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NCAA MEN'S 2ND & 3RD ROUNDS: CHARLOTTEMarch 17, 2011Edward JoynerDarrion PellumBrandon TunnellCHARLOTTE, NORTH CAROLINA THE MODERATOR: Questions for the student athletes from Hampton. Q. Darrion, I wonder if you remember where were you in 2001 when Hampton beat Iowa State? DARRION PELLUM: Prep school. Q. Do you remember watching that game? DARRION PELLUM: Not at all. Q. You guys know about it. DARRION PELLUM: Yeah, we know about it. Q. Obviously everyone brings up no 16 has beaten a number 1. Does what happened in 2001 give you any confidence that maybe that doesn't apply or that you can break the mold for either of you? DARRION PELLUM: A lot of confidence especially ever since we found out what we was going to play. We've been hearing it all day on campus. We just took that that hopefully we can make that come true again. Q. Brandon, just curious, the attitude you guys taking once you guys saw who you were playing and I'm curious if any of you guys are kind of Duke fans at all, watching them on TV all the time? BRANDON TUNNELL: Yeah, definitely. At practice Coach Joyner uses Duke for a lot of knowledge about how we should play hard, how we should play like Duke. Actually, when we saw it pop-up on the screen we were very excited. After it settled in, we flip back into game mode. We understand number 16 has never been number 1. That's the beauty of it. It makes us play that much harder. Q. How many times have you guys seen the replay of the 2001 game and is it, you know, something that they show you on recruiting trips and also this week, how much have you seen it? DARRION PELLUM: It's kind of funny you ask that because we haven't even seen the tape yet. We talked a lot about it and heard about it from the people on campus. We haven't really seen the tape. Q. I just wonder with AAU ball or anything like that, are you familiar with any of the Duke players, have you played against them, with them, or do either of you guys know any of these guys? DARRION PELLUM: Not really. Dawkins, maybe because he's from my area. I played at the gym with him a couple times and stuff like that. Other than that, not really. BRANDON TUNNELL: Nolan Smith, you got Seth Curry, I can't even remember any of teams that they actually played for. I know I remember seeing them like playing against them at AAU. Q. How has Buck kept you guys loose this week? He's pretty much a player's coach. How has he been keeping you loose? DARRION PELLUM: He's basically the same all the year, wild, happy, excited. We come to practice, he does that. I think that goes a long way with us. Q. Tell us your better story about him being wild and crazy at practice or a game. DARRION PELLUM: We were just especially for a tough game. Everybody is focused. He'll come in there and get everybody, us in the middle and just be quiet and start yelling out of nowhere. He's just saying I'm playing or something like that. Get everybody back in a good mood. That goes a long way with us than we would to have an open practice, everybody not so focused but focused at the same time. Q. What are you guys going to have to do to keep close with Duke? What are the priorities when you guys tip it off? DARRION PELLUM: I think main thing just staying focused. They're a great shooting team, 1 through the 5. I think we get to the shooters, it will be an okay game. THE MODERATOR: Any other questions? Okay. Thank you guys. DARRION PELLUM: Appreciate it. COACH EDWARD JOYNER, JR.: I guess I start, we're happy to be here. We're happy to be playing a traditional power such as Duke. It's a good chance to measure where you are as a program and where you are. We've got a lot of young men excited by this opportunity and ready to get on the Court and see what we can do and how we measure up. I guess that's about it. THE MODERATOR: Questions. Coach, your players said that they've never seen a tape or any replay of that 2001 upset over Iowa State, the 15 seed. Any reason that that wasn't used as potentially motivation this week being the ten-year anniversary of it? COACH EDWARD JOYNER, JR.: Everything I believe is timing. It ain't the right time yet. Trust me, they're going to see it tonight along with Miracle, Rudy, anything else you can find. If y'all got any suggestions, you can give it to me, but they will see it tonight and along with anything else we can get to pump them up to try to come out and get a ballgame. I think they're already pumped up. Anything to show them it has and should be done. Q. Just out of curiosity, where were you in your career for that win? Did you watch it or anything? COACH EDWARD JOYNER, JR.: Actually I did. I was here. I'm a graduate of John C. Smith University here in Charlotte. Went to high school in Charlotte. I was actually here and one of the people who was sitting on the edge of their seat watching the game and amazed that it was done. Ten years later I got the opportunity to possibly, you know, make history again. No disrespect to Iowa State, they ain't Duke. We're going to go out there and try. Q. Buck, what do you tell the guys? Obviously they know about Duke and everything. What -- Xs and Os, what you do you tell them they don't know. COACH EDWARD JOYNER, JR.: One thing with respect for Duke, they're one of a handful of teams in the country that play for this moment, you know. Part -- let's mirror some of what they do. I probably -- my father and my uncle are by far my mentors as coaches and the two best coaches I've ever seen in my life. The third one probably is Mike Krzyzewski. So I've watched every interview, anything he's ever done up to this point now. One thing that he's always said that once you get to this point, every game in a National Championship and you play every game like it's a National Championship. This is our National Championship. Now, if you're lucky enough to make history Saturday or Sunday, we'll be the next National Championship. Any game you play from this point on, it is what it is. You got to show up, you got to play and leave it all on the