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SOUTHEASTERN CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENTMarch 10, 2010Rotnei ClarkeCourtney FortsonJohn PelphreyNASHVILLE, TENNESSEE THE MODERATOR: We're ready to continue on with Arkansas. We'll begin and ask Coach Pelphrey for some opening comments. His thoughts on the Arkansas team headed into the Tournament. Then we'll take your questions just for the two student-athletes and then excuse them to the locker room. And then we'll finish with some questions with Coach Pelphrey. COACH PELPHREY: Obviously, we're very excited to be here and looking forward to our game. Georgia is a very good opponent. We had a hard-fought battle with them already this season, and it was really probably for both ball clubs, two different hands, two different teams, and we were able to play our best basketball in the second half and towards the end of the basketball game. But Georgia provides a lot of problems for everybody up front, and we'll need to meet some challenges there. Do a good job with rebounding the basketball, taking care of it, hammering it inside. And then from a defensive side, we'll play a lot of man to man and play some zone as well. We'll have to be good in all facets of the game. We know that. THE MODERATOR: We'll take your questions for the student-athletes. Q. This is for both players. You guys, obviously, it's been tough to win games of late. This is a new season, a new start kind of. What's the team's mindset with a five-game losing streak but having a fresh start this week? COURTNEY FORTSON: You know, we put that behind us and just went from that, worked hard in practice, and hopefully it will show in the tournament. ROTNEI CLARKE: Like Court said, we put that behind us, and we're not worried about a losing streak or anything like that. We're coming into the Tournament and trying to get some momentum. Q. For both you guys again, what's been the difference between the two streaks, the winning streak and the losing streak in your minds? COURTNEY FORTSON: I think it's been our fundamentals overall, like just boxing out, just simple things, boxing out and rebounds, making the extra effort. ROTNEI CLARKE: Same thing, the little things. Like court said, we really stressed that in practice, limit turnovers, tend the basketball, and just doing the little things, boxing out, no second-chance opportunities, and things like that. Q. I know both you guys were pretty young in 2000. This is the tenth anniversary of Arkansas winning the SEC Tournament, the only time they did it, they were a third seed in the West, they were 7-9. They were playing Georgia, a lot of similarities. Do you have any thoughts on that? COURTNEY FORTSON: To be honest, I wasn't aware of that, but now that you think about it, that's pretty -- that's basically a mirror image of the records and everything. ROTNEI CLARKE: You know, like Coach said, it's the past. It's totally different tournament, totally different teams. I don't think that will make any difference coming in. Q. For both of you. What do you guys want to prove in this tournament or just show? ROTNEI CLARKE: Just show that we can compete and make a run in this tournament. You know, I feel like our team has a lot to prove, and we want to be able to do that. COURTNEY FORTSON: Like Rot said, I feel that we don't have to prove anything, but I feel we have to show everybody we're one of the top teams in this tournament. Q. For both players. Do you notice a difference when, as a team, you guys are playing together or encouraging each other or feeling on the same panel or basically have great chemistry versus when it's a real struggle to feel that great about each other and work together? COURTNEY FORTSON: At first, you know, when you're going through adversity, you really don't know you're going through it until you just sit down and think about it or go back and watch the game. Then you'll be like, oh, you could have done better on that play. It just happens so fast. So you really can't put your hand on it. ROTNEI CLARKE: Like Court said, even when adversity comes, we try to stick together and keep our team chemistry, even though adversity brings out your character. We try to unite and come together as one and learn from things and move on. Q. It's been kind of a streaky year. You've had some winning streaks, losing streaks. Do you feel like this is a week you can get back on a winning streak? COURTNEY FORTSON: Hopefully, this is the week we get back on a winning streak. Of course, that would be good for our program and our confidence. So hopefully we will. ROTNEI CLARKE: Same thing. Of course we want to be on a winning streak. In order to do that, we know we're going to have to play really, really good basketball. Of course we want to start a winning streak again. Q. I just wondered if you guys could talk about the first Georgia game. Obviously a big comeback at their place. Does that give you added confidence in a rematch on a neutral floor? COURTNEY FORTSON: I think that adds confidence that we defeated that team. That doesn't mean anything going into tomorrow. We