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NCAA MEN'S 1ST & 2ND ROUNDS REGIONALS: ANAHEIMMarch 22, 2008Joseph JonesDominique KirkDonald SloanMark TurgeonANAHEIM, CALIFORNIA THE MODERATOR: We'll, start off with a statement from Coach Turgeon, then open up the floor to questions for the student-athletes. Coach, whenever you're ready. COACH TURGEON: I'm proud of my group; really disappointed in the outcome. You never want it to end, especially the way we're starting to play. We just keep getting better every time we step on the floor. We controlled the whole game. I feel like we were in control of the whole game. And, you know, we did a good job against their defense, their pressure, and it just came down to Love and Collison at the end just making plays. I mean, Love made two unbelievable shots and we couldn't guard the ball screen late, and Collison made two big-time shots, and that was the difference in the game. Wouldn't change a thing. Just proud of our group. I feel awful for my seniors who have done so much for this program, so much. And I just hate to see it end, because I think we were just really coming on. Q. Talk about the final play and kind of what you saw and just your emotions in general? DONALD SLOAN: We had a designed play set up to get our shooters open, and it wasn't that drive, so I drove, and went up to shoot a layup, I guess, and it was brought back down either by my force or somebody else's. Leave it up to other people to see, but it didn't go our way. Q. Can you talk about the second half and kind of what happened. In the first half you guys decidedly had the difference in the paint. I mean, what was different in the second half with Love coming up with all of those blocked shots and things like that? JOSEPH JONES: He just made some great plays. He hit two key shots for them that they really needed, and that's the only difference it was. After I played tough defense, he just hit two big shots for them. Q. Dominique, can you talk about how far this program has come from when you got here to the point you are at now? DOMINIQUE KIRK: It's been just amazing. How this program grew from, you know, four years ago. You know, we came in, you know, we worked hard to get to this point. And, you know, it's pretty sad how it ended. I think we really had a good chance to win tonight. I mean, a real good chance. I think we played great. They made plays, and we couldn't really get shots. I mean, it just was just amazing how this program grew. I mean, just amazing. Q. Dominique, while it never appeared that you guys lost your cool, only three field goals in the last ten minutes. Did they just crank up their defense, or did things just not work as well? DOMINIQUE KIRK: Well, you know, UCLA is pretty well known for their defense. I mean, they had good defense out there, but also we did miss a lot of, you know, good look shots. You know, I know there was a couple of them that I missed, and I was wide open, and I should have made, and I didn't convert. You know, it just -- it's pretty frustrating, but you know we played on the defensive end -- I think we played great on the defensive end. It was just a great defensive battle. Q. The same question that Dominique got asked a little bit ago about just your general thoughts about where this program is now compared to where you came in. JOSEPH JONES: Words can't even describe it. This program has came a long way. It went from not really known on the national basketball level, at the national basketball scene, but now we are up there with the best. The program is upward bound. We keep getting better and better each and every year. There's no telling where the program might end up. Right now it's looking great for us, and it's going to keep getting better for us. THE MODERATOR: Any further questions? All right thank you, gentlemen. Open up to questions for the Coach. Q. Y'all had them 26-6 in the paint in the first half, and then it wasn't like that in the second half. Was it adjustments they made or can you talk about what the difference was? COACH TURGEON: Well, they blocked about every shot we had in the paint, it seemed like, and we turned it over against their double-team. The first half we made plays against their double-team, and the start of the second half we made plays against them, got them out of doubling the post. And, you know, I thought we were in total control. I thought we were always one step ahead, whether it was the ball screen action or doubling the post. But, no, we just didn't make the plays in the second half. We had the ball right there. We had a number of times we had it right there. And, you know, they obviously blocked a lot of shots in there. So, you know, our guys aren't use to getting chinned, getting the shot blocked like that. I don't know if it was blocked, but we kept going in there and, you know, then I -- we went with our ball screen series because we started to turn it over on the post, so I was getting frustrated when we'd turn it over. If we just wouldn't have turned the ball over, we would have kept the lead; I think our turnovers got them back in the game. But, no, you got to give them a lot of