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NCAA MEN'S 1ST & 2ND ROUNDS REGIONALS: DENVERMarch 20, 2008Dionte ChristmasFran DunphyMark TyndaleDENVER, COLORADO THE MODERATOR: Start with some thoughts on the game, coach. COACH DUNPHY: I thought Michigan State's defense was terrific. We couldn't really run a lot of our sets. At some point we just let Mark make plays. I think that's a tribute to how they play the game, how difficult they are to score against. I thought we did a pretty good job in the first half of getting the ball inside to both Sergio and Lavoy. When we had our chances a couple times in transition, a couple times in a halfcourt set, we didn't necessarily come through in the first half. That hurt us. But, again, I think that that's a real good defensive basketball team. I heard a couple of comments of somebody asking how Drew Neitzel felt he didn't have a great shooting night. But just in the first half, we had helped so much on Neitzel, there were a couple of slips for easy baskets that he probably didn't get credit for those assists. But that's how important I think he is to their basketball team. While he only scored five points, I think he changed offensive possessions a number of times to help them score. And they got very good efforts from their big guys. Their front court, obviously Morgan played great. Suton made a big jumper in the second half. Naymick had a couple of follows that really hurt us. I thought that was a big key to the game. Chris Allen made big shots. The kid Summers hurt us, too. I thought it was a really good team effort by Michigan State. We didn't play our best. We had to play our best in order to win the game. THE MODERATOR: We'll take questions for the student-athletes for the next few minutes. Q. Did the altitude affect you at all? Did you prepare for it in any way? MARK TYNDALE: Not at all. I don't think it affected us at all. The first night we got out here, we practiced in Denver. It was pretty good. We was a little fatigued at first, but we overcame it. I don't think that affected us at all. DIONTE CHRISTMAS: It didn't affect me personally at all. I don't think it affected my teammates. Like you said, we came out the first night, it was rough the first night, but then we got used to it. We practiced numerous times. You know, it was okay. Q. Even though it hurts today, could you reflect a little bit upon what the last month or so has been and what you've done for this program to take this step this year. MARK TYNDALE: I think it was great for the program. I think Coach Dunphy did a great job of getting us back to this point where we deserved to be. I think we worked very hard in the summertime leading up to this. We wasn't surprised at all about the outcome of our season. We would have liked to play a little bit longer, but unfortunately our season ends right here. Michigan State did a great job. I really appreciate my teammates and the coaching staff. They've really grown me and made me become a better man and a better human being and I really appreciate that. DIONTE CHRISTMAS: The last couple months have been special, not only to me, but I'm sure to my teammates as well. The job that Coach Dunphy and the coaching staff did was great. I think it's very great for the program, you know, for us. I think we came a long way from the beginning of the season till now. It ended tonight. But, like I said, man, we just came a long way. I'm just proud to be a part of this right here, just be a part of this program. Can't ask for nothing else better than this, man. Q. Dionte, when you have a shooting game like you had today, what can you do? Was it the Michigan State defense or did you just have an off day? DIONTE CHRISTMAS: I think Michigan State did a good job of just playing me tonight. They took away the three, taking away the drive. Like coach said, we couldn't get into no sets. We had to depend on Mark coming down, making a lot plays for us. Tom Izzo, the job he do with that program, is great. That's a great defensive team. That's probably the toughest defensive team I played all year, all my career. That's a tough defensive team. But, you know, I just tried to do other things, set screens to get my teammates open. But, you know, that started to work in the second half. Those guys did a real good job on me personally, you know, as a team. Q. Were they doing anything unique on defense or just playing very well? Was there scheme different or they just did it very well? DIONTE CHRISTMAS: No, just regular. But it was just, you know, good help defense. Those guys helped each other a lot. They was very physical. That was one of the most physical teams I played against before ever. Yeah, I don't think they did nothing special. I heard Coach Izzo, he don't do nothing special, he just tell them guys to play straight up man and just be physical. That's what those guys did tonight. Q. Mark, can you talk about the size that they have down low and dealing especially with Raymar, how imposing he is physically? MARK TYNDALE: He's a very strong player. I think he's very talented. He's a lot better in person than he is on film. He's pretty good. I like that kid a lot. He work hard. He was complimenting me and Dionte after the game. I just think he's a good person. Sky's the limit for him. He's going to have a great future ahead of him. Q. Could you elaborate a little more about Raymar, what kind of player he is, trying to guard him. MARK TYNDALE: He's a tough player. Great size. Very physical. Can shoot the ball from the outside, drive it also, make good decisions with the ball. He's a pretty good player. Q. Can you reflect again on what your first NCAA appearance was like and how it all went down? DIONTE CHRISTMAS: It was great, man. Couldn't ask for nothing better than this, you know. They treat you like royalty, you know, making the tournament. We came out here to do a job, man. Tonight we didn't get it done. I definitely, definitely want to get back here next year again. I don't want to be sitting in this position; I want to be advancing to the next round. This ride has been one of the best rides ever, man, with Mark Tyndale, Coach Dunphy, Chris Clark, my seniors. I couldn't ask for nothing else. This year, like I said, was a special year for us. I think we did a good job of just coming together mid-season and doing what we did. Like I said, man, it was special. Couldn't ask for nothing else. THE MODERATOR: Gentlemen, we'll let you guys go. Thank you. We'll take questions for Coach Dunphy. Q. Could you talk about the step that this program made this year and what these kids did to get you back in the tournament? COACH DUNPHY: The