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NCAA MEN'S 1ST & 2ND ROUNDS: BUFFALO

March 18, 2010

BUFFALO, NEW YORK

THE MODERATOR: Joined by student athletes from the Clemson Tigers who come into Buffalo as number seven seed. 21-10. Closer to me Trevor Booker and next to him is Demontez Stitt. We will open it up for questions.

Q. Hi, Trevor. The Missouri players say they know you because you played for them last year under a different name. His name was DeMarre Carroll. They think that your game is a lot like his. Do you? Are you familiar with what he did?
TREVOR BOOKER: I know he was a hustle player. I mean that's the only thing I really know about him. I mean, I go hard. I try to hustle. But that's really the only thing I know about him.

Q. They called him "Junk Yard Dog." As a man in the middle, I mean there's guys that are a lot taller than you, obviously. What makes you so successful in the middle?
TREVOR BOOKER: Well, I try use my strength, and like I said, I hustle, I try to go hard into the other player. I know a lot of people say I'm undersized. But I just put that in the back of my mind and let it motivate me.

Q. Trevor, do you think Missouri has an advantage and coach worked with you in the World University Games tryouts. He says he knows you a little bit.
TREVOR BOOKER: I don't think so. He coached me probably one or two scrimmages down there. He didn't get to see too much. I didn't think about that he could end up playing against me. But I don't think they have an advantage.

Q. With Missouri's injuries, both with Justin Safford being out with an ACL and also it was revealed that Laurence Bowers is playing with that pretty serious wrist injury, how important will it for to get Trevor in the offense and keep him involved as the game goes on?
DEMONTEZ STITT: I think it's going to be very important to get the ball inside. They are going to be scrambling around a lot, doing a lot of trapping. Sort of like we do. But from what we've seen on film, from what I've seen on film, if we get the ball to Trevor on the inside, I don't think that they have the post presence to guard him, and if they do double down, we have to be ready to make shots on the perimeter.
THE MODERATOR: Trevor, your thoughts?
TREVOR BOOKER: Like you said, I think it's an important part to the game just to get the ball down low, I know they like to pressure the ball. I mean if we get it down low they're probably going to double team. I have to be ready to pass the ball out and trust my teammates.

Q. Can you guys talk about two things: One, the idea that teams that press don't like to be pressed? And the other one, do you have any concerns that it might be a really tightly officiated game with lots of fouls and that sort of thing?
DEMONTEZ STITT: We can't really worry about the officiating. We just have to see how the officiating goes as the game goes. But as far as teams that press don't usually like to be pressed, I mean, we've been playing high speed the whole year since I've been at Clemson. We always played at high speed. So I believe that I mean we're going to be ready for their pressure just as well as they are. It depends on what team imposes their will on the other team.
Like I said, we are used to playing at this pace. We're used to playing a fast pace. So I think if we just control the ball, I mean push it, as coach has been talking about pushing it intelligently, knowing when to pick and choose, when to attack and not to attack, making the smart play, I think we'll be all right.

Q. Just for both guys, third straight year here in the tournament, still looking to get out of this first round. What is the experience the last two years taught you about coming into this game?
TREVOR BOOKER: The experience for me, just got to play 40 minutes. You can't play one-half and expect to cruise to the next -- through the next half. I know my sophomore year we played Villanova and had them up 17 at the half and they came back and ended up beating us. We have to play 40 minutes.
DEMONTEZ STITT: Pretty much basically the same thing. I mean since I've been here we've been to the tournament twice. This is the third year. I mean both of those years, I mean I felt we could have won both of those games if we would have played Clemson basketball throughout the whole 40 minutes. Like Booker just said. I mean we're more experienced now. Some of the guys, we're a more experienced team. We've been here. Some of the younger guys we have to put them along and help them recognize the significance of this game.

