|
|||
|
|||
|
 |
|
|
SOUTHEASTERN CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENTMarch 10, 2012Terrance HenryMurphy HollowayAndy KennedyNEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA Vanderbilt – 65 CLAUDE FELTON: We're joined by Coach Andy Kennedy and student‑athletes Terrance Henry and Murphy Holloway. We'll start with an opening statement from coach and then take questions for the student‑athletes. COACH KENNEDY: Proud of my guys' effort. Really battled, gave ourselves a chance. Obviously a couple of keys didn't go our way. Our inability to string together consecutive offensive possessions has been Achilles heel of ours all year, and it obviously came home to rest today. And our inability to find John Jenkins, what a terrific shooter and single‑handedly, he put them in the championship game with his shooting, the timelines of it. I thought our zone was effective at times, and then we would lose him and he made us pay time and time again. I think Vanderbilt, I told Kevin this, I think that they're really poised to make a run. Tomorrow obviously, it will be difficult in this neutral environment, but I think once they get into the NCAA tournament, I think that he's got his team playing where they could really stay awhile. CLAUDE FELTON: We'll take questions for the student‑athletes. Q. You had consecutive steals there with a little over six minutes to go. You were down five. Did you feel like that was maybe the biggest missed opportunity y'all had? MURPHY HOLLOWAY: It was. I guess it was. We didn't score off the steal, so I guess it was a missed opportunity. I feel like coach said, losing John Jenkins like coach said at the end of the game, I think that was maybe our biggest mistake when he hit that big shot. Q. Talk about fatigue, your legs, how fresh you felt in the second half . TERRANCE HENRY: I felt like fatigue wasn't really a factor. We were playing for our season, playing to get to the NCAA tournament, and you can't get tired at this point in the season. MURPHY HOLLOWAY: I feel the same way. Man, just wasn't no fatigue, man, because ain't no matter how many games you play, when you're playing to try to reach a goal, you don't even think about being tired. Q. Scoreless in the first half, you hit eight points for the game. What were they doing on you and what did you find challenging about getting your shot off? TERRANCE HENRY: It wasn't really challenging. I was just getting too deep. I wasn't jump stopping, wasn't sticking to playing my game. Jeffery Taylor did a great job defending me tonight and we just got to look ahead. Q. Do y'all think y'all advocates for the tournament, do you think you're a game short, what are your thoughts on it? TERRANCE HENRY: I really don't know. Hopefully they show us some love, the committee tomorrow. But we just happy to still be playing basketball, if that's the case. MURPHY HOLLOWAY: Man, me, I think like it's up to the committee now. I think that we let this one slip, so it's up to them, not us anymore. CLAUDE FELTON: All right. We'll excuse the student‑athletes and take questions for coach. Q. Same question I had for Terrance and Murph, now that the game is lost, do you think that there's still a case for the NCAA tournament or is it one short? COACH KENNEDY: I don't know. I don't know that. I know that we have basketball to play. I know that there will be basketball in our future. Where is that? I don't know. Any time that you no longer have a say in that by having an opportunity to win games, obviously it's not the place that you want to be. Q. The players said they didn't think fatigue was a factor. It kind of looked from our perspective at times that guys were running out of gas. What did you see from your sideline? COACH KENNEDY: I appreciate them saying that because that's what we're telling them. The practicality of it is, obviously you play three games in three days, it's like my voice, three games in three days, it kind of leaves you at times. But for us, it was just ‑‑ basketball, you guys know, you cover it for a living. But it just comes down to a play here and a play there, making a shot, getting a stop, being where you're supposed to be. There's some telling things that we have to do to be successful. And the thing that jumps off the page at me when I look at the stat sheet is we get out‑rebounded and we're not very successful when we get out‑rebounded. And we get four offensive rebounds. Reg going down early, obviously that affected that. Some other guys, like Murphy Holloway does not get an offensive rebound,, Terrance Henry does not get an offensive rebound. Nick Williams does not get an offensive rebound. Then if you had told me that going into the game I would have said, Hey, it probably is not going to work out for us, and that certainly was the case. Q. You talked about the team's effort a lot during this stretch, where did that come from? There were times during the season that it looked like the effort might not have been the same, particularly the Vanderbilt game in Oxford. Could you address that and could you talk about, is this the closest you feel like you've been in watching the selection shows since you've been at Ole Miss? COACH KENNEDY: I don't know. It's difficult. This is a difficult part of being the coach, because you got so much going on through your head and you