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ATLANTIC 10 CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENTMarch 9, 2012Ramon GallowayJohn GianniniATLANTIC CITY, NEW JERSEY St. Louis – 78 COACH GIANNINI: We lost to a very good team, their record makes that obvious, but I'm telling you, it would be hard to play the game of basketball better than what St. Louis does. There is always someone more talented, I'm sure there are teams with more talent than us and than St. Louis but in terms of how they played the game they are extremely impressive. I thought on our end we got off to a bad start, after that I thought we outplayed them for good portions. Again, I think they were more solid, we made more mistakes and getting in the hole early hurt us but our kids played hard and one of the unique things about this year's team is that was a game with a minute, minute and a half, 2 minutes left. No one was leaving and that's how every single one of our loss were this year. We never had a bad game where we were out of it the whole way. A lot of times the other team, you get off to a bad start like we did today and you just never get it back. This team was in every play every single minute and I think it's a testament to how hard these kids play and we're going to miss Earl a lot but other than that we have everyone back and I think it's more of‑‑ it's certainly not an ending for the majority of the guys in that locker room and we can learn from a team like St. Louis who doesn't make many mistakes, doesn't do much to hurt themselves. THE MODERATOR: Questions for Coach? Q. You were able to get it down to 1 the second half, why couldn't you get over that hump? COACH GIANNINI: They wouldn't let us. We would have loved it if they would have let us, we really tried, they wouldn't let us. They weren't cooperative. (Chuckles.) We tried! Q. Coach, Rick Majerus was talking about how you guys deserve an NIT bid, how much would that mean? COACH GIANNINI: Big deal, big deal, we're 0‑4 to St. Louis and Temple, two good teams but we're 4‑0 against UMASS, St. Bonaventure and Xavier. We would love to be in the NIT. I think when those‑‑ that bracket is announced, you see some of the best programs in the country in that. Obviously everyone would prefer to be in the NCAA Tournament, but you're judged by the company you keep and you're going to see household names in that tournament and we would love to be among those household names and one of the better programs in the country. Q. John, with the four‑guard offense, the advantages and disadvantages are obvious and these advantages played out today but what about the disadvantages? COACH GIANNINI: It's usually rebounding but that wasn't at an extreme level today. I really can't say that, you know, I think Conklin had a good second half but Conklin had a big guy on him, that match‑up is a wash. I think typically it hurts you in terms of rebounding but tonight I don't think it hurt us a whole lot, we made mistakes, we had a guy or two not have normal good games, got in the hole early but most importantly that is as sound of a team as you can play. They're maniacal with their scouting preparation and we had one set that we executed perfectly that they had never seen and through their habits and fundamentals they covered it like a textbook something perfectly executed with good players that they had never seen before. People think highly of Coach Majerus as a coach for good reason, we lost to a good team. We could have played better, we can beat them but we would have to step it up. Q. Ramon, can you talk about the game and in terms of what it means for the season to end like this and the hopes for postseason play? RAMON GALLOWAY: It's a tough loss, we worked hard to get 21 wins for the program, stepped up from last year and to lose first round is disappointing, but we worked hard all year and like we said, we lost Earl but that's only one player and got everybody else back so we need to get back to work tomorrow, day after that. Q. Ramon, as a Philly guy you had to know about the Philly losses, was there motivation to carry the torch? RAMON GALLOWAY: It was a lot of motivation. Everybody told each other, we're the only Philly team left in the tournament so we tried to keep that as motivation so we can have our Philly pride and just La Salle pride. Q. This is your first year at La Salle, can you speak to it? RAMON GALLOWAY: As a whole it's been great. To have Coach G. coach me and the players I'm playing with and am going to continue to play with is great. To have teammates, Tyreek, Taylor, everybody on that bench is a great team and they have great chemistry, and we're family. Q. As was mentioned you guys cut the lead to 1 on two separate occasions, you went 7 minutes scoreless to open the game after scoring the first basket, can you and Ramon talk about what Coach said to you? RAMON GALLOWAY: At the beginning Coach G. told us to keep our heads and keep it together. In the game of basketball each team is going to have their runs so the score at the end of the game counts so don't caught up in the early runs, stay positive and stay together and in order for us to come back we had to get defensive stops and we brought the game down to 1, we couldn't get the defensive stop that we needed. They're a great team, they rebounded great and their defensive presence was awesome. Q. Coach, with the promising core coming back, how excited are you for next year? COACH GIANNINI: We're really excited and I think one of the big positives is I thought Steve Zack played great today and Jerrell Wright had a good year, and we played our four‑guards a lot this year because they're were our most veteran players, our most our most experienced players, consistent players, and therefore our best players, but I think our big guys are going to keep coming on and they're just going to keep getting better. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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