when his body has gotten healthy because his game is so good.
So I think if there's frustration it's because we all know he's a great basketball player that's been hampered a little bit not able to play at the level that he's capable of playing at.
And fortunate thing for us is the healthier he gets the better he plays. He's starting to get a little healthier coming down the stretch here and it's made a real big difference in our basketball team.
MODERATOR: Thank you so much.

End of FastScripts

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