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NCAA MEN'S 1ST & 2ND ROUNDS: PROVIDENCEMarch 19, 2010Wayne ChismScotty HopsonBobby MazeBruce PearlJ.P. PrinceBrian WilliamsPROVIDENCE, RHODE ISLAND THE MODERATOR: We're joined by Tennessee student-athletes, Bobby Maze, Wayne Chism, J.P. Prince, Scottie Hopson and Brian Williams. Q. Bobby, can you talk about their back court and the speed? I know that's something that's given you guys trouble at different times this year? BOBBY MAZE: They have two terrific guards, one a transfer that can really score the basketball, he's playing the 2 guard, I think he's averaging 30 points in his last four games. And they have a point guard that's left-handed that can get to the basket and I think made five out of eight threes in Georgetown. They use a ton of ball screens, and so defense, in the ball screen coverage will be the key if we're going to win this basketball game. Q. Bobby, could you elaborate on use the ball screen is so difficult to deal with. I think Wright said Ohio ran like a million of them? BOBBY MAZE: I think the ball screen has put the defense at such a disadvantage, one, is because you're getting screened. And so the offense, when you're playing offense, you have an advantage, you come off the screen and you see space and you can come off to shoot or you can come off the drive. I think that's one of the teams that ball screens so much. And randomly you don't know when it's coming. As a defender you come off half and set up a screen against you and it gives them an advantage to make a play. Q. J.P., Ohio coach was in here before talking about how he really looked at the Tennessee situation with some of the roster situation and the turnovers in players mid-season because they faced something similar as your situation. And they have found their second stride down the second half of the season. Can you talk about the adjustment period you guys had to go through and how you found your stride after some of the personnel changes mid season? J.P. PRINCE: I think we kept our composure as a team and just stayed together. Whoever we played that day I think we were ready and prepared as a team, regardless of who the personnel was, we just listened to the coaches and did what we had to do as players to be successful on the court. Q. Wayne and Brian, can you talk about shifting gears from playing San Diego State a team that was focused inside on offense to now going to the perimeter oriented guys, how that changes you guys for the game tomorrow? BRIAN WILLIAMS: One 99 percent of their offense is ball screens. So me and Wayne have to slide our puppies, obviously, and guard the guard until our guard get back and defend. But it's a team effort. It's five guys defending their five. It really ain't a big difference. Q. Ohio State came out and really never looked uncomfortable at all yesterday against Georgetown, whether you want to credit their offense execution, but the defense side is not going to be an issue for you guys for 40 minutes. Do you expect to come out and take Ohio out of the comfort zone you saw them in last night? WAYNE CHISM: Well, they came out against Georgetown, they came out on fire. They made a lot of tough shots. So we really have to come out and be focused on defense and stop those two guards from shooting a lot of threes that they did during that game. SCOTTY HOPSON: I think just our ball screening defense will be a key advantage to the game. Try to make them make tough twos and just compete on every play and we'll be fine. Q. Scottie, it looked like you found your three point touch, but you were only 3 of 9 from the field, can you talk about where you think you're at offensively right now? SCOTTY HOPSON: I definitely think there's room for improvement. Got to make aggressive plays, get to the rim as much as possible, just find outweighs to get myself going, so I think I'm fine right now. Q. Wayne or Scottie, either one of you, how much did you know about Ohio University until last night? WAYNE CHISM: When we watched them. That was the first time. So after going through film and watching these guys they can shoot the ball, one through three. It's going to be all about defense out on perimeter, our guards are going to have to do a great job, and like Brian said we have to move our puppies and defend these guards so they can't get off to a hot start. SCOTTY HOPSON: I don't know much about them, but I saw them last night. They definitely look like a great basketball team. Their guards are definitely their main focus. And it's definitely going to be a key in this victory. Stopping them and holding their guards will be big in our victory. THE MODERATOR: We're pleased to be joined by Tennessee Head Coach Bruce Pearl. Coach, would you begin with making an opening statement, please. COACH PEARL: Well, we're very pleased to be here and to have survived and advanced to the second round. Last night's game against San Diego State was everything we thought it was going to be. It was very important that we were able to not law San Diego State to beat us the way they've beaten everybody, and that is with their energy plays and with their amazing ability to rebound the ball on the offensive end. The beautiful thing about this tournament is the match ups. You really can't go from two more extremes than you're going from here, in the sense