latter part of the season was absolutely terrific. I was very, very proud of everybody on the team. I thought we came together as a group. I thought we had terrific chemistry. I thought everybody knew their role. It got even better knowing your role toward the end of the year. I think that's what made us a pretty good basketball team toward the latter part. For us to win three games in the Atlantic-10 tournament, represent the Atlantic-10 as a champion, was a terrific accomplishment by these guys. Q. When the guys were leaving the floor after the game, you didn't see the tears, guys having to be pulled up off the floor. Do you think there's a specific reason for that? Is it that they maybe think they were lucky just to get there with how the season started off? COACH DUNPHY: No, I don't think that at all. I just think the lead that Michigan State had late gave us a pretty good indication that we weren't going to be able to combat that. But I think when you get into the locker room, and once they sit down and think about it, reflect a little bit, then they may think a little bit more emotionally about it. But I don't think that's the particular way these guys are. The guy I felt most sorry for, in all honesty, was Chris Clark, because he's meant so much to our program and he didn't get a chance to play later in the game. I would have loved to have gotten him in the game. For me, that was the most difficult hug to make 'cause he's such a tremendous kid, tremendous guy. He's done great things for our program and will continue as an alum of this program. Q. On their perimeter defense, Naymick and Suton would flash out for an instant. Is that something you anticipated? How much did that affect what was going on beyond the arc for you guys? COACH DUNPHY: It was not a surprise to us. They've done a great job of we call it blasting those high screens. We had to react very quickly to that. We needed players on each side. We needed to get the middle covered, as well. Then the next pass would have been open. They did a good job of taking that next pass away. I don't think we're a great passing team. That's certainly something we'll try to get better at. But there were opportunities to post feed out of that, because of the blast, and we didn't take advantage of it. But, again, I think it's a terrific, terrific man-to-man defensive basketball team. I thought they switched out on Dionte great. He was always contested. With the exception of maybe the last one in the game, I thought most of his shots were absolutely contested. Q. Did you feel because of that defensive job you just mentioned, maybe Mark or Dionte got a little frustrated at times? COACH DUNPHY: I would absolutely suggest that they did. There were a couple of plays in the first half that we had Lavoy running the floor in transition. We threw the ball away once. There was another play that I thought Mark made a great penetration. All you got to do is lay it on the ground, Lavoy would have gotten it and laid it in. I think those two plays might get Mark a little bit more frustrated. Dionte was being guarded like he's never been guarded before. He didn't get any good looks. Certainly he's going to get frustrated. But, again, I give all that credit to Michigan State. They did a terrific job. And sometimes you're gonna get frustrated. You have to fight through that. That's a great life lesson for both of those guys. And they're not the only ones who were frustrated. We were all frustrated because of that terrific defense that they were playing. Q. You mentioned the locker room. Obviously you've been there before, having to console kids after that. Talk about today's circumstances. COACH DUNPHY: I don't think there was much consoling. We had a terrific basketball season. We're gonna celebrate that. We were disappointed today. We didn't play our best basketball game. Again, the most difficult person that I have to face at this point is Chris because of what he's meant to our program. There wasn't a lot of tears of sadness shown in there. I hope that that means they're ready to continue to play basketball right away and work on their game. Our season's over, but getting better is never over. That's what we hope that we are going to accomplish in the coming weeks before we send them home for the summer. Hopefully we'll get together again in the fall and be ready to go to try to see if we can't get back to the NCAA tournament, which will not be an easy task. It's going to be a lot of hard work. Q. What did Michigan State do to defend Christmas? Did they do anything that surprised you defensively? COACH DUNPHY: You know, I'll watch the film and see what the that they did. To me there was a lot of hedging on those screens that if he was coming off one, they got good help. I think they just work really hard at the defensive end of the floor. They're really good at keeping you in front of them. There wasn't a lot of drive and kick opportunities for us today. Certainly in the first half there weren't many. When we did get an open look, we didn't necessarily knock it down, with the exception of Ryan Brooks, he thought he played terrifically today. But Dionte, he was guarded. He was certainly a focal point of their defense. Those are going to happen sometimes. You got to figure out other ways to score it. His only basket was off of a post-up. While it's not a staple of our offense, he certainly has that option. Some of those opportunities presented themselves, but we didn't take advantage of it. But I just think because he's such a good scorer, they're going to put their efforts in trying to stop him, much like we did the same thing with Neitzel. So really the effect of that has to be some of the other guys stepping up. With the exception of Ryan Brooks in the first half, we didn't do a good job of stepping up. Q. Your team didn't step up when your two big guys have an off night. Drew had appear off night, the rest of the Spartans stepped up. Did that surprise you at all? COACH DUNPHY: No because, again, I think when you are a very good player, like Drew Neitzel is, you create opportunities just from having that focal point of the defense be on you. And I thought they took advantage of that. I thought there were some really good plays by their big guys early. Raymar Morgan, that's a pretty nice stat line, seven for nine. He made a big three in that first half that hurt us greatly. But they all played well. I think they did their job better than we did our job. And the end result is what you see. THE MODERATOR: Thanks very much, coach. COACH DUNPHY: Thank you. End of FastScripts |
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