credit. I think Love just -- I think he turned it up. I mean, he got every rebound, blocked every shot, and made -- the kid just turned it up. Q. Can you take us through that final time-out. Was there ever a shot to set up a three for Dominique or Josh? COACH TURGEON: Yeah, that's what we were doing. Sloan went crazy on the play, but we had a three set up for Dominique and using Josh as a decoy. And I was watching that action, and all of a sudden I saw this blur coming by, and I saw -- you know, saw him get bumped. And, you know, I don't know, you'll be able to see it. They'll show it a thousand times on TV. Yeah, I was going for a three. I was going to run out of here with a one-point win. That's what I was looking for, whether it would have worked, because Sloan went so fast, I don't know, but something we've practiced a lot, something that's worked for us, and I got a lot of confidence in. I thought it would be hard to get a three for Josh. We had two sides of the play, but I thought we could sneak one out for Dominique. I was kind of watching that action, and Sloan just went a little too quick, but he was feeling good about himself and thought he could get to the basket, and that's what he was trying to do. Q. Coach, can you just talk about assessing this season and where you go from here for next year and just kind of wrap it up that way? COACH TURGEON: Well, it took a long time, but I finally had them playing the way my teams play. We're not playing as fast as I'd like to play, eventually, but I thought our execution was at a much better level. Our defense was at the level it needed to be at, finally got them rebounding. We didn't shoot free throws all year the way my teams will in the future, but I thought we were going to win the national championship. I thought we were going to win today. We're getting better. We played the number one seed on their home floor last week; had last possession. We played another number one seed on not their home floor but -- and, you know, I thought we were going to win tonight and win the next one and win the next one. I really believe that we're just getting better every time. So I'm proud of the way we're coming along. I think, you know, was it a great year? It was close to being a great year. We lost a few games probably shouldn't have lost on our home floor, and it would have been a fantastic year. But we did some really nice things with a new coach, and losing the players that we lost last year, and kind of bringing the young kids along. So as far as next year goes, I can't even -- I'll just try to survive this one. Hopefully we can continue to improve. It won't be easy. We're losing three warriors. You know, Beau and Dominique and Joe; that meant a lot to us. But our young kids got to grow up. If you want to assess next year, they got to grow up. They grew up tonight. D-Ro was fantastic, played with great maturity. Davis was pretty good but our young kids got to grow up to keep this thing rolling. Q. Coach, can you talk about the turnovers a little bit more. Seemed like that was when the -- they got energy from them, and the crowd got into it because of that energy. COACH TURGEON: Yeah. We only had 11 turnovers, which is pretty good defense against them. Five at half-time and six in the second half, but our post had too many of them. DeAndre had 4 in 15 minutes. Bryan Davis had 2 and Joe had 2. They had 8 of our 11, our posts. We had one day to prepare; we knew it was coming, the double-team, and just didn't make the plays out of it. And knew they were going to be strong. We had to be strong with the ball, but we had opportunities to make plays against the double. We made a few plays against it. We actually got them out of the double-team in the second half. We hit a three and got another guy, we got D-Ro for a layup, but that was the whole -- we just couldn't handle their double-team the way we needed to handle it. And we just made bad decisions. We had a guy lifted, and all we had to do was throw the ball back out to him. We just didn't make the right decisions at times. But you got to give their defense -- I mean, they're big-time defensive team, and you got to give their defense a lot of credit. Q. You talked about Roland as well. It seemed like when you came back in the first half, Derrick came in and took Collison out of the game for a little while. I mean, he wasn't out for very long, but Derrick did the good job on the defensive side there? COACH TURGEON: Yeah, he did, and I was really proud of him tonight. Thought he made a lot of really good decisions offensively and played with poise, made a couple of big buckets for us, and he did a nice job on Collison. Collison's really good. And those two plays -- but we were using that group at the last line-up and thought about subbing and putting some defensively different guys in, but we went with those guys. But D-Ro was great tonight. He's got to be more consistent with for us in the future for us to maintain this thing and keep it going in the right direction. THE MODERATOR: Any further questions? Thank you, Coach. End of FastScripts |
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