got a million things you're trying to deal with, and it's really‑‑ I don't have time to reflect on six years. I felt like we were in control of our own destiny a number of times coming to this tournament. I think it was Atlanta, maybe Nashville, I can't remember, but we have been in a position where we could close the door, and we haven't been able to get that done. So ultimately, no, the power is out of our control and that's not a place that you want to be at this time of year. Q. Nick's held scoreless, Terrance has eight. What were they doing to them or was it just them not being able to make their shots? COACH KENNEDY: We knew that coming into the game that Vanderbilt, how they were going to defend us. Ultimately we try to put our guys in a position to make plays. When your two leading scorer's are your two freshmen, Jarvis and Snoop, that's not going to bode well for you either. You got to have guys step up. If it wasn't for Nick in the game that he had in round one, we wouldn't have been here very long. Terrance made huge plays last night or we wouldn't be in this position. We have to have guys make plays, and for whatever reason, tonight we weren't as productive as we needed to be. And for them, when you look at it, if you would have told me, Hey, Jeffery Taylor's going to have two points, and Exeli's going to go scoreless, I would say, Boy, I like our chances there, most especially after what happened to us the first time we played. Again Jenkins is a tremendous player. And he struggled early. And again, he is such a good player, it never shook him. I think he was probably, I don't know what it was at half, but I know he missed a ton of shots early and it didn't seem like he was in rhythm. I told our team at halftime that I really believed the first half, if you would have asked me to scripted it‑‑ say for Reg going down for an injury, I would have scripted it just like it played out because I thought it was kind of a lethargic game. That plays into our hands. We bought 20 minutes playing three games in three days. I would much rather play a 20‑minute game than a 40‑minute game. And it was right there for us. And then John Jenkins said, Hey, this thing's getting close, hit two big ones. We left him a couple times when we were trying to trap him, which I thought was effective, but again didn't make the proper rotation. He made us pay. They advance. We go home. Q. Those two possessions after he got steals, and it seemed like maybe that was your best chance to make a run back at them. COACH KENNEDY: Well, I agree. We made some plays with some athleticism in the open floor. When we extended the floor, it scared me to death ‑‑ when you got a shooter like Jenkins, because we extended the floor, but it helped us, they turned it over, gave us possessions. And then our inability to score those, I can't tell you how many times this year we have had guys have and‑one opportunities and we go 0‑3. We leave three points on the table with the inability to finish. And then obviously at .338 and fading in the nation in free‑throw shooting, it's a miracle that this team has won 20 games. That would be a good study for you to do in the off‑season. How many teams in the country have ever won 20 games regardless of class, that were .330 or above in free throw percentage. That's an incredible thing now when you're that poorly or that inefficient from the foul line and still find ways. That's why I was proud of the guys' effort. Our execution failed us and that's why we're sitting here today. Q. I thought another big guy for them was Johnson off the bench. He had a couple and‑one situations in that second half. Talk about him. COACH KENNEDY: I like their freshmen. I like their team. They have a good team. I thought Brad Tinsley made some big shots for them a couple of times at the end of the shot clock. We fouled Jenkins on three. We slowed the game and had the game at our pace, and then our inability to keep Number 2, Johnson, in front of us. Parker hit a couple threes. It was a good team effort and that's what teams do. Vanderbilt's got a good basketball team. When their other guys are struggling, you find other guys to step up. Snoop did that for us. Kept us within striking distance, came out and was aggressive off the dribble, showed some real promise. I thought played really well for us the last half of the season. Q. What was the exact nature of Reg's injury there? COACH KENNEDY: Ankle sprain. I didn't see it. My trainer told me at halftime that he was surprised‑‑ I shouldn't say surprised, but he was please that had Reg was fighting through it. So it must have‑‑ I didn't see it. You guys have the monitor. I don't know the severity of it, but he said that he tweaked his ankle. He came back. We tried to keep him warm as much as possible, but obviously in 19 minutes with him having two rebounds, he was not nearly as effective as we would have hoped. CLAUDE FELTON: All right. Thank you. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
|
||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
About ASAP Sports •
FastScripts Archive •
Recent Interviews •
Captioning •
Upcoming Events •
Contact Us
FastScripts | Events Covered | Our Clients | Other Services | ASAP in the News | Site Map | Job Opportunities | Links |
|
ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297
|