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SOUTHEASTERN CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENTMarch 14, 2009Wayne ChismBruce PearlTyler SmithTAMPA, FLORIDA Tennessee – 94 CLAUDE FELTON: We'll continue with Tennessee. Opening comments from Coach Pearl. COACH PEARL: It was a terrific basketball game. Very high scoring. I thought the players made the great plays. You had to enjoy the performances of some of the individuals. You know, obviously Wayne Chism with a career high. Just offensively played with great fluidity. You know, Tyler Smith just being the difference maker in his match-up. Made so many tough shots. He's obviously our glue. I thought we got very good point-guard play from Bobby Maze tonight with five assists and one turnover. You know, defensively we struggled with the ball screen. And we know we're going to see an awful lot of ball screens tomorrow from Mississippi State. So we're going to have to work to improve that. We are very focused on the opportunity to prove who the best team is in the SEC. We don't know that yet. But tomorrow we'll have an opportunity with the victory if we can win, to be the best team in the league. But it would take victory tomorrow for us to be able to say that. Q. This is a team now the way you're playing that everybody expects to see at the start of the year. What happened in the past four, five weeks? You're playing loose, having fun. Flying up and down the court. Points are coming early. What's going on? WAYNE CHISM: We're coming together as a team, and that's the biggest thing we need to be focusing on. We're always staying together now and playing with passion out there. TYLER SMITH: The same things you said. We're having fun, we're getting up and down the court. I mean, we're just together as a team now. Everybody's together. It's not like one guy will go out. I mean, it's all together. It's a team, and that's what we've been looking for all year. Q. When you left Auburn, you were pretty disappointed. You felt like they beat you to a lot of loose balls. How much did you guys talk about that before this game? Did Coach show you any film clips of that game? WAYNE CHISM: He didn't show us no film. But that's all he preached to us. We've got to man up out there and that's what we did tonight. We knew the refs were going to let us play. And everybody was telling everybody in the huddle. Let's man-up, rebound and defend. That's what we did, and we got most of the loose balls that we had gotten out there. Q. When you look at the other side of the bracket, Mississippi State comes out of there, what are your thoughts about that? Particularly, you guys and Varnardo? WAYNE CHISM: Well, looking at Varnardo, he had 7 blocks against LSU. Then they had another big man. But they were going at it in that game, and Mississippi State played up to their level and came out with a great win against a tough team. TYLER SMITH: I mean, Varnardo is just down in the paint he changes a lot of shots. Today he showed why he got the Defensive Player of the Year in the SEC. Q. What were you thinking when Wayne went on that three-point run? I hadn't seen that from him before? TYLER SMITH: You haven't seen it before? Q. In games. In games. TYLER SMITH: Wayne came out shooting like c /HRO* today. I mean, he was coming down the court just letting it go. And I said hey, he hit his first two, give Wayne the ball (laughing). Q. Tyler, just want to ask you about motivation. Like tomorrow you'll be playing a team that's kind of fighting for its NCAA life. How do you be as motivated as the team you're going up against? TYLER SMITH: They're fighting for the NCAA life, and we're fighting for a great seed. It goes both ways. We're just trying to play our basketball. We know we can do things that haven't been done in a long time in SEC history. That's what we're trying to do. Q. Just want to ask you, Coach talked yesterday about the history of the program and not playing them many Saturdays, and certainly not many Sundays. Does that motivate you to know how long it's been since you've been in a position to get an SEC title? WAYNE CHISM: It's been a while. Since I've been in the school. I've played in this tournament three times and came up short a lot. To finally play on a Sunday, that's very good. It shows that whoever Coach goes out to get, it doesn't matter who is their big top name or not. They're going to come in and play hard for Coach. That's what we came in to do this week. We came in hungry and continue to play basketball together. And that's how we're playing again on Sunday. Q. Last year was a painful exit with the Hill turnaround over the wrong shoulder. The other day you told me this is a new place. Does it feel like a new season for you? Can you reflect on last year's pain? Did you bring that with you as a motivator, and just your thoughts on,I guess, the other day you indicated it was kind of a new season for you? WAYNE CHISM: I said it was a new season. We're in Tampa. We ain't in Atlanta. We've been in Atlanta the past three years, two years since I've been here. And now we're in a new place. It's warm out here, and I'm feeling very comfortable. I want to stay instead of going back to the cold weather. But staying here and playing on Sunday is great. That's what I came to this school for is to win the championship, and I'm going to play for one tomorrow. CLAUDE FELTON: We'll continue with questions for Coach Pearl. Q. Jeff Lebo, this is actually a two-part question. First let me ask you, do you think Auburn is a team that deserves to get into the NCAA Tournament? And then, second, Jeff Lebo just said he's not even sure if this tournament, the SEC will receive its automatic qualifier because of all the negativity and the cloud of negativity that's been put on the conference just this entire season as far as being a quality conference, if you will. Can you talk about both, please? COACH PEARL: Well, I'll start off by having to answer the question whether or not we're a quality conference. It's a great basketball conference. We've got a two-time