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MOUNTAIN WEST CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENT

March 12, 2009

THE MODERATOR: The student-athletes for TCU are Ronnie Moss and Zvonko Buljan. Coach, we can start with you with some brief remarks about the game.
COACH CHRISTIAN: I thought it was March basketball. You know, it was two teams playing a possession-by-possession game. You know, I take my hat off to Utah. They're a very resilient, tough-minded, excellent basketball team. And I think, you know, they're gonna make a lot of noise not only in this tournament, but when they get their chance in the NCAA tournament. I think they're that type of team. They score in so many different ways. They obviously have a great low-post player in Nevill. But they spread the floor with great shooters. A guy like Carlon Brown who is kind of a difference maker. I was proud of the effort of our kids. I thought we came in -- I knew we would play hard and I knew we really were going to do everything we could do to win. I couldn't be more proud of their effort tonight.
THE MODERATOR: Questions for the student-athletes first.

Q. Ronnie, when you think about the future, you have one year under your belt now in college basketball, when you think of the future of TCU, what are you thinking right now?
RONNIE MOSS: Well, right now I just think that we have a great future ahead of us, especially with Coach Christian coming in. He's a great coach. Since I've been here, he's came in and taught me a lot and I've learned a lot. I'm just willing and ready to keep learning from him.

Q. Ronnie, can you talk about the last shot you had there. Looked like you had a great look there. Did you think it was going in?
RONNIE MOSS: Yeah, I thought it was going in. I might have kind of flicked it with my hand a little bit. It probably threw it off. I mean, it was a great look; it just didn't fall. I mean, I would have been pleased if it would have went in, but it just didn't fall for me tonight. So, I mean, it's okay, though. We be back.

Q. Late in the game you could see the emotion coming out in your face, the way you were playing. Was there a point where you thought you were going to win this ballgame? You looked like you were trying to will this team to victory.
ZVONKO BULJAN: Well, I trust all game, right before we start, we gonna win this game, because we really get ready for this game. I mean, they good team. We also good team. I think we got some, you know, better skills than they do.
I was positive we was gonna win this game. Just through the stretch, it was tough, what happen, happen.
THE MODERATOR: At this time we'll dismiss our student-athletes. Thank you, men. We'll open it up to questions for Coach.

Q. It seemed like most of the things you would have wanted to go in your favor did. You had Nevill in early foul trouble. He wasn't a factor at all in the first half. Seemed like your team controlled the tempo. How frustrating is that?
COACH CHRISTIAN: I'm frustrated for our team because I think they did everything they could to execute the plan that we put forth today. Especially on Luke Nevill, I think he had two field goal attempts. That's a testament to how hard those guys played and followed the game plan.
I'm frustrated more for our seniors, Kevin Langford and John Ortiz, because I wanted to continue to coach those guys. I have so much respect for the way they've handled this year, you know, with a new coach coming in, totally changing the philosophies of some of the things that we do. They never once wavered in their conviction to do the things the way we asked them to do. I'm disappointed for them.
Like I said, I'm proud of our effort. I think there's so many little things that we can take out of this game. Anytime you play a close game, you're going to take little things away that we need to improve upon - them and me.

Q. You mentioned Kevin Langford. A tough night for him. Foul trouble. Never seemed to get in sync offensively, did he?
COACH CHRISTIAN: Yeah, it was a big problem for us because a lot of our game plan, this time of the year you want to go through your seniors. I think they deserve it. Especially a guy like Kevin Langford, he's an all-conference player. Couldn't get into a good rhythm for him offensively. I felt bad for him because he was trying so hard. He did pick up some early fouls and late fouls that I think hurt us. We had kind of funny lineups on the floor, especially at critical times in the game. That's hard to do. Because you only have so many timeouts so you're asking guys to do jobs they haven't done all year. To their credit, I thought they did as good a job as they could do.

Q. Three-point shooting was one of the things that really hurt you all year. Do you think that was one of the deciding factors in tonight's game?
COACH CHRISTIAN: I think, without question, to beat a great team like Utah, you've got to score the ball. And I thought we had pretty good looks again. We just didn't knock 'em in. That's obviously something we need to address on twofolds. We obviously have to get our guys better and more confident shooting three-point shots. Then when our scholarships, that's obviously a priority for our program, to get some guys who we feel pretty comfortable shooting the ball.
Again, we did hit a couple big ones, and that's what you want. I thought Ronnie Moss hit a really big one. Jason Ebie hit a really big one. We gave ourselves a lot of opportunities to win this basketball game. That's all as a coach you could ask for.
THE MODERATOR: Thank you, coach.
COACH CHRISTIAN: Thank you.

End of FastScripts

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MOUNTAIN WEST CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENT

March 12, 2009

Zvonko Buljan

Jim Christian

Ronnie Moss