|
|||
|
|||
|
 |
|
|
NCAA MEN'S 1ST & 2ND ROUNDS REGIONALS: KANSAS CITYMarch 18, 2009Bobby BraswellKenny DanielsMark HillTremaine TownsendKANSAS CITY, MISSOURI KEVIN KLINTWORTH: On behalf of the NCAA and the Big 12 Conference, welcome to Kansas City. We are joined by Cal State Northridge. Two athletes, Tremaine Townsend, Mark Hill, and Kenny Daniels. We're ready for questions. Q. Hi guys. Tell us first, if three of you guys could talk about this is your first trip. The school's first trip back to the tournament in a while and your reaction when you heard your name and then your reaction when you found out your opponent. TREMAINE TOWNSEND: It was -- you know, this is a very exciting time for your school and to bring recognition to our program, and we're just all very excited to be here, and, you know, a chance to compete on the stage is just awesome opportunity. So we're all very excited and, you know, Selection Sunday when that came around, you know, that's a moment that everybody can enjoy, and we got to be there and enjoy that moment so it was all great. MARK HILL: Yes. I kind of feel the same way. You know, just a very exciting. I really can't just describe the words, really. Just amazing, you know, and then when we found out we was playing Memphis, we're just excited. They're a great team and we're a great team. So we'll just excited, really. KENNY DANIELS: Just like these guys said, it's exciting. Like a dream come true. I'm kind of close to home, so I get to play in front of my fans. That's also exciting for me and Selection Sunday, we have to do that with our team, with our family. It was a good experience for us. Q. Kenny, how did you make it from St. Louis to California? KENNY DANIELS: It's a long story. Q. Give us the short version. KENNY DANIELS: I played at Vashon, I guess, who is from Kansas City, know where Vashon is, what Vashon is about. I went to junior college in Wyoming, and I got a chance to meet Coach Danny Sprinkle, and he told me about Northridge. And I went on a visit and I liked it. I made a decision to go there. Q. How many folks you going to have in from St. Louis? KENNY DANIELS: We're going to be a lot of us in there. Q. Mom, dad? KENNY DANIELS: Mom, dad, cousins, just my family. Q. Brothers and sisters? KENNY DANIELS: Yes, sir. Q. How many? KENNY DANIELS: Four brothers and sisters. Q. Mark, in particular, Memphis is like you had said before, they're a very long and athletic squad. I think their shortest starter, he's 6-5. How are you guys going to manage the side disadvantage you have in some areas? MARK HILL: I feel that we're going to try to use our quickness. Guys are taller, but we're just going to try to use our quickness and going to go out there and play basketball. We're going to go out there and play fearless and going to play our best and see what happens. Q. Speaking about Memphis height and length, what is it that you work on? Have you matched up against anyone during the season that compares to that, and how have you worked on trying to attack what Memphis tries to do? TREMAINE TOWNSEND: Well, you know, throughout our season, at the beginning of our season, we played a lot of top schools -- played Stanford, UCLA, played New Mexico. He got some good experience against some top schools, and we just go out there and compete, and that's that we plan on doing against Memphis. Just them versus us, and that's how we look at it, and that's all we can do is just step on the floor and compete and see what happens. MARK HILL: I feel that we're not going to try to change our game plan. We're going to go out there and play Cal State Northridge basketball. We're going to play our game. Q. Speaking about that, just to give the fans an idea, what exactly is Cal State Northridge game? What is it that you guys like to do? MARK HILL: We like to get out and defend; we like to run. Our secondary game is probably like our -- we run 90 percent of the game. We're going to go out there. It's going to be exciting because Memphis like to run, we like to run, so we're two running teams, basically. That's Cal State Northridge basketball, pressure and run. Q. For all of you maybe starting with Kenny; how have you guys overcome the off court distractions that you've had this year? How have you turned it around and been able to focus on basketball? KENNY DANIELS: It just seems like, though, things made us come closer together. We know we needed everyone to come together to accomplish what we just accomplished. So I just feel like, although things that happened, made us become a better team. MARK HILL: Yeah. I feel that, you know, we're a family and a team. I feel like it made us closer. You know, we just depended on each other more and just didn't want to mess up because we knew we're messing up for the whole team. We just really treat it like a family, makes us ultimately closer. TREMAINE TOWNSEND: Just like they said, you know, we're a family and we just looked at it as another life problems. Just another up and down, and if you let it put you down and not move forward, then you just got beat by life. We wasn't going let that happen. You know, now we're here, so we accomplished what we needed to accomplish. Here we go with Coach Braswell. KEVIN KLINTWORTH: We're joined by Cal State Northridge coach, Bobby Braswell. We have opening statement and questions for Coach Braswell. COACH BOBBY BRASWELL: Well, obviously we're very, very excited to be here and have this opportunity to play in the national tournament. This team has been through quite a bit this season, and they've handled it very, very well. And as a coach, I couldn't be more pleased and satisfied