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NCAA MEN'S 1ST & 2ND ROUNDS REGIONALS: MIAMIMarch 19, 2009Chase BudingerJordan HillRuss PennellNic WiseMIAMI, FLORIDA LARRY WAHL: We welcome the Arizona Wildcats, the No. 12 seed in the Midwest region. They are an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament. We welcome Nic Wise, Chase Budinger and Jordan Hill, and we'll open the floor now for questions. Q. Jordan, how much of Luke have you seen on tape these last few days? And as another pretty good big guy, how much do you sort of embrace that challenge of spending 40 minutes with him tomorrow? JORDAN HILL: We've all seen a good amount of clips on him. He's a pretty good player. He's real long, real big, way bigger than me, so it's going to be a good match-up between me and him. Q. Have you played someone 7'2" before? JORDAN HILL: No, he will be the biggest I've played against this season. It's going to be a good challenge for me and a good challenge for him. Q. Jordan, how have you avoided foul trouble this year, and has that been difficult? JORDAN HILL: I want to say it hasn't been difficult, just moving my feet better and making better decisions when it comes to blocking shots or whatever. I've just been trying to keep my hands up on my opponent to try to get good shot blocks and doing what I have to do to stay out of foul trouble. Q. Chase, there's no shortage of bracket experts, if you will, that say that this is the 5-12 game that's going to go in favor of the 5-12. How much have you guys heard that? How much do you like hearing that? I mean, it's not going to mean anything tomorrow, of course, but can you see it give you a nice little boost knowing there's a fair number of people out there that think you guys will be back playing on Sunday? CHASE BUDINGER: Well, we try not to hear that kind of stuff. Utah is a very good team. They've got the No. 5 seed for a reason. They had a great year, and they're a good team. And even though people are saying that this is an upset-type game, we're not letting that get to us at all because we know that Utah is a very good team. We're not going to overlook them at all. Like I said, they got that No. 5 seed for a reason. Q. Have any of the three of you been to Miami before? And has anything really jumped out at you about the city? When did you all get here anyway, yesterday? CHASE BUDINGER: When did we get here, two days ago? I've never been here before, and I didn't know what to expect. But I love the city. It's a great city. NIC WISE: No. JORDAN HILL: I haven't, either. Q. Even when NBA teams come in, the night life, that sort of thing, I would presume you're not partaking too much in that right now, but there are distractions here. It is one of those distracting kind of cities. Are you guys aware of that? Have you talked about it? You're laughing, so clearly you have. JORDAN HILL: I mean, Miami is a distraction city. We've been to a lot of distraction cities, but we manage just to stay focused on what we need to stay focused on, and that's to play basketball. Miami is a beautiful place, and we really haven't been doing nothing much since we got here but just trying to prepare for the game tomorrow. We just try not to let that get in our way but try to prepare, stay focused. Q. Can you guys just tell me, any of you, Utah is never on TV very much, at least nationally. I wonder if any of you were aware of how good they were before you got matched up with them and what are some of the biggest challenges you can see with them? NIC WISE: You're right, we haven't seen much of them or heard much of them at all this year. We can tell they're a great team just by looking at their schedule. They beat UNLV and Gonzaga. We beat Gonzaga but we lost to UNLV, so we know how tough they are. Just winning their league and their tournament shows how good they are. Q. You guys don't come to this side of the Mississippi too often. Is it kind of a blessing in a way that you didn't draw that 12:00 o'clock game which would be 9:00 or 10:00 o'clock in your world? NIC WISE: Yeah, we woke up this morning at 9:30 and we were dragging because in Tucson it's 6:30 or 7:00. We are still getting used to it. Q. Are you guys coming to the early session or will you stay in the hotel, coming for the noon game to see what the place is like with people in it? CHASE BUDINGER: Most likely not. We'll probably be doing film or something. LARRY WAHL: If there are no more questions, we'll let the players get ready for practice. We have Coach Russ Pennell of the Wildcats, and Coach, if you want to open up with some remarks about your season, about being in the tournament and being here in Miami. COACH RUSS PENNELL: Well, first of all, like I'm sure every coach that's sat up here today has said, we're grateful and thankful to be in the NCAA Tournament. Our journey was a little bit different than some of these teams. We kind of had to sweat it out, I think, on Selection Sunday, and actually the last couple of weeks did not win as many games as we would have liked to have, but still at times played pretty good basketball. We're looking forward to tomorrow night and especially playing against a really, really good Utah team that I think is underrated, and as I was listening in to our players talk, they may not be well known because of their lack of national exposure, but believe me, any coach that's seen them on tape or has played against them knows how good they are. So we've got our work cut out for us tomorrow evening. I'll take questions now. Q. Have you specifically talked with your guys just about so much has been said the last 48, 72 hours that maybe you guys didn't deserve one of those spots, maybe a Creighton or a St. Mary's, any other team? Have you talked to them specifically about that, about that something-to-prove mentality, or is that stuff better just kind of left alone? COACH RUSS PENNELL: Well, first of all, I think that deserving to be here is probably left up to other people to debate. We certainly felt like we deserved to be here, and we make no apologies for getting in. As far as that underdog thing, I think that the important thing right now for everyone in this tournament to understand is that everyone is 0-0. The seedings mean absolutely nothing right now because it's one-game seasons. If you win, you stay; if you lose, you go home. Really that's our motivation, we would like to stay in the tournament, and in order to do that, we have to defeat a very good Utah team. Q. You guys are back on the road. Are you guys conscious at all of the road struggles you had this year in the regular