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NIT POSTSEASONMarch 31, 2009Steve FisherKyle SpainLorrenzo WadeNEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK STEVE FISHER: I think on behalf of our team, I'll offer congratulations to Baylor, who played better than we did tonight. (Curtis) Jerrells in the first half, (LaceDarius) Dunn in the second half, were hot. They have done that before. And we just weren't quite good enough tonight. We had too many turnovers that led to baskets and when you turn it over, you can't get a shot. So we are disappointed about that, but we are very proud of the season we had, and how we represented ourselves, our league, our university and our city, to get to Madison Square Garden, a great tournament. And we lost to a really good team who is playing terrific right now. I think both of us have won nine out of our last ten coming in here. So as disappointing as it is, and it is, for all of us, we lose five seniors, and the pride we have in what they have done to grow this program, is immeasurable. As we get on the bus tonight, we reflect on that as opposed to the loss tonight. We got beat by a very good team. Q. What was going right in the first half and what was going wrong in the second half? LORRENZO WADE: In the first half I think we got a few more easy baskets than we did in the second half, we were letting them go out in transition in the second half, easy transitions, layups. And again, they were knocking down shots. I believe they shot over 50 percent from the field overall, as well as 50 percent from the 3. It's tough to beat a team when they are shooting basketball like that. Q. Lorrenzo, I remember there was a play when you shot a 3-ball and had a hand in his face and it still went down. Was there a point in the game where you threw up your hands, and were like, "Are you ever going to miss?" LORRENZO WADE: Sometimes players have nights like that. Unfortunately there were two guys that had nights like that; when you have two guys knocking down baskets like that, yeah, you do kind of throw your hands up in the air at times and just wonder if they are going to miss. Q. Can you talk about the offense tonight; it seemed like you had trouble getting into a rhythm there. KYLE SPAIN: In the first half for the most part, I thought we all did a pretty good job on the offensive end. I don't think we did as bad of a job in the second half. I don't think we defended as well as we should have in the second half. I think they got a lot of easy baskets, and they pulled away, and that's why they got a victory, because of that. Q. Is it frustrating when that's happening? KYLE SPAIN: We should have done a better job of getting the ball inside. We had to work inside out and that's how you have to work the zone, and apparently we didn't do a good job doing that. Q. We talked so much before you came into Madison Square Garden; how much of an influence was that on what happened? LORRENZO WADE: Like I said before, a gym is a gym. I know Madison Square Garden is a very historic place but once the ball goes up in the air, you lose your pregame jitters and you just go about your business. We are very happy to play in Madison Square Garden. We wish we would have won the basketball game and NIT has been very good to us and more than anything, I'm appreciative to my teammates for helping us get to this point in the season. I look for better things to come from San Diego State university. Q. Can you look back on the impact that this senior bunch has had? LORRENZO WADE: Richie Williams is the all-time, I believe, assists, as well as steals leader in the Mountain West conference. To have a guy like Kyle that's a lights-out shooter, Matt Thomas has been vital, on and off the court, with his leadership. I mean, you know, I'm going to miss playing with this group of guys. This is I believe the best team that well -- well, one of the best teams I've ever been on and this is definitely the closest team that I've ever been on. Q. How can this have an impact moving forward, what you guys have been able to do the last year or so? LORRENZO WADE: I think now everyone expects San Diego State to do big things. With guys like Billy White, Tim Shelton, D.J. Gay returning, guys that have been in the trenches, they know what it's like and they are also going to expect big things out of themselves. I'm sure Coach is going to bring the best things out of these guys in years to come. KYLE SPAIN: Not only are people going to expect San Diego State to do well, but it's going to bring more athletes to San Diego State to participate in this program. Q. Was there a point maybe after the game where you realized it's the last time you're wearing the uniform and last time you'll play with these guys? LORRENZO WADE: I sat in the locker room while we were waiting to come in here and soaked it up, looked at my teammates. I'm sure it will be last time I see all of these guys wearing San Diego State uniforms and sitting in the locker room. I'll probably reflect on it a little bit more over the next couple of days. But, you know, it's life. I have many great memories here at San Diego State and I won't forget about anything. Q. Hard to let it go in some ways? LORRENZO WADE: Very hard to let it go. For some reason I feel like tomorrow we are going to wake up and have practice, I wish we were going to Wake up tomorrow and have practice. Unfortunately we won't, but it's been a great ride. Q. Is that as