with the group of young men that have just persevered and worked hard and, you know, we had a lot of tournaments make excuses for not being here, and these players haven't done that. I'm extremely excited and proud of my basketball team. KEVIN KLINTWORTH: Questions. Q. Hey, Coach. We asked the players to talk about the excitement they felt in hearing their name on Selection Sunday. With you as a coach and getting this team back to the tournament and then follow-up about seeing who you were going to play. COACH BOBBY BRASWELL: Yes. Well, I think we all probably had the same level of excitement. Even though I've been to the tournament in the past and have sat through going through the selection process, it was a very moving moment. It was a moving moment probably because, again, of the obstacles and the adversity that this group has had to deal with throughout this season, and that made it even more special. I've always challenged the group and suggested to them that there's nothing greater than sitting home on a Sunday afternoon at 3:00 and hear your name and see your name come across that television, and for a lot of these guys, it was their last opportunity to have that done. So I was extremely excited for them in that way, obviously. When we -- it really didn't matter who it was. You know, obviously we were just happy to see our name. When you see Memphis, obviously you think one of the absolute best teams in the United States, and so we've been to this -- down this road before. We played back in the tournament in 2001. We opened up with Kansas in the tournament, and obviously they were very good as a basketball team then. I explained to our players in the locker room, once you get through all of the fluff and the pomp and circumstances of the tournament, you walk out on the floor and all the dimensions are the same. We've played a pretty aggressive schedule this year, and our guys have played in some tough situations. Hopefully, we'll be able to respond tomorrow. KEVIN KLINTWORTH: Next question. Q. Coach, you must be awful proud of these kids for the way they've come through. Here they are in the tournament. I mean, whether they win tomorrow or not. COACH BOBBY BRASWELL: Yeah. Words -- I mean, you hear this said, you know, words can't express how proud I am. But I'm extremely blessed and extremely honored to have worked with this group. You have to remember by the end of the season, we were playing guys that hadn't played a lot of minutes at all and asking guys to do things that they weren't used to doing. We asked Rodrigue Mels to play point guard. He never had played it his entire life. You know, when Josh Jenkins went down and he stepped up and obviously, ended up being the MVP of our tournament, the Big West Tournament. We had a great group, a great team back in 2001 when we won the Big Sky Championship. I was talking to one ever my assistants who was with me at that time. I said, "What's the difference between those two teams?" That team in 2001 probably had a little bit more talent, but this group has more heart and more character and more toughness than I've seen, and I'm just very, very -- I don't want to take anything away from the 2001 group because I would take those guys back tomorrow, but I'm extremely proud of our guys. Q. Coach, how specifically do you turn around these kind of off-court distractions and make it a positive? What specifically do you tell your players so that they can cope with something like that? COACH BOBBY BRASWELL: You know, as a coach, you've been in this business long enough, you've always talked to your team about adversity. Dealing with adversity. Usually that has to do with maybe losing two, three games in a row and how you respond to that kind of adversity. The kind of adversity these guys faced this year was a whole lot different. I understood that, and I understood that it was a moment in which their character was going to be tested. We have a saying, we have a thought for the day that we occasionally use in practice, and it's about character. And our definition of character is the ability to meet the demands of reality. And we challenged our guys. You know, your reality is different now, and our ability to meet that, to step up and still perform in the face of all things we're dealing with will say a lot about the character of this basketball team, and I think that's what did it. I also understood it was important for me to stand up in front of those guys and they have to believe that I believed in them. They have to see in it my eyes that I believed they could still win and still be successful and, you know, and that was kind of the task that at hand throughout the season. Q. How -- strategically when you look at Memphis, you see the length and speed and their defense in particular. What do you do? COACH BOBBY BRASWELL: We can't stretch our guys and make them any taller or any faster or quicker. We are who we are at this time. Obviously, their length, as you said, and their athleticism is a concern, and that's what makes them a very good basketball team. You know, it's funny when you watch them, and I've had a chance to talk watch them extensively on tape. You would think they're out in passing lanes and doing a lot of denying and pressuring. They really don't do that. They take advantage of their length. They get you in circumstances and situations where you have to put the ball on the floor, and then when you put the ball on the floor, you end up facing guys that are 6-9 probably wing spans of 7 feet or more and block a lot of shots, get a lot of deflections. Makes it hard on you offensively. I told our