	products recent interviews FastScripts archive about ASAP Sports

Our Clients:

Browse by Sport

Find us on

Subscribe to RSS

Click to go to
Asaptext.com

View our
e-Brochure

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

March 19, 2010

Glen Rice, Jr.

MILWAUKEE, WISCONSIN

Georgia Tech Â– 64
Oklahoma State - 59

DENNIS KRAUSE: We're joined by Georgia Tech Head Coach Paul Hewitt and student-athletes Gani Lawal and Derrick Favors and Glen Rice. We'll start with Coach Hewitt, please.
COACH HEWITT: That was a really good team we just beat. When I saw the name go up, I remember seeing them a couple of times. I didn't know a lot about them. John O'Connor, my assistant coach who had to scout, we started watching. And I'll tell you, a couple of times we called each other throughout the week. It was like, wow, these guys are really good.
They run some outstanding offense. They constantly keep you moving, and if you're not alert they can get easy shots. I thought our guys did an outstanding defensive job. And that's even with giving up 50 percent from the floor. I thought our guys were tremendous defensively taking them out of some of their pet plays. And after playing against a guy like Anderson, who is clearly one of the top five players in the country, I thought we stayed really disciplined defensively. Didn't foul too much, contested shots, and played a really solid basketball game against a very good team.
DENNIS KRAUSE: Questions for the student-athletes.

Q. Can you talk about defending the 3-pointer? Of course, that was the thing coming in, and you guys held them 6 of 22 on the night.
GANI LAWAL: They were a good 3-point shooting team. They like to do that. That was one of their strengths coming in. Obviously Anderson, Keit Page, Muonelo, we just wanted to show them our screens and be there and not let them get clean looks. They did a great job. Like I talked to you guys before the games here, we wanted to carry our defensive effort from Greensboro to here, and that's what you saw tonight.

Q. Derrick, today, during the season, you guys score points down low, get rebounds. What's something you all going into today knowing the two big guys down there to dominate down low to set the tempo for the team?
DERRICK FAVORS: Me personally, I try to get every rebound that comes off it and try to post up as strong as I can, and if they kick it out, but mainly just get rebounds.

Q. Gani, the job that Iman did on Anderson, can you talk about that? He was clearly struggling some offensively, but did he make up for it on the other end?
GANI LAWAL: Coming into this game, Anderson was their top guy. It was definitely a team effort, but you can't take away what Iman did. Iman really stepped up to the challenge. He was there on James pretty much every catch he got, contested shots, and we did a good job on him. He's a good player like coach said and wanted to limit his touches and kind of keep him out of a rhythm.

Q. Talk a little bit about the free-throw shooting, 24 of 25. You were 64.5 percent of the team this year. How big was it to hit the free throws down the stretch?
GANI LAWAL: Just practice, practice, practice. They were falling tonight. We've had some tough nights this year, but we had a good night tonight. We're going to keep practicing doing what we're doing and hopefully they keep going in like this.

Q. Did you realize when your last basket from the field was?
GANI LAWAL: No, when was it?

Q. 8:19 to go.
GANI LAWAL: That's good.

Q. Keiton Page scored, hit two 3-pointers early and another basket and had 8 points early. But you guys really didn't let him shoot the rest of the game. He had another one or two field goals after the eight minute mark of the first half. What did you do to let him not get a look at the basket?
GLEN RICE, JR.: Just made an adjustment and to be there on every catch he got, close out strong, and try to make them, if anything, go to the basket and not get any 3s off.

Q. Gani, can you talk about the tone you set at the free-throw line and how the team did tonight?
GANI LAWAL: Like I just said, it was practice, practice, practice. We shot the ball very well. We pressed them all the time and we shot great tonight. This is tremendous, 24 of 25. That's probably the best we shot all year at the best time of the year, so great.

Q. What are your thoughts on a possible match-up Sunday against Ohio State?
GANI LAWAL: They've got to have a game to play. We're going to get ready for whoever we play, whether it's UC Santa Barbara or Ohio State.

Q. You guys had a 3-point lead, James Anderson had the ball, he dribbled into some traffic, you guys stopped him. Can you describe what happened on that play?
GANI LAWAL: Our defense was great. I've been saying it all week. Our defense was great. We got our hands on it. Got a scramble, came up with the ball. We knew the guys who we wanted to go to, and we came up with a big play.

Q. What was the feeling when they reset the shot clock there at the end to go from 1 to 34?
GANI LAWAL: Just a great break. We got some tough breaks this year, man. Shot at Maryland, shot at Miami, buzzer beat us. It was a great break our way and a great play by Moe to get the ball on the rim.
DENNIS KRAUSE: Thank you. You're free to go. Questions for Coach Hewitt.

