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

March 18, 2010

DeVaughn Washington

PROVIDENCE, RHODE ISLAND

Ohio Â– 97
Georgetown - 83

THE MODERATOR: We're joined by the winner of Game 3, Ohio and our student-athletes are Armon Bassett, D.J. Cooper, Tommy Freeman, Kenneth Van Kempen and DeVaughn Washington, along with head coach John Groce. Coach, would you open it up with making an opening statement, please.
COACH GROCE: Sure. Obviously really proud of our team and we've worked really hard the last few days to execute the game plan and they bought in 110 percent, with both feet. Did a great job the last three days. I thought of being really mentally and physically prepared to play and we knew we were going to have to do that because we were playing such a great Georgetown team.
My hats are off to the guys. I always say this time of the year the most aggressive team and the team that has the players that make plays, and obviously we had a lot of them made by a lot of different guys on a lot of different occasions during the game, I thought was the difference.

Q. Didn't you know you were supposed to be scared, you're only a freshman and that was Georgetown?
D.J. COOPER: My guys and Coach Groce do a great job keep putting confidence in me, if I get rattled or anything, they just give me encouragement.

Q. What were you guys talking about during the breaks, during the time outs about keeping your poise those last five minutes? I'm sure you were aware of what happened to Robert Morris earlier. What did you tell each other as the seconds went down there?
ARMON BASSETT: Just exactly that, to keep our poise, and we had to make plays, and had a good run going. We kept our feet on the ground and we pulled it out.

Q. Armon, just looking at the numbers, you guys can score and you can shoot the three, and you did that throughout the season, but tonight it was a little different level, 13 for 23, just talk about it.
ARMON BASSETT: We are just blessed. We kept believing in ourselves and God just kept on blessing us right now. I'm glad everyone is up here because it was a team effort.

Q. Armon, you said after beating Akron last Saturday that you expected to win every game this season and that wasn't going to be different today. How were you able to keep that confidence against such a strong and big Georgetown team?
ARMON BASSETT: We're fortunate to beat a great team and great program like Georgetown. But I try to tell my teammates, we may not be a better team, just got to be a better team on a given night. That's going to be a mindset going in, we've got to be a better team for that particular game.

Q. Armon, your coach has described you as having swagger, a good bit of swagger, could you tell us where that comes from and how that helped you in a game like tonight?
ARMON BASSETT: I mean half of the battle is having confidence in yourself. That's it, you've got to have confidence in yourself. I have a coach that has great confidence in me and my teammates and I'm just out there playing my role.

Q. Could you just sum up what it's been like the last few weeks to go from the 9 seed in your conference tournament and no one expected you to win that to being here and beating Georgetown on this stage?
KENNETH VAN KEMPEN: It's fantastic. A lot of people throughout the year kind of doubted us, but I feel like for us as a team we kept confidence in ourselves, kept working hard so that it pays off right now as a great experience.
TOMMY FREEMAN: As KVK said, people kind of did doubt us going to the middle of the season, we lost our first four games in conference, so we've gone through some pretty rough times. We've stayed together and just had confidence in each other and I think as the season progressed our team got closer. And all the guys came together at the right time. And I think we're just peaking at the right time and playing our best basketball near the end of the year, especially going into the conference tournament we felt that we could play with anybody.
We played everybody close in our conference. And so we felt that we had a pretty good chance going in if we could knock down some shots and step up and hit them at a big time. I think as the season progressed on we came closer and we're playing our best basketball.

Q. You guys hit 13 of 23, three pointers today as a team, 71 percent in the second half, 56 percent for the game. Is that par for the course for you guys, and did you feel like once the first one fell that the rest would come?
ARMON BASSETT: I don't think you can think about it, when you think you're open, you think you can make the shot I think you've got to let it go. And us three, we play a lot of time in the chute and it paid off for us.
D.J. COOPER: We just step up if we're open and just take the shot with confidence and knock it down.

Q. Tommy, there was a stretch in the second half where every possession down, you guys seemed to make every shot. Did you feel like you could score at will as you came down the court there?
TOMMY FREEMAN: We had a feel like we have a pretty good personnel of guys that can step up and knock down shots. And we feel like we've put the time in offseason just honing in our shooting. And so, you know, we're just giving what the defense gave to us and we were knocking down shots tonight.

Q. Tommy, you when you fouled out towards the end of the game you had the fans shouting your game. How does that feel?
TOMMY FREEMAN: Just this whole experience is something I never experienced before. It's a great opportunity for us to be here right now. I'm blessed to have our fans here and just everybody supporting us. It was a pretty good feeling.

Q. DeVaughn, you guys had to battle the beast from the Big East, what did you guys tell yourselves, you big guys going into this. You had a big night yourself tonight, what was it all about for you?
DeVAUGHN WASHINGTON: It was about engine energy plays out there, I do what I do for my team. I make energy plays, toughness plays, and mentally just run the floor in our fast break offense, and just spread out the floor for our guys to make plays for us.