season away from McKale Center? COACH RUSS PENNELL: Yeah, except this is a neutral site where we're undefeated, and I like that much better than calling it a road game. Q. After USC beat A.S.U. in the PAC-10 Championship game, did you think that really hurt your chances? And second, after everything the team has been through this season, how satisfying was that reward on Sunday when your name came up? COACH RUSS PENNELL: I thought when they lost it hurt us. I knew the committee traditionally, they say they don't look at the conference affiliate when they're dealing with teams to select to the Tournament, but I was probably more concerned when I saw that Mississippi State won because I just thought that there were too many spots being taken that might knock us out. So it was a pleasant surprise when we got the news on Sunday, and we were watching the selection show. It was a moment I won't forget just because of the way the kids celebrated and just were overjoyed with the opportunity to play again. Q. Usually the 12 seed is the big underdog in tournaments, and you know a lot of people are already picking you to win. I just wondered how you feel about that? Is there any more pressure that a lot of people think you should be the favorite even though you're the 12 seed? COACH RUSS PENNELL: Again, I think that's based on the fact that a lot of people aren't familiar with Utah. I don't see how in the world a 12 seed could be a favorite over a 5, especially one that played in a tough league like they played in, got a share of the conference championship, then won the conference tournament. We certainly don't look at it that way, and I wonder if that's something they started in Salt Lake to fire them up, because that would fire me up if I was them. Q. Do you find it amusing that first you're not supposed to be in this tournament and now you're supposed to beat the five seed? COACH RUSS PENNELL: It's amazing people are critical of us being in and then they fill out their bracket and they move us forward. Again, those things have very little, if anything, to do with us playing, and it comes down to us putting the ball in the basket and stopping them from doing it. Q. Jordan is giving up three, four inches, I guess. He's never faced a guy that big, he said. Is this sort of the challenge, that a kid like that just naturally sort of embraces? COACH RUSS PENNELL: I think so, with him. Again, the thing I love with Jordan is sometimes he has selective amnesia, and in his case we played Santa Clara this year and they have a big guy. His last name is Bryant. I believe his first name is John, I'm not positive. He may be an inch or so shorter than Nevill but he's still a big guy. Certainly Luke Nevill is a very, very good college center that has great length, and our conference has more guys playing basically they're power forwards playing center, and that's what I believe Jordan is. So he'll be in for a good night's work tomorrow night as well as our other guys trying to defend Mr. Nevill. Q. Your guys obviously have played a lot of minutes. I noticed a lot of 40-minute games for your players. I wonder what your philosophy is on when you take them out, and I wonder if that will change in a situation where you have to win or you're out. COACH RUSS PENNELL: I think I love about the NCAA Tournament is the 30-minute time-outs. Basically they are long enough where we get to rest our guys a little bit more. I know with us we always just kind of play it by ear. Two fouls does not automatically take you out of the game. It's more of a feel. If we have a decent lead and a guy gets two, yeah, we might take him out. We don't have the luxury of setting our big three on the bench very often. If we do, and sometimes I've been criticized for maybe playing them too much, but my philosophy on that is, okay, they're good and fresh and we're down 15 by the time I put them back in. To me that's a little counterproductive. So we just kind of take each game, each situation as it comes, try to figure out what's best for the team, and then make the appropriate adjustments. Q. I know you make it a priority to prepare for every game the same way. Is it difficult in this scenario with all the extra stuff going on, with the tournament, with the hype? COACH RUSS PENNELL: You know, we tried to get a lot of this stuff taken care of before we left. When you start talking about tickets and all the things that go along with that, and also, we have a very good support group in our administration. I know Ryan Hanson is setting here, and I'm not trying to pub him, but he's done a good job of taking care of a lot of the details that we don't have to mess with, along with Matt Brase. The thing that we are trying to do with this team is keep everything as consistent as possible, from our workouts to when we eat. You know, you're not going to trick these guys. They know this is a big venue and that's part of the fun of being in the NCAA Tournament. So I want them to enjoy that. But honestly I think the biggest thing is when we tip it off tomorrow night at 7:10 that they can approach it as a basketball game, that they have to be in tune with what we need to do to get the job done. Q. This is the time when big-time players step up in big-time situations. You have that type of player in Chase. What do you think you'll see from him or hope for from him? COACH RUSS PENNELL: I think Chase will play well. Chase has had some games this year where he's been borderline dominant and he's had some games where he didn't play quite as well. I know he was disappointed in his last time-out, which I think has served as motivation. The big thing with Chase, and I want him to understand, we've told him, is he's our guy, and I want him to go out there and understand he doesn't have to do anything but enjoy himself and play to the best of his ability, play hard. If he'll do that, the rest of it'll fall in place for him. Q. Earlier this year you talked about 40 percent or 40 touches, I can't remember. I think it was 40 percent. Did you monitor that in terms of touches with him and shots and stuff like that? COACH RUSS PENNELL: What I believe you're alluding to, we said we'd like to see him take about 40 percent of the shots, somewhere in there. And I think he's been close. Really we've probably added Jordan to that mix a little bit more, and that's kind of the way we play is through the middle, through Jordan, and then Chase and Nick both feed off of that. LARRY WAHL: We'll let Coach go and prepare for practice. Thank you. End of FastScripts |
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