still have to stay focused and execute the game plan. ROTNEI CLARKE: Yeah, it's a totally different game. New place, neutral site. So I don't think anything from the past game is -- it's not going to make a difference in this game. We've got to come out ready to play and be ready to go. THE MODERATOR: We'll excuse you back to the locker room at this time. And we'll continue on with Coach Pelphrey. Q. John Marshawn yesterday talked about being a leader and putting this team on his back. Talk about his comments a little bit, especially about if that's what this team needs is a leader and if that's what's been missing this season. COACH PELPHREY: I had a chance to speak with Marshawn. I think a lot of what he was references is -- and I've had meetings with a lot of guys in terms of encouraging them to develop as a leader. I think Marshawn has pro hac vice himself as a player, and he's also proven himself in terms of how hard he's worked. He's had some success in the classroom, last semester he did very well. So I think he's got some characteristics of a leader, and he is leading already in some fashion. But through our talks, I mean, I obviously encouraged him to continue to do more. You've got to understand too, with some of the things that's happened to us this year and some of the challenges we've had to meet, it's taken some of our veteran players, maybe the leaders, off the floor. Some guys have been gone for long periods of time, and other guys not so long, some guys for a short period of time for different reasons: suspensions or injuries or whatever the case may be. Michael Sanchez obviously really hasn't played all season long. So we've had to deal with a lot of guys not being on the court in leadership roles. And I think, in my conversations with Marshawn, that's kind of what he was talking about. He wants to continue to grow to be a leader, to be a great leader, to be able to kind of be there consistently all the time. And not that anybody hasn't done those things, but when you're not out there, it's kind of difficult to lead. So hopefully, nobody reads into anything in terms of negative standpoint other than that we are encouraging a young man who's got a chance to be a tremendous player. And when your best player is your hardest worker and then he's got a chance to be a great leader too. So those were the things he's been talking about. It's been unfortunate for us at times this year -- like everybody has had to deal with adversity, every basketball program, every company, every classroom, where it's not always easy. It hasn't always been easy for us. I think whenever you -- all teams want leadership, all teams want chemistry. And if it was that easy just to say it and have it, then we'd all do it. But we're certainly trying to encourage and mold and bring the best out in all these young men. And we have done it at times, and other times we haven't. Q. John, it's been kind of a streaky year for you, wins and losses at times. What's your feeling about the team right now with this five-game losing streak? Do you feel like you've had upswings after tough streaks, and can you do it again? COACH PELPHREY: I think, when you look at it in terms of wins and losses, that's accurate. That's a fair assessment. Obviously, for us right now, it would be nice for us to win a basketball game and see where that could lead to. You know, you look at our season, we had to deal with a tremendous amount, like everybody else in our league and across the country. And so hopefully, we'll be able to take all those experiences and put them together and put them to good use, and we can play well tomorrow. That would be nice. It won't be easy. It's a good basketball team. Mark has done a tremendous job with his team, and they've got some really good players. They're going to want to do well also. Q. Coach, you talked about the difficulty in trying to develop some of that stuff, and you've talked about getting guys to care about their teammates since you've been at Arkansas. How do you go about developing that, where you get guys to do that day in and day out, to sacrifice for each other and really play together and get along and all those things that you're trying to develop? COACH PELPHREY: Well, that's one thing this basketball team has done. We've hung together. You know, probably you've heard the word streaky several times, but you guys already since I've been sitting here. Probably the most consistent thing we've done as a basketball team every day is show up at work. I like that. I think that's a great place for us to start in terms of the progress that we're trying to make and that we have made this year to certain degrees. So just continue to grow. I think bottom line is we're going to continue to recruit and add guys to the program. We've got guys coming back who's got some tremendous experience now this season and last season, and it's going to pay off for us. I think you could -- as you recruit, you gravitate toward people that hopefully have your personality, have those types of interests at heart. I am pleased with our basketball team from the standpoint