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BIG EAST CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENT

March 11, 2009

Tory Jackson

NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK

West Virginia 74
Notre Dame 62

JOHN PAQUETTE: Coach Mike Brey.
COACH MIKE BREY: Well, I mean first of all, they really shot it well. You know, you're worried a little bit. They go 3 for 11 in the Louisville game. Bryant really hurt us out there early. We didn't expect him shooting jump shots like that really got them started.
But at the end of the day the offensive board just killed us and it hurt us in Morgantown. We couldn't keep them off the offensive board. They only shoot 30 some percent and you score 74 points, but the backboard has been an issue with us at different times.
It's been an issue with us and with them both times and, you know, I thought they were in a great rhythm. They defended us well, too. You don't beat -- to beat West Virginia you're going to have to score in the 70s and 80s to beat them.
In the first half it was hard, hard to get entries with their -- their length bothers you on the backboard and it bothers you in passing lanes.
JOHN PAQUETTE: We've been joined by Tory Jackson and Luke Harangody.

Q. Mike, the start, how tough is that when you're dropped in such a big hole so early?
COACH MIKE BREY: It's tough to dig out. I'm very proud of our group. We made it, I told them at halftime you're not throwing -- fellas, we're going to make it interesting. The climate is going to change a little bit and the crowd will get in it.
We'll have some offensive success. We did but every time. I think we got it to single digits and you wanted to get over the next hump, usually an offensive rebound cost you but when you're digging out of a hole like that, it's exhausting and it's very, very hard with a real good team like West Virginia.

Q. Mike, it seems like you were stuck in zone for awhile. Did you think about pulling out earlier?
COACH MIKE BREY: I mean sometimes you try and ride out some of those 3-point shots early. We got out of it -- we got out of it pretty quick if my memory serves me right, but in all honesty, they were in a better rhythm shooting 3s when we were in man the first couple possessions. They continued to knock them down even when we went in man. (Alex) Ruoff got into the act. (Darryl) Bryant was a guy who we wanted to play off of a little bit and maybe be able to help and he made us pay. I give him credit. He made big shots to start them.

Q. Tory, can you talk a little bit about the difficulties you guys had offensively in the first half?
TORY JACKSON: They did a good job of getting up under us early. They came in -- their offense, it was clicking and they kind of just fed off of that on the defensive end. They took us out of our offensive zone but we did a great job in the second half. It's just sticking it out and fighting and making a run.

Q. Luke, you had a big second half as opposed to your first half where you seemed kind of quiet. What was the biggest difference for you?
LUKE HARANGODY: I think the second half hit a couple shots, got a little bit of rhythm, established myself better in the post than I did in the first half.

Q. Coach, what does -- the people the past couple years say nobody wins it after playing five days. What does it mean now that a team has to work even harder to try to maybe get to that championship game with five days?
COACH MIKE BREY: Well, yeah. I mean we're fatigued playing two nights in a row and then especially having to play like we did in the second half digging out of a hole. It's hard for me to imagine playing five nights, quite frankly physically, you know, cranking it back up.
It just seems really, really difficulty. We never talked about trying to play five nights. We talked about trying to get on a little run and making it interesting and we were fortunate enough to win the first one last night, but it's draining when you have to turnaround.
I think when you play three in a row -- we played three in a row in Maui. Most of the other exempt tournaments have a day off. We played three in a row in Maui. By the time we got to the Carolina game because our Texas game was so physical -- he kind of had pneumonia and we were dying. So, I know what three in a row does, so, five, that's tough.

Q. The two players and then Mike. So much was expected out of you guys. You guys expected so much out of yourselves. Is there a sense looking back on it all that disappointment, frustration?
TORY JACKSON: I'm not disappointed at all. We still get a chance to play so the season didn't go our way maybe but things happen. This is college basketball. I'm not disappointed at all. I love all of my teammates and the coaches so just to have the opportunity to continue to play is good for me.

Q. Luke?
LUKE HARANGODY: The same thing Tory said. This season maybe didn't go as we expected it at the beginning. We never gave up. We went on a 7-game losing streak at one point. We could have just laid down. We kept fighting and as Tory said, we stayed together as a group because we're such a tight-knit team. I'm not disappointed at all. I love my teammates.
COACH MIKE BREY: I think it's disappointing we won't play in the NCAA Tournament. That's what we expected. I don't know with all the -- some of the preseason stuff had some real interesting predictions for us. I don't know quite frankly if I believed in all of those and you've seen us play in the best Big East and, you know, where we're at. I really thought we were a 9-and-9 team in the regular season before the season started.
I told my staff if we can pull off 9-and-9 giving who we were going to repeat and who we were going to have to play, playing the A schedule, we got 8-and-10 and could never quite get the next quality win. We get to the edge of it and would never really get it.
We'll be honored to play in post-season. We'll get a chance to do that. I talked to them about 97 teams out of 340 get to play in the post-season and, you know, we'll find out Sunday hopefully that we'll be playing somewhere and, you know, we'll be honored to do it. But, yeah, the other thing, we got kids here now that have played in two NCAA tournaments. I don't want them taking that for granted. We're on the longest post-season run with our program than we've ever had with ten in a row. Certainly you like them to be all NCAAs but we're kind of 5-and-5.
This is where we're at. We talked about getting rest and then finding out the next challenge and this group get to go play some more basketball and maybe getting back to New York City in the Garden.
JOHN PAQUETTE: Any other questions for Notre Dame? Thank you.
COACH MIKE BREY: Thanks.

End of FastScripts

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