that San Diego State was a ball control team that did very little ball screen and their focus was on post up to a team like Ohio University where everything is about the ball screen offense and spread. I've got some familiarity with it because I coached Wisconsin and Milwaukee for four years and matched up against a Butler system that is similar to this. But like every system they evolve based on personnel. But the foundations are very, very similar. The Ohio State, Butler, now Ohio family of coaches do a tremendous job and particularly in the offensive end. This is a team that has scored 80 or more points in five out of their last six games. And right now is one of the hottest teams offensively in this tournament. And finally, I think the great challenge for every team that plays Ohio every team might have a guard that can deal with a guy like D.J. Cooper or Armon Bassett, but not many teams have two or three guys that they can put out there at the same time that can deal with those two because they're very, very unique. They're both scoring point guards. And they're a very tough conference. Q. The crowd always gets behind the underdogs in this tournament and you mentioned the great guard play. Do you think your team understands how scary a challenge this opponent is? COACH PEARL: There's no question. We know what's at stake. We know both from our own experience as well as the things that we've reminded them of that advancing in this tournament to the regional semifinal is very, very special. Every win, this field gets whittled down to half. At the end of today only 32 teams will be left. And at the end of the weekend only 16 teams will be left. And that is a very, very special place to be. Regardless of who our opponent is we'll be excited about playing. We had about 20 minutes of film this afternoon, it didn't take long at all for our guys to have their eyes completely wide opened, and to understand the abilities of this basketball team and what a very, very tough cover it's going to be. When Ohio plays well in the game tomorrow, and they'll play well, because they've been playing well, it will not be because our team wasn't excited about playing or ready to play or took them lightly, it will be because they are a tough cover and they make it very -- they do things and they have the talents to make it very difficult on you. I mean they made 13 threes against Georgetown. And Georgetown did a lot of good things against them defensively. And Georgetown threw lots of different ways to guarding the ball screen at them. And they scored regardless of whether Georgetown hedged, switched, stunted, iced, you name it, they tried it and Ohio had an answer for all of it. Q. Coach Groce was up here talking about how he actually noticed how your program handled the transition mid-season with some personnel changes, because his program subsequently had some of the same stuff happen to him. Can you talk about handling a transition mid-season with personnel and the evolution of your team from that point forward this year? COACH PEARL: Well, I think our job as a coach is to put our players in positions to be successful, to evaluate -- we are constantly evaluating our talent and the combinations of guys that are out there. You've got to make sure that the players understand that when we, as a team, are successful, you as an individual will benefit far more than if you as an individual are successful but the team fails. So there are times when guys are asked to play different roles based on who's available and who's not available. When our roster got depleted we needed to ask guys to step up and do more than what they had been doing. When guys returned to the roster, some of the guys that had stepped up went right back to the bench after a period of time. And they had to understand and accept that. So I think it's really about family, about team. I think it's about coach communicating to a team where we are and what we're doing. I think it's important that the players understand where -- what is their role. And I think oftentimes it's their job to carve it out, but it's also your job to help them understand it and help the rest of the team understand it. Q. Was D.J. Cooper on your radar at all recruiting wise. What stands out most about a freshman playing the way he's playing? By the way, his teammate Bassett thought if he had won a few more games he might be compared to John Wall a bit. But you can make that comparison, also? COACH PEARL: Two things, one, my question is were you over at the Crowne Plaza this morning at 7:00 watching film with my staff. I asked my staff who is this kid, where is he from, and why didn't we know about him? Even though he was from trick go small schools. No, I didn't know about him. But he is really good. And I don't know how tall he is. They list him at 5-11. But he plays a lot bigger than 5-11. I think he's going to be -- he plays big. He's got a good feel for the game. He's got unlimited range. He's just got a NCAA. And I think the thing about John Wall, John Wall is physically more mature, just more powerful. John Wall can't shoot it like he can. And I think it's a fair comparison because he does a lot of the things for Ohio that John Wall does for Kentucky. So I think it's a very fair comparison. Q. You guys played in the low '60s night. John Groce wants to play