Q. Demontez, so much of this game is probably going to be about ball security. Both teams like to force a lot of turnovers. How important is it to take care of the ball knowing that you got a guy like Trevor inside to go to on offense?
DEMONTEZ STITT: It's very important for us to, like I said earlier, to control the ball. I mean these last couple of practices we've been working on pushing the ball, I mean working against pressure. But at the same time when you push, you have to be aware that guys are going to be running behind you, trying to tip the ball. They're going to try to speed you up. And half court offense is very important to keep your poise. Just looking at some of the teams on film that sort of kept their poise, they did a better job against Missouri and their pressure. Controlling the ball and limiting turnovers and getting the ball inside I think that's going to be the key for us to win this game.

Q. There's been a lot of talk about the ACC being down. There's one poll or something where no one felt Duke could even make the Final Four. Is there a little bit of resentment among the players and teams you think trying to prove it's not quite that way in the ACC?
TREVOR BOOKER: I think so. I think every ACC team that's in the tournament is going to try to prove them wrong. If you're in that conference, you don't want to hear that type of stuff. So you try to go out and prove everybody wrong.

Q. Guys, Demontez, particularly you, you talked about teams that had success against Missouri, and you're right, teams of that slowed them down. Can you really imagine -- you guys aren't going to turn into Nebraska all of sudden, are you?
DEMONTEZ STITT: No, like I said, pushing the ball intelligently. Just limiting turnovers.
When I say controlling the ball as far as that, that doesn't necessarily mean slowing the game down and running at a slow speed. Just we got to be able to limit our turnovers and get the ball inside. We don't want to come down and shoot up a lot of quick shots. That's what we want teams to do, because we play at that pace. Watching it on films that's what they want teams to do so they can get out on breaks. Bad offense turns into good offense for them. I mean, controlling the ball I mean doesn't necessarily mean not attacking. Coach wants us to attack. I mean but we want to limit our turnovers and get the ball inside.
THE MODERATOR: Any other questions for Clemson student athletes?

Q. This is for Demontez. Do you kind of favor the pace of the game that's going to be tomorrow? High paced game? It seems like you guys have struggled when it's been half court, kind of slow it down pace that's got you guys into that sort of offense.
DEMONTEZ STITT: Yeah. Me and Andre are going to push the ball all night. This is the type of game that I personally like to be in, up-and-down game. Guys are going to be scrambling everywhere on both ends, for us and for them. So it's going to be a type of game that's going to be fun, it's going to be high intensity. But basically it's going to come down to the team that keeps their composure and the team that imposes their will on the other team and which team, you know, breaks.

Q. Demontez, will we see more of you and Andre together on the court and have the ball to sort of control the pressure?
DEMONTEZ STITT: I'm not exactly sure. You have to ask Coach that. It will probably be most likely we'll probably be on the court together a lot like we've been doing. But who knows, Coach may change up the game plan and have us on the court a little bit more to have two quick ball handlers on the court to sort of break those traps. I guess only Coach knows that.
THE MODERATOR: Gentlemen, thanks. We're joined now by Clemson Head Coach Oliver Purnell. Tigers come in the seventh seed. 21-10. Welcome to Buffalo, Coach. We will go ahead and have you make an opening statement and then we'll take questions.
COACH PURNELL: We're extremely pleased to be representing Clemson here in the first round of the NCAA tournament. As I think about -- think back on the year, the thing that stands out to me is how tough it is to get here from the ACC. We've got a great league. We beat up on each other coming down the stretch of the season. And you've just got to kind of hang in there and obviously you've got to win. But you've got to hang in there and do a good job. I thought our non-conference schedule was also very tough, starting way back with the tournament out in California, with a number of teams that are now in the NCAA tournament. And then getting into the early ACC season schedule, I thought our guys were resilient. We went through some difficult times, went through some challenging games. But our guys really do enjoy and get up for big games. And for the most part, they distinguish themselves very well in those big games. We've got one coming now. Doesn't get much bigger than this from the standpoint that you're in the first round of the NCAA tournament.
If you want to compete for the national championship, you have to find a way to get through this game. Our guys were disappointed the last couple of years when we went out in the first round. I'm hoping that will be motivation for us, as we prepare for this game. And as we play this game, that our guys want to stay here for a while and move on and stay in the tournament for as long as we possibly can. And I think the obvious thing is to win that first game and see what happens.