Q. Did you guys feel you needed to make as high percentage of three point shots you did today in order to win this game?
D.J. COOPER: We just felt like we just had to step up and do whatever the defense gave us, take whatever they gave us. We were driving the ball, we were looking to kick and me, Tommy and AB, we were hoping to knock the shots down. .

Q. You guys obviously hit a lot of open shots and moved the ball and spaced well. Were you surprised at the amount of open looks you got, could some of that be blamed on Georgetown's defense. Can you sum up what the experience has been like, the ride the last two weeks?
COACH GROCE: We've got a lot of confidence in our offense. Guys have been making plays here the last couple of weeks of the season. And spacing is important to us in our offense. I felt like we had the floor space. Fortunately for us we were able to make some shots, and when you make some shots it extends the defense more. When that happened we were able to drive a bit and create some other opportunities for other guys other than just D.J. and Armon. I thought those two things, our perimeter shooting game and our ability to dribble drive the ball to the lane really complimented each other well.
In terms of the experience, obviously, you know, more than anything I'm excited for our guys. Just everything that they've been through, as they alluded to earlier. Their backs were against the wall so many different times this season. There were some times where the only people that really believed in what we were doing and where we were headed were the guys in our locker room and our administration. For that I'm really excited for our guys and hope that it's something that they'll take with them beyond basketball as they move forward in their lives.

Q. Greg Monroe is one of the most athletic big men in the entire nation, he does so many things well. What was your strategy to neutralize him throughout the game?
COACH GROCE: I told the guys before the game that we weren't going to stop him. He's a really good player. He's a mismatch problem. He can drive the ball. He scores it in the low post, the long post, he hits you on the glass. He can pass. He can handle. He's a terrific player. I told our guys, basically in our game plan we want to do some things, double him some, sometimes we didn't. We tried to keep him off balance a little bit and keep him guessing.
But you're not going to completely shut out a great player like him. I told our guys, don't get discouraged if he scores some. He's going to score some. He's a great player. We had to keep our poise in that situation. And I thought for the most part our guys did that.

Q. Can you just put into a little bit of historical perspective what this win means to the program and what it means to your conference, especially with a win over the Big East?
COACH GROCE: Well, any win in the NCAA Tournament, I've been fortunate to be in it a few times as an assistant and now to play in the tournament is certainly a privilege. To advance in the tournament, we're very fortunate to have beat a good Georgetown team today. In terms of historical perspective, I haven't had a lot of time to reflect on that. Someone had asked me on the radio, hey, is this the greatest win of Ohio University. I don't want to disrespect the tradition of our program. We've had a lot of good players and great teams. I certainly think it's one of them.
I think in terms of what it means for our program long term, I think it's great. What it does more than anything is, I think it gives tremendous belief with our guys and what we're doing, in our system. I've always believed in what we were doing from the beginning when our staff took the job, and our players have done a good job jumping in with two feet. But it's also another thing to see it come to fruition, and I think it's made that belief evening stronger amongst our team, which is terrific.

Q. This afternoon Robert Morris gave Villanova all it could handle. Clearly you guys were the best team on the court tonight. What does that say in the big picture about the quality of mid-major basketball, are you closer than a lot of people think, obviously, I guess?
COACH GROCE: Well, it's crazy. I mean my wife and most people that know me will tell me I'm so one track during the season I don't get to watch a lot of basketball other than our own team and who we're playing next.
The parity in our league is unbelievable. On any given night anybody can beat anybody. I think there are some good basketball teams out there, no question, regardless of conference. Obviously the teams that are in this tournament are in it for a reason. I know today was -- I didn't get to follow all the games today, but my wife did. She loves to do that and talk to me about the games. She's an NCAA Tournament guru, she thinks. But she was telling me how close all of them were tonight, before we even came over. It doesn't surprise me. It doesn't. There's just a lot of good teams out there, a lot of good players, a lot of good coaches.

Q. A question about your perimeter shooting, especially from three point range. Did you come in here hoping that it would be a factor in terms of loosening things up, creating separation?
COACH GROCE: I was hoping it would be, because it's been that for us all year. We shot 36 percent plus percent from three last year and led our conference. And this year we led our conference again in three point field goal percentage. We've broken our school record in back-to-back attempts and makes and percentages. It's kind of something we do. Did I know we were going to go 13 for 23 and as you alluded to, shoot 71 percent from the three in the second half? No. I had a lot of confidence in our guys. They shot them all year, and I know the guys that shoot them expect them to go in.

Q. Just talk about your back-court play tonight. If we didn't know any better, it seemed like you had the Big East back court tonight?
COACH GROCE: Well, those two guys have been terrific down the stretch. I've said this before, I wouldn't trade those two for anybody. I love those two kids. I love their swagger. They make plays for us. They give our team a confidence I think the other guys have really gotten where they believe in their decision making. And they make their teammates better being out there. They've been terrific over the last couple weeks.

End of FastScripts

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