faster. Georgetown couldn't control tempo at Ohio, where do you think you guys are going to be? COACH PEARL: The numbers suggest that Ohio display better going fast. They do play better in the '70s and the '80s. We've been a team that's been able to win regardless of tempo. And so I think we won't try to control tempo, but you have got to value possessions because they're so good in transition and they do -- you can't let them get easy ones. It's important that we do mix in some patience and make them cover and not have it be just a track meet. Q. In a general sense, can you explain to people about this tournament in like Cornell knocking off Temple today and how close the teams are, what is the difference finally in a tournament like this against some teams? COACH PEARL: I think the thing is the teams that are left have all been through the grind of a regular season. They've all gone on the road, had their backs up against the wall, won games they weren't supposed to win, developed some toughness and chemistry. Do you understand that these kids don't want to stop playing? They desperately want this thing to continue. And so they do things that maybe they've not done before. Brian Williams, making two free throws in the closing seconds, Melvin Goins going four for five from the three. And I think that the situation with all the upsets is about match ups. And certain systems going up against other systems and sometimes the match up just brings out the worst in you. And sometimes it brings out the best in you. So you really -- it is not very predictable. There is a lot more parity. I'll tell you another factor in this, too, is in the women's game there are 15 scholarships on those teams. And in the men's there are only 13. If we went to 15 -- there are 11 schools in the Big Ten. So if you give each team three more scholarships, that's 33 more scholarships in the Big Ten, there's a chance that D.J. Cooper is in the Big Ten, not Ohio University. And so that's another reason why there's so much more parity on the men's side. Those of us in coaching, and I think many of you in the media understand this. But, you're right, I don't think the fans necessarily do. Q. Along those lines, what are the special dangers presented by a No. 14 seed that's already won one big game in tournament and that you don't maybe know much about coming in? COACH PEARL: Well, I think because of videotape and because of we have a day and a half or two days to get ready we'll know as much about Ohio, they'll know as much about us, as we'll know about a league team. We may not have history, we may not have tried and failed in certain things, but we're going to know a lot about them. I have no idea what seed they are. It doesn't matter what seed they are. It's Ohio University, they're at MAC champions and they're standing in our way of advancing to the Sweet 16. They don't care in it's Tennessee or the SEC, they don't know what our seed is. They know we have one shot in a moment and doing something very special for that school and their student-athletes. I think if you asked our guys what their seed was, you brought my whole team in here, and it will have nothing to do with their IQ, they won't know what seed Ohio is. But they can tell you they beat Georgetown last night by double digits. And they can tell you how many points their kids had. And how many points their team scored and what they're capable of. Q. A bit of a local angle, feel free to have fun with this, tell me about Keno Davis as a ball boy at Boston College. And did he learn anything? COACH PEARL: Yeah, he did. Keno has got one of the brightest minds in college basketball. He is a brilliant offensive tactician. And he gets it honest because he's a chip off the old block. Keno has been in the gym his whole life. And he's right, he was a ball boy when I was at Boston College. And I thought so much of Keno that I hired him when he graduated from the University of Iowa. His first full-time job was my assistant at Southern Indiana. He was one of the best bench -- at age 22 he was one of the best bench coaches I've ever had. He could strategize, he could game plan, he wasn't afraid to tell me what he thought. And I wasn't -- I was smart enough to listen to him. So it's been a lot of fun watching Keno pay his dues. I think he feels really good. He really likes it here. He really likes his athletic director. He really likes his president. And he really feels good about the future. He's got a good, young team. Q. What was he like as a little kid? COACH PEARL: Just a gym rat. He was in the gym all the time. He had a little wise ass in him. He was confident. And you liked that. You respected that. But I tell you what, he's -- that was when he was younger. But then as he got older he let his work do the talking. I don't know Keno now as a head coach very well, because obviously I'm busy in Tennessee. But he was efficient with his words and he let his thinking and he let his teaching kind of do the talking, just like his dad. And I'll tell you this, Tom Davis, if you made a list of the top ten coaches, all time in college basketball who either didn't get to a Final Four or probably names of some of the ones that weren't the household names, you know the household names, Tom Davis would be on that list. End of FastScripts |
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