Q. You obviously like to play at a fast pace. But could you just talk about the luxury of having a guy like Booker in the paint when the game does slow down into a half court situation? And how important is it going to be for him to get multiple touches in this ballgame for you?
COACH PURNELL: Well, Trevor is one of the best players in the country. It is a luxury to have first-team All-ACC player, one of the best in the country. A guy that can go inside and out. Offensively we like for him to get touches in the lane. We like to run our offense through him, inside-out. And it creates a situation where teams have to choose whether to double or triple-team him in some cases. It presents our other players with opportunities to score. And if they don't, he's pretty good from a scoring standpoint. So it is a luxury to have him. If you are leading coming down the stretch, and the team is in a chase mode, at the end of the shot clock, you want the ball in his hands. If you are behind in a game when the clock is winding down the last six, seven minutes of the ballgame, you want to score when the clock is stopped. Obviously, he's a guy that can get you a bucket and get fouled. So it is a luxury to have him. He's had a great career for us. Not only scoring, but defensively, passing the basketball and doing so many other things, not to mention he's won more games than any player in Clemson history. He's probably the best all-around player that's ever played in Clemson. So it has been nice to coach him.

Q. You talked about how good your league is. Listen to some of the experts, you think you guys were the SWAC or something. Because Carolina is down, that's overstating the idea that this league is down has been overstated?
COACH PURNELL: Yes, I do. By the way, if you talk to most coaches in our league, we think Carolina will be right back next year. Yeah, I think that's the case. That's been the story line so many times this year, whether it be the print media, talk radio or TV. That's a popular story. So when a story gets repeated over and over, it can sway the perception of something. And I think it does sway the perception of our league. Certainly the league numbers-wise is right in the area it's always been. In the top three, in the RPI and all of that stuff. If you want to use that.
So Carolina is down this year. But we've got some excellent teams. They won the national championship last year. There are a lot of people that feel like Duke will be in the Final Four this year. So we still have that "premiere team." But the other teams in this league, trust me, are awfully good.
I think any of them can beat any other team in the country on a given night.

Q. Oliver, will we see more Andre Young, Demontez in the back court against this Missouri pressure or not really?
COACH PURNELL: Yeah, maybe. Maybe. I like that -- we talked all year long, I like that combination. The concern you would have is the concern that you always have, is from a stamina standpoint and having both those guys kind of tuckered out particularly in this kind of game. But it's a one-and-done situation. If you don't win. So I'm not going to be too worried about stamina and that kind of thing. If those two -- those two guys obviously make us a better ball-handling team. Andre and Demontez are two of our better scorers, so particularly if we're struggling scoring, you'll probably see them more together.

Q. Coach, both teams play very similar styles. The press, the high-tempo offense, how do you see this thing matching up against Missouri?
COACH PURNELL: I think you stated it very well. I think there are a couple of subtle differences. They probably play a little more zone than we do. They like zoning out of bounds underneath, anytime the ball is out of bounds underneath they like the zone. So that puts them in the zone for a few possessions right there. They can choose to go to that some. We're more of a post-oriented offense. A low-post-oriented offensive team and they're more perimeter-oriented. I think those are two subtle differences. But from a mentality standpoint, we like pressure defense. We like to push the ball on offense and so do they.