that we have shown up and we've worked the next day, regardless of whether we won, regardless of whether we've lost, those guys have done those things. I've said this all along that these guys are the hardest working group of young men. I've been around three years. At this point in time, they like each other. They have an understanding of what it's all about to be a student-athlete. And that's only going to continue to grow. Is it perfect right now? No, it's not. No team is. And then I think all that's going to help us in terms of making progress towards winning. This season, up until the last week, ten days, we were in first place. We're competing for first place. That wasn't the case the previous year. Certainly feel like that we could have done better. But everybody in the country will probably feel that way at some point in time this season. Q. John, talk about getting a fresh start in the tournament, what that means, especially when maybe you've had a tough couple of weeks. And you heard all that stuff I said about the similarities with 2000. I guess you were at the Tournament as a Florida assistant. Does that mean anything to you? Do you like some of that stuff? COACH PELPHREY: Certainly, being a Razorback, we love the history. We're appreciative of what those young men did for the University of Arkansas. It wasn't easy. It's a tremendous feat. It needs to be celebrate, and it needs to be remembered, especially by us, being Razorbacks. I don't know how much of an impact it's going to have for our basketball team in terms of motivation or those types of things for this. The bottom line is you can't win the fourth game unless you win the first one. So we're going to put all our efforts and energies in just trying to get through this next 40 minutes. If we're fortunate enough to do that, we'll deal with the next 40. It's great that we have a history like we do at Arkansas, and hopefully we can work hard and make our own history and be a part of it. Q. You forgot about the fresh start part. COACH PELPHREY: Obviously, you're talking about a fresh start -- I don't know if it's a fresh start or not because it's -- if you don't play well, you go home, that's not a very good beginning. It can be over with quickly; not much of an end and not much of a beginning and not much of an end. Certainly, we understand we've got another chance to play. In a tournament type atmosphere, it's always exciting if you can win and stay around. For us in college basketball, that's probably something that's just magical about our sport. Whether it's a conference tournament, certainly the NCAA Tournament, you have that feel to it. I've had a chance to experience it as a player. I've had a chance to experience it as a coach. I've had a chance to experience it in Arkansas both in a conference tournament and an NCAA Tournament. I've had a chance to move on. It's something that's hard to put words and describe it. But it's a lot of fun. It's a lot of hard work. Most of the time what happens this time of year, all the selflessness and stuff and team sports kind of disappear. Nobody really cares whose name is on the front page of the paper the next day. Nobody really cares who scores. All we're consumed with is getting 40 more minutes of basketball life. Q. John, the games where Fortson is on versus the games where he has his struggles, what do you see from him in those good games, and what does he need to do tomorrow to be successful? COACH PELPHREY: I think obviously you've got to give credit to the team, to the coaches for putting together game plans and obviously to the players for executing it. They've been a second team all-league performer this year, they're going to start with him pretty quickly in terms of how we're going to deal with him. If he's struggling in a game, that's a compliment to other people. The things that we need him to do is take care of that basketball. If we do get turnovers from him, they need to be of which that don't lead to baskets, where we can actually get back and set our defense. Here of late, we've had some turnovers, not only from Courtney but from our team, that we haven't been able to get back and stop. The other day against Ole Miss, I think we had four turnovers. They stole it and laid it up, and you can't defend. I think from the opposite side, he's able to score and get himself to the free-throw line. The second half of the SEC schedule, that was something that kind of disappeared a little bit. I think he may have gotten 11 free throws at Tennessee. But he hadn't gotten close to double figures up until that point in a long period of time. When he's playing well, he's finding a way to get himself to the free-throw line. He's always going to be a guy that's a high assist guy. Maybe up to last week -- I don't know where he is this week, but he was leading our league in assists and doing some of those things, kind of getting everybody involved. Q. Coach, you mentioned you've heard the word streaky a couple times. Do you feel like you've been a streaky team? If yes or no, whatever the reason you would think that. COACH PELPHREY: I