basketball team, obviously we have to take care of the basketball. Just watching them, it seems like every time an opponent turns the ball over, they convert it on the other end. If you look at our stats, we've had a problem with turning the basketball over. We've got to be very, very smart about handling the basketball, being very strong with how we handle the basketball, and I believe play with some confidence, too. There's a certain style that we play. It would be wrong for me to ask our guys to come into this tournament and all of a sudden become a different team. We still have to be the team that we've been all year, but we definitely have to eliminate mistakes. Q. Coach, speaking about that, you have to do what it is that you do. When you played your out-of-conference competition, how did -- did anybody compare to what you saw on tape with Memphis, and how did that help you? COACH BOBBY BRASWELL: Well, you know, if you look at our out-of-conference schedule, we were at UCLA, at New Mexico, at San Diego State. We were at Stanford. You know, we played some what you would call high major competition, obviously at those places. I don't think we played a team that had the length and the athleticism that Memphis had. Maybe San Diego State a little bit. They just present a whole different situation for you, and it's really hard to practice against that, obviously. So that's why you have to depend on really just doing what you normally do. You can't recreate the scenarios you might face. You just have to, you know, hope and pray that your guys come out and they execute the game plan and they execute what you have to do on the offensive end of the floor. We ended up leading our conference in scoring and also in important defensive categories as well. So it's about execution for us and not turning the basketball over. Q. You talked about some of the -- overcoming something of the player distraction. How about yourself? What happened to you? Did your life pass before your eyes when dash talk about that experience. COACH BOBBY BRASWELL: Yeah. I'll tell you for Bobby Braswell, just 27th, obviously I was involved in a serious car accident and it changed my perspective on things on life a little bit. I've always been a person of faith, obviously. I had just dropped my family off at home and went out to run by the office and pick up something when the accident happened. So I was very thankful, number one, my family wasn't with me, but it just gave me an appreciation of life and your family and your players and not taking things for granted and, you know, told somebody the other day, I really believe I'm a better coach today than I was before the season started. I believe I'm a better father, a better husband, and I believe our players are better players today because of the experiences. I think adversity does that to you. I think it matures you. You know, I depend heavily on God's grace to kind of get me through things and learning how to handle situations and everything else, but I just believe that when -- there's also a saying we have that what doesn't kill you will only make you stronger, and I just think that it's really held our group together. Q. How badly were you hurt? What was the extent -- COACH BOBBY BRASWELL: I was extremely blessed. When the Fire Department got there, they were surprised that I was out of the car and standing, and, you know, it was a situation where I could have been killed, obviously and -- but, again, grace of God, I was able to survive that, and I was out a little while dealing with some back and neck issues and everything else, but by the time the season came around, I was able to get going and deal with the issues of our team. One of the things I always tell our guys again is the one thing that basketball does for all of us, it's a relief from reality sometimes dealing with issues off the floor. We can come in and do something we really love doing, and I really focus on that couple hours that we have practice. Q. Coach, 15 has beaten a 2 only four times in the history of this tournament. Is there a particular formula, anything in your mind that you see playing out that has to happen in order for you guys to have an opportunity here? COACH BOBBY BRASWELL: We have to play well. We have to play well. That's the bottom line. We're going to have to play a nearly flawless game, and we're going {to} {have} to just -- for you it starts with our defense. There's some goals that we have every game, and that's -- if we can get close to those goals or have those goals, we have a chance and that's -- if we can force our opponents to shoot the ball below 40 percent, if we can get between 35 and 40 deflections a game, if we can win the war of the boards, the battle of the boards and we protect the paint. If we can do those things, we feel like we have a chance, and for most of our games this year, when we've done that, we've won. Again, I know this is a different animal we're dealing with here with Memphis. The bottom line is we're not going {to} {have} a chance unless we defend and we can slow them down and get some stops. On the offensive end, we're going to have to make some plays and take care of the basketball, obviously. KEVIN KLINTWORTH: Any more questions for Coach Braswell. Thank you, guys. End of FastScripts |
|
||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
About ASAP Sports •
FastScripts Archive •
Recent Interviews •
Captioning •
Upcoming Events •
Contact Us
FastScripts | Events Covered | Our Clients | Other Services | ASAP in the News | Site Map | Job Opportunities | Links |
|
ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297
|