Q. Coach, in terms of the selection committee, do you think that it's getting to the point where they've become just sort of infatuated with statistics, almost to the point of ignoring the old eye test, Mississippi State being the example this year that clearly seems to be better than, you know, maybe a dozen or more teams?
COACH PURNELL: I personally don't think so. I think the committee does a good job. I think they use -- they use a number of different criteria to make a decision. I think they line them all out there and then there are some obvious teams that, you know, go on the board right away. I think we are one of those. And then they get down to a certain number of teams. And I think they do a comparison contrast. I think they look -- one of the messages I think that have been sent for a long time is if you're close, they're going to look at what you can control in your schedule. I know we pay a lot of attention to looking at our non-conference schedule feeling like we're in the ACC, so it's -- it's a high likelihood that we could be closer on the bubble. And if you're in that situation, you want to make sure that you have every advantage. We've gone on the road to certain places that I would rather not go, but we've gone on the road with an eye towards the RPI and the eye towards at the end of the year, how many road games have you won? That question I think comes up in that room. And you want the answer to be -- you want that answer to be a positive. So I think they look at a number of different things. And I think they do -- by and large, I think they do a pretty good job.

Q. How much of an advantage is the fact that this will be an up-tempo game considering some of the struggles you guys have had in kind of slow-down half court games like last week at NC State?
COACH PURNELL: I hope it is. I think you are talking about one of the best, if not the best pressure team in the country, Missouri. And so it's hard to look at that as an advantage. The advantage is that maybe we can duplicate in practice more so than most teams the kind of pressure and the kind of pace that we'll see. Because we like the up-tempo. We practice it every day. We press each other every day. We run on each other every day. So we didn't have to spend a lot of time figuring out how we're going to simulate some of the things that they do. But they do it better than anybody, and so that means you're going to have to be effective in what you've done in practice.

Q. Mike Anderson said that the people who say that teams that press don't like to be pressed probably never played basketball. Do you agree with that with him, I mean?
COACH PURNELL: I don't know about whether or not they've ever played basketball. But I've never felt that way. I think that sometimes when you're being pressed, it can generate offense for you, as opposed to calling a play and figuring this out and that. And if you're effective and attacking the pressure, it can generate offense for you. So we've actually liked teams pressing us at a certain point, particularly when we're leading in the second half.

Q. Apologize if this has come up already. The team that you're going to be facing has -- with the injuries that have occurred, they're a little different than what you've seen on tape the last course of the season, and possibly you'll see people that even Missouri fans haven't even seen play whole lot this year. How do you prepare for that?
COACH PURNELL: Well, the young -- the really good player, his name escapes me -- I watched tape with him in the game -- he's a glue -- he's been a glue guy for them, and so on and so forth. The last three tapes we've seen, he hasn't been there. We have seen them play without him. So that's the way we're preparing. We can only watch him on tape. Last three tapes we've seen him, he's not there. Part -- I think it was an Iowa State game, we watched -- actually watched him get hurt. Which was -- didn't look good. That wasn't nice to see. So yeah, we've had a chance to look at him that way.
We understand they have other good players, they're going to plug them in there. Their style, their philosophy has not changed. Somebody was saying how much they've struggled and so on and so forth. It's similar to saying we've struggled. I think you better look at who they're playing before you say they're struggling. Kansas, Kansas State, they're okay. So I don't view it as they're struggling. They're certainly adjusting from losing a very good player and one of their insiders. And we've had to do that this year with Demontez Stitt. But good teams find a way to adjust. And they move on.
I don't see them -- we didn't change the way we played when Demontez was out. Missouri has not changed the way that they play. So we have to approach it just like the guy was never there, almost.

Q. One quick follow-up. Do you specifically target a game plan to take advantage of Laurence Bowers' wrist, for instance?
COACH PURNELL: No, no. I don't think so. I think he's one of their long insiders that blocks shots and goes to the glass and still runs the floor. He's so long. So, no, no.
THE MODERATOR: Thanks very much. Coach, appreciate your time.
COACH PURNELL: This has been fun. I hope to see you again soon.

End of FastScripts

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