think, when you just look at it in terms of wins and losses, you can certainly slap that on if you like. I think obviously from my side of it, it's been something where we haven't always had our pieces. There's always been something kind of keeping us out of rhythm. I think that's been the hard thing. The thing I appreciate with a better basketball team is no matter what happened with us, a guy being out for personal reasons or somebody's injured or hurt -- and we've had some of that crop up on us. Even as late as a shootaround on a couple of occasions. We just went out, and we played and tried to do the best we can do. I appreciate that from those guys. But, yeah, there's been some of that. There's been very, very challenging to deal with in terms of being able to get us all the pieces out there. That's made it tough. It's put a lot of -- it's put Marshawn -- I think Marshawn is the only guy that maybe has gotten through every single basketball game this year. Think about that. If you'd told me to start the season, I'd think no way, he won't be able to handle it, and he has. You never know what's coming in a season. You've got to be ready for it and handle it and don't get too high and don't get too low. Probably for me at this point in time, I think that obviously our nonconference schedule is very, very challenging, and we had to deal with a lot. We kind of got our bearings thereafter, you know, a difficult schedule to start the SEC. Got on a little bit of a run, played very well. You know, when you get to that point in the time this season where we weren't able to compete as well as we like, maybe our last five games in terms of winning, you've got to give a lot of credit to -- you've played 11 games. You've got to give a lot of credit to the opposing coaches. You've got to give a lot of credit to the other players. A lot of those games were on the road. For making it more difficult to be able to capture wins. That's probably been the toughest thing for us to handle is that we were right there. And I guess, you know, the thing is you've got to continue to work hard and just keep putting yourself in a situation where you've got a chance. We had a chance. We weren't able to finish it off. And we don't have any excuses for that. We'll take ownership in that. We own that. But from where we started early on, to have that chance, I think that says something about those guys too. That doesn't need to be lost in the fact that we did have the opportunity, which that probably wasn't in the thought process of anybody going into the SEC play, especially after four games. Q. John, particularly this time of the season, you talk about good teams getting better as the season goes on. Could you talk about that. And also how that happens in practice with talent pushing talent, especially in the Razorbacks' case? COACH PELPHREY: Say that again? Q. Getting better as the season goes on, talk about that. Good teams do that as the season goes on, especially this time of year. And talent, pushing talent in practice to push those guys to make them better in that case. COACH PELPHREY: For me, that's what I would like to have. Go back. First of all, all coaches would love to say we got better from the start of the season till the end of the season. We all say there's peaks and valleys in that. But you look across the country, and the best teams in college basketball, you're going to see them playing well at different periods of time. Nobody can get their hands on that to explain why somebody is not playing great. If we all understood that, then guys would be playing phenomenal at the end of the season and at the right time no matter what the sport. The other thing is from my perspective of what I would like to do, no doubt about it, I'd love to have 10, 11 guys, have one or two guys sitting out or redshirting, and it's just mortal combat every single damn practice. I think maybe the best team that I've ever been around as a coach, that was what happened when we went to the national championship game in 2000, those guys came, and it was battle. They knew if they played very well, they'd get 20, 30 minutes a night. If they didn't play well, they'd get 17 or 18. They'd decide who played. The next year we got hurt. Lost three straight games, started 1-3. We basically couldn't practice. A lot of 5-0. A lot of five against managers or whatever and walk-ONS and stuff, and that basketball team won 11 of its last 12. Who knows? Who knows how it goes? For me, I would love to have talent pushing talent every single day, but there's different ways to do it, and we won the championship that year in terms of our league. So that's good. I think our basketball team has gotten better. We've been able to get Mike healthy and Courtney back in there and Rotnei healthy. I think the competition in practice is good, especially when you've got some young guys you're trying to sprinkle in there. The important thing is too you'd like to be able to get continuity with your top group of guys. THE MODERATOR: Thank you very much. End of FastScripts |
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