Court. That's what we're going to do and let the chips fall where they may from there. Q. Can you talk about your days at Smith and also Coach Steve Joyner's effect on your career? COACH EDWARD JOYNER, JR.: First of all, I love Charlotte. It's home. You know, I was born in Winston-Salem and spent a good part of my life there, but when we moved to Charlotte, I took to Charlotte as home. I graduated from Harding high school. From there I went to John C. Smith University. I think that made me the person and the man that I am today. Steve Joyner, I think everybody from Charlotte who has dealt with the university who knows him know that he's a different person. He's a great man. If I could be half the person he was, I ain't worried about coaching. If I can be half of the person that he was, you know, my life, everything will fall into place. He took me in in high school, treated me as one of his sons. His sons are my brothers. Believe it or not, when I go places and people say I saw your father, I have no idea who they talking about. I know it's one of them, either my father or either Steve. We don't even question it. We just laugh about it. My uncle's wife, we were at a funeral, I think I was talking to John about it one time when we in Winston. She came up to me and said some lady just gave me a handful. She came and was real, real nasty towards me. I was like, what happened? Then mind you, she's my aunt. She said, it's a shame how you do your son up in Virginia. I don't see you at none of his games. You don't ever go. She said all she could do was shake her head and smile and said, I'm going to call him and apologize. When the lady told her that, she said I'm at all my son's games. My little cousin is the women's coach at Winston-Salem State. She makes every game. The lady gave it to her. The effect that Coach Joyner has had on my life and anybody that's dealt with that program has been tremendous, and it's because of him that I'm sitting here today, that I am the man that I am today. Q. Coach, Monday Seth Curry was saying growing up in Charlotte, he used to attend your father's camp at John C. Smith. Did you ever work those, and do you remember him? COACH EDWARD JOYNER, JR.: Actually, I know Seth well. He -- his brother and a bunch of those kids, they grew up in our gym, and it's kind of amazing to me to see them, you know, grow to the players that they are and now I have to face him. So I'm going to talk to them all day tomorrow all the times we worked together, the little sodas or pointers I might have given him, do me a favor and don't play as well as you should. No. It's great to see those kids grow the way that they have, and it's ironic we all get to be here together and what better picture can you write, what better script can you write? For my first tournament, growing up in Winston and being born in Winston and winning the MEAC, two weeks ago, me and my wife were sitting in the car talking. I told her, you know what would be a great story, because she knew that growing up I was a huge Duke fan, huge, and I said we would go to Winston, everybody in Winston would be there, we'll win the tournament at Winston. Then we'll get the pick, go to Charlotte and we'll play Duke, and I'll be dog if it didn't happen. I guess you got to be careful of what you ask for. It is what it is. Q. How is the ticket distribution going? Is that a long list or how is that working? COACH EDWARD JOYNER, JR.: I've been avoiding everybody. I actually cut my phone off. I'm going to have a large amount of family members there, large amount of people here, you know, watching the game somewhere, and everybody is excited, everybody is excited. I'm not ashamed to tell you I'm relishing in the moment. I love it. This is what I dreamed of. This is -- when Theo Smalling passed last year, me and his mom talk. This is one thing we talked about and text each other from day-to-day now. One thing she always tell me, enjoy it, Coach, enjoy it, Coach. Theo is up there enjoying it. That's what I tell the team, enjoy it. That ain't telling you that we are not going to come out and try to win a ballgame. We are going to come try to win this ballgame. You believe that. But we're going to enjoy this moment. I'm going to enjoy this moment. This is definitely a dream come true. I am not taking the smile off my face since Saturday whenever the last tick went off that clock. We're going to be ready to come play and we're going to have a good time. Q. Playing a team like Duke, you guys can't change much. What do you kind of go into this game just the same game plan that you've had for other teams? COACH EDWARD JOYNER, JR.: The difference in playing a team like Duke, they got -- they have no weaknesses when it come to the kids and the talent of kids that we have. We're going to have to play a complete game. We're going to have to play 40 minutes and then we're going to have to add 110 percent of effort on top of that. We understand that. But we also got to be who we are. I got Kwame Morgan probably took just as many shots as Jimmer Fredette. He's my second leading scorer. We're ugly on offense. We're going to try to play defense and try to get in transition and that's just who we are. We feel like if we're able to rebound, there will be better chances for us to score. But we understand who Duke is. We going to come play. We're going to come play. I don't think it's nothing that we can change now. You're not going to surprise Nolan Smith, trust me. When I -- when we first found out who we were playing, I did the normal thing that I think everybody do, we going to go out there and press them and get the ball out of Nolan Smith. Then I watch tape and say nobody in the country did it. I doubt if I'm going to be able to. Might as well just let our kids do what they've done all year and see if that works for us. THE MODERATOR: Any other questions? Okay. Thank you, Coach. Go get them tomorrow. COACH EDWARD JOYNER, JR.: Thank you. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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