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NCAA MEN'S 2ND & 3RD ROUNDS: CLEVELAND

March 20, 2011

Kris Joseph

CLEVELAND, OHIO

Marquette Â– 66
Syracuse - 62

THE MODERATOR: We're joined by Syracuse head coach Jim Boeheim and student-athletes Rick Jackson and Kris Joseph. Coach, an opening statement.
COACH BOEHEIM: I thought it was a great game. I thought both teams just went at it for 40 minutes, and it really came down to Crowder hit a big 3 to tie it, and we made a really costly turnover on the inbounds play, and Odom hit a great 3. Hit two big shots and they just made the winning plays at the end of the game.
THE MODERATOR: Questions for the student-athletes.

Q. Rick, it was such a hard game, such a fiercely contested game against teams that obviously know each other very well. I mean, can you talk about what's going through your mind in those last 90 seconds? You made that huge bank shot and it looked like OT. What do you think happened there in the last 90 seconds?
RICK JACKSON: You know, I knew it was going to be a fight down to the last minute. Marquette is a good team. They've got good players. You've got to defend. You can't let nobody shoot.
And I think we just had a little breakdown at the end, and guys got open and good players make open shots. Can't leave nobody open, and that's what happened.

Q. Rick, they were sending a second guy at you most of the day. Can you talk about what you had to do and how that affected the whole offense?
RICK JACKSON: You know, they was double-teaming me every time I got the ball. All I could do was really just try to take my time. And I knew I was going to get doubled, but I tried to find my teammates and find guys that was open, and I really just tried to be a playmaker today.

Q. Kris, you faced them. You've seen their speed getting up and down the floor. Was it difficult to adjust when you guys took the big lead and then they came at you after some of those turnovers?
KRIS JOSEPH: That was the story of the game; we turned the ball over quite a bit. And they're a team who pushed the ball whether it was a made or a missed basket, and we have to do a better job getting that.
THE MODERATOR: Thank you, gentlemen. Questions for Coach.

Q. Jim, kind of the same question I had for Rick, could you talk about how they ran the double-team at him and how that affected you?
COACH BOEHEIM: We knew they were going to. Everybody's been doing it the last couple of weeks. Ricky made some great plays out of there. We made a couple of turnovers out of that but he made some great passes out, and in the second half we didn't make the shots. We were 1 for 8 from the 3 in the second half. We had really good looks. In the first half we made them; the second half we didn't.
They took the ball out of his hands, they weren't going to let him get to the basket, and he made good plays out of there. We got some open shots. Our offense was fine, except for the turnovers, the turnovers ended up being the difference in the basketball game, and they hit the two big shots at the end.

Q. How much does it hurt not having Brandon Triche in the game at the end there? Did that change your offense?
COACH BOEHEIM: Dion did a good job, so I'm happy with Dion offensively. It hurts our defense a little bit. But Brandon took such a hard fall, you know, he wanted to try to go back, but I just -- I just didn't think he could do it. I just didn't think he was able to go. And we would have liked to have had him at the end.

Q. Did it look like a back court violation from what you saw?
COACH BOEHEIM: I didn't see it. I couldn't see.
We had a freshman taking it out, and he just didn't wait a second -- he needed to wait for Scoop to get clear a little bit, and just one of those things.

Q. James played a lot tonight, C.J. played a lot, but Baye didn't look healthy on the bench. Did they play more because he was sick? Or what was going on with Baye?
COACH BOEHEIM: No, they just weren't ready for the physical nature of this game, our two freshmen. They just weren't ready for it, those two big guys.

Q. Can you talk about the freshman inbounding it? Do you put it more on him inbounding or Scoop for not catching it in the back court?
COACH BOEHEIM: It was just miscommunication. We were looking for Kris first, and he was covering, and Scoop was coming back, and I think he just needed to wait a second for him to get clear. And it was just a miscommunication. It's not one guy. It's one play.

Q. Can you talk about how the offense changed when Jimmy Butler went and guarded Scoop Jardine instead of Joseph in the second half?
COACH BOEHEIM: He's a good defender, but that wasn't a concern of ours. We don't want Scoop to score, we just want to get the ball to Ricky, and we were able to do that. We got the shots we'd like. We had six charges. We've talked about that all year, just a couple were okay, but six offensive fouls is way too many.

Q. Brandon on the bench for so long, but Dion really picked it up for you and seemed to be aggressive. You talked about the other two freshmen that weren't ready. Dion obviously was.
COACH BOEHEIM: Dion and C.J. played very well. Dion had a tremendous second half. He really took what was there. He made some great plays on the offensive end.
THE MODERATOR: Thank you, Coach.

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