good of a zone as you've seen played in a while? STEVE FISHER: They are a good team. They are a very good team. I believe we were 7-for-12 in the first half from the 3-point range, and we had good looks in the second half. What we did is we turned the ball over too many times. It's hard to win when you have 19 turnovers. And so many of them from our perspective were unforced or we are thinking they should have been completed. But as I said earlier, Baylor is a terrific team, and they have got size, they have got athleticism, they have got experience. And they were playing as well as most people in the country at the end of the season. We were, too. They are a very good perimeter-shooting team, very good. They made some open shots, but they made some hard shots. But you know, I think the zone, you know, what the zone did is that it made it harder for us to get quality looks. Our man-to-man offense creates a little more attack off the bounce and we tried to create a high post and I thought we did a very good job of it. We just were not able to get enough out of it when it got there. I'll come back to the turnovers; way too many turnovers. Q. Was Baylor better than you expected going into this game, seeing them play? STEVE FISHER: I don't think so. I knew how good they were. I watched every game from the Nebraska game before they played Nebraska in the tournament right on down. I was immensely impressed with the coaching, the talent and the execution. Q. Despite the loss, how important is this run for your program to New York this year? STEVE FISHER: What we did, when we got into the NIT, we were like a lot of people, that we were hoping that we were going to be in the NCAA. We cried and felt sorry for ourselves for 24 hours, and then we said, "Let's win the NIT." And our seniors made that commitment. So for us to do what we did -- we are a little bit like Baylor in terms of history, not having a long legacy of winning. We had never won over one postseason game in tournament play, and we won back-to-back to back, and got the opportunity to come to Madison Square Garden and play, and that's huge for us. We were the story in town for two weeks, and that does immeasurable good for all of us. And Kyle made the reference for everything, from recruiting to perception to expectations to all of the things that you look for as a coach and a player. We have got a good program. We have won 20 or more games for four straight years, but this is the first time we have made a dent and a mark in postseason play, and we like it and we want to do it again. Q. You mentioned the turnover, and some of them being the unforced variety. Why; how does that happen? A bit uncharacteristic for your bunch. STEVE FISHER: Well, it's basketball. It's basketball and sometimes stress does that to you. When you've got length and quickness and you've got people flying around out there, what looks to be an open area turns out to be covered if you're not careful when you're playing good people, and we were playing good people. I'm going to say Baylor had a lot to do with it. It wasn't all our casualness and unforced turnovers. Some of it was, but Baylor had a lot to do with those 19 turnovers and they had everything to do with what they did with it; they scored a lot off our turnovers. Q. What can it do for a program to be in a tournament like this? STEVE FISHER: For us it grows expectations, internally, first, and then with our fan base. I mean, we have had some phenomenal crowds back in our arena, and all that does is it adds to what we are trying to do: Create an environment where it's fun for kids to come and watch, and one where we expect to win and we put pressure on ourselves to win. So I think it helps; the residual, we'll see what that means from a recruiting standpoint. But it raises expectations for those that are returning and those that are coming in. We have a large number for recruits coming in, so we will raise the expectations when they set foot on the campus in fall. Q. How do you feel about losing all of the seniors and what they have meant to you with the connection they have formed? STEVE FISHER: I owe them a huge debt of gratitude. When you win, everybody benefits. Myself included. What they have done is what we expected them to do. We came and we knew we had good players, and they won and then they won a little bit more, and then they have done it in a fashion that I feel proud of. They competed hard. We had a really tough-minded, competitive basketball team this year, and a lot of us have talked about how well we guarded. You know, we were not quite as good tonight, but again, Baylor had something to do with it. We were a team that guarded people hard and we were very proud of that part of our game. Q. Did you get a sense that Richie was shaken up at all; that first shot went way off. Did that affect anything that happened later on? STEVE FISHER: No. Richie has played for four years. He's shot an air ball before and come back and made steals, baskets. No, I don't think so. I think that's just a part of what we do. It's an imperfect game. You try for perfection. You have to move on and you have to play in the moment and you have to deal with the play you're in and not think of the last one or think too far ahead, and we have done a good job of that this year. I'm very proud of how we have done that, especially with our seniors. Thanks. End of FastScripts |
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