defending National Champion the last couple of years in Florida. We've got one of the most tradition-rich programs in the history of college basketball in Kentucky. And what makes this conference so good is neither one of those teams are in the Final Four here in Tampa. That speaks to the commitment that the SEC has placed on men's basketball. I do think Auburn is going to receive very strong consideration for an NCAA Tournament bid. They've got 22 wins. They were 10-6 in conference play. They won 9 out of the last 10 games heading into this one. And there are only two losses in the last 12 games are at LSU and this one here to Tennessee. Some of their early season work -- they've had some injuries. And the NCAA Tournament does pay attention to that. The committee pays attention to that. They lost some games early on with some missed free throws and some injuries. But since they've gotten healthy, they've been right there as one of the top three teams, in my mind, in the SEC. And so, I do hope they get very strong consideration, and I hope our league is able to get four or five teams to the dance. Q. What are the biggest challenges Mississippi State presents to you tomorrow? COACH PEARL: Couple challenges. Obviously, a tremendous, tremendously well-coached basketball team. Rick Stansbury does as good a job as anybody in this league. They shoot the three ball. They'll put four guys on the floor that can really shoot the ball. We struggled in ball screen defense today, and they'll spread us and ball screen us. Smaller-bodied guys recover quickly. Mississippi State, I don't think had but one guy, Brian Johnson, and maybe a couple that are over 200 pounds. The guys that play a lot of minutes are athletic. They're long and they're lean. And they'll bounce back. So they have that advantage, I think. And then finally, they've got the best defensive player in the country in Jarvis Varnardo. It's going to be interesting to see tomorrow. He had 7 blocks today. You know, we'll do what we have to do to mix our stuff inside and out. But he presents a tremendous defensive challenge the way he defends the paint. Q. Do you think the way your team played in these two games back-to-back is even better than the way it played in South Carolina and Florida when you won those back-to-back? COACH PEARL: I think the quality of our play was just as good. I think the fact that we did it in the hostile environment of Florida and South Carolina where the SEC is completely on the line. Our backs were completely against the wall. Three, four weeks ago when you looked at Kentucky, Florida, South Carolina, Tennessee. We were the only team that had to go on the road and play those three teams. We came out of there 2-1 on the road. So the significance of getting on the road and playing was important. But I do think in 4 out of our last 5 games we've played the best basketball that we've played all year. Q. You started your run here down the stretch when you beat Mississippi State in Knoxville. Since then you've been great. What happened to get your up-tempo Mojo back? The stuff you had last year, you had different players, but you're finally backing up tempo, and the guys are cheering and having fun and shooting the ball. COACH PEARL: I think if you look at the field-goal percentage defense in those last five games and our ability to rebound the basketball, we had 31 defensive rebounds. Auburn had nine offensive rebounds. So there were 40 opportunities and we got 31 of them. That gives you a chance to rebound and run. So our defense has improved. Our rebounding has improved. Therefore, we've gotten more opportunities to get out in transition. I think four assists at Kentucky, and the fact that we're celebrating 100 years of Tennessee basketball, and that was not a proud moment. We were embarrassed at how we played. And I think since that time the team continues to say we're playing together as a team. Offensively, defensively, and understanding that's what it takes in order for us to be successful. Q. Can you just discuss your team's resiliency in that second half? Putting two good halves hasn't been something that you've been guaranteed to do. But two nights in a row you've done that. Tonight Auburn cut it to six a few times and you've always had an answer. Can you just talk about that? COACH PEARL: I think you go along the lines with the idea that there are too many weapons. You know, I thought Cameron Tatum got some really good minutes there in the second coming off the bench. Between he and Scotty Hopson we had 21 points from our two-guard position. So when we go to our bench and we don't drop off that well. I thought Emmanuel Negedu played a little bit better tonight. Reynaldo Wooldridge had a big rebounding and a couple of big possessions. I think those guys coming off the bench kind of buy your best players a little bit of time so you can hang in there. J.P. Prince hurt his shoulder again, and wasn't, you know, wasn't as effective. Yet we were able to withstand that. And Tyler's such a warrior. He's such a competitor. He played a lot of minutes last night. He played a lot of minutes tonight. And Tyler plays so hard that he really hadn't carried the ball. He played 19 minutes in the first half when both Wayne and J.P. had two fouls. So, I just think in answer to your question, I think the depth. Q. Before this tournament started, you speculated on the NCAA seeding. What do you think is on the line tomorrow in terms of what kind of seed you can get for the championship? COACH PEARL: I think if we won the SEC Championship we'd be in the -- you know, I'm not a bracket on the. I did not go to med school. So I have no real degree on the subject. But I'd say if we're winning the SEC Tournament puts us in the 5, 4 range. I think the SEC Tournament champion and the No. 2 strength of schedule, and our RPI being something in the low 20's, maybe even now in the teens. Give us a shot at that. But we've got work to do to get there. That's all speculation. End of FastScripts |
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