Q. Paul, can you talk specifically about what you did to stop Anderson the whole game and the adjustments that Glen talked about on Page?
COACH HEWITT: Iman Shumpert is a great defender. He may have some ups and downs sometimes offensively, decision-making may be up and down, but he's a great defender. Should have been all-defense in the ACC. And I thought he, first of all, did a great job. And secondarily, I thought our big guys did a good job of showing and recovering.
We always talk about helping the helper around here, and when Iman did need help, somebody was there and then somebody was there to help that help guy. So, again, they shot 50 percent. People may look at the stat sheet and say they riddle, but our guys put out a great defensive effort against a very good offensive team.

Q. Have you ever been involved in a game like this where you didn't get a field goal in the final 8:19 and miss it with the line of a great defense?
COACH HEWITT: Not that I recall. I'm very happy for Gani because he did set the tone. He had a game earlier in the year, went 17 out of 20 from the free-throw line, and he has a DVD of all the free throws he made in that game. I told him to keep watching that and recapture that feeling. When he stepped up made those first two, that was a great sign for us. He set a positive tone from that line.

Q. Any regrets for calling timeout after you saw Peacock shot go?
COACH HEWITT: The only thing I had going through my head was we didn't have the possession arrow. I think it was a one-point game at the time. I felt I had to call it. It was a mistake, obviously, but like Gani said, we finally caught a break.

Q. I wonder if you did anything unique to work on free throws, keep anybody late or just know the basics?
COACH HEWITT: We have several different free-throw shooting games that we play. The one we're doing now you have to make three in a row before you can get a credit for your team. We have another game where you have to swish it for it to count. If you hit the rim or miss, it's a minus or a no credit.
So we're doing the three-in-a-row game right now. And we're a good -- our guys can make free throws, we just don't happen to make them sometimes in the game.

Q. Just like some other teams, you're lucky to have a very young team, and potentially -- you're lucky to have a young team where they can contribute right away, especially when you're starting five. What's something you told your freshmen coming into this year now that you know they have the tournament under their belt?
COACH HEWITT: You know what? The thing I try to make sure they understand is these opportunities are fleeting and don't allow this opportunity to go by and then realize five, ten years from now, boy, we had a really good team and we didn't capitalize on it. There were times this year where I wasn't sure if they quite understood that.
But as the year went on, you could see them really stepping it up and, mentally we're really locking in. Like Gani said, we just had some bad breaks throughout the year. And I was really proud that they never crumbled they never fell apart. They continued to build, and here we are.

Q. How many credits would you get for as many free throws you knocked down tonight?
COACH HEWITT: Do the math. Let's see, three into that, that's eight, right? Eight credits.

Q. Having such obvious talent but also being so young, can you talk about the challenge you've had in getting this team on the right path?
COACH HEWITT: The challenge for me really ended about ten games to go in the year, because I really felt like we got it. And unfortunately we didn't have wins to show for it. Now, early in the year, it was challenging. Let me tell you, it was challenging. It was really challenging. We talk about shot selection and commitment to defense throughout the whole 35 seconds of the possession. Fouling too much. But about ten games to go, and our record doesn't reflect it, I really felt like this team was starting to play good basketball. To rehash it, you haven't covered us, but we lost the buzzer beater at Miami. We lost an unbelievable game at Maryland which was a great game, unless you're on our end of it. Then we got to the ACC tournament. We got a couple of breaks. People didn't shoot quite as well. And now here we are. We make free throws, we get another break. Who knows. That's what it's about this time of the year. Just play great defense, which we know we can do. Rebound the heck out of the ball, which we know we can do. And hope you have something go right for you at the end.

Q. When did you guys hear about the starting lineup change for them, and how did you guys approach them having the four guard --
COACH HEWITT: You know what, they actually went back to -- that's the lineup they've been starting. Then on the sheet that was handed to me, they had a lineup change. But actually they went back to the lineup we had prepared for. We thought they were going to start Moses and Pilgrim. That's the sheet that they had. But when we got to the game, they announced that they had Muonelo in there with Gulley. Gulley, actually. That's the line they've been using the whole time.

Q. Oklahoma State had a bit of a momentum jump going into halftime there. What was your message to your team at halftime? Because clearly you --
COACH HEWITT: Get loose balls. Get loose balls. I thought we were standing around. I thought Page made an unbelievable play when he dove and knocked that ball free. There were a couple times we were flat footed. They were getting loose balls going out in transition. I think they outscored us 9 nothing in transition. It was on the strength of getting loose balls. There wasn't much else. I thought we were getting the ball inside strong. I thought we were a little weak with the ball and a little weak with our effort going after loose ones.

End of FastScripts

ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297