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NCAA MEN'S 2ND & 3RD ROUNDS: GREENSBOROMarch 17, 2012Kenny FreaseTu HollowayMark LyonsChris MackBrad RedfordDezmine WellsGREENSBORO, NORTH CAROLINA THE MODERATOR: Questions for the student‑athletes? Q. Kenny, you played high school basketball against C.J. McCollum, what do you remember of him back then and was he a standout player for them? KENNY FREASE: I remember watching him play in high school and playing against him and he's always been a prolific scorer. I remember in high school he wasn't as tall as he is now, but he's always been a really good player, he's always been a hard worker and it's not a surprise to see him where he is today. Q. Tu, this is a question for you. Talk about C.J. as well. What do you guys have to do to shut him down? Obviously he took Duke apart last night. TU HOLLOWAY: Well, C.J. McCollum is a great player, pretty difficult to go out there and just shut a NBA player down, which he is, so we're going to need myself to defend him and also the rest of my guards to just go out there and try to limit him as much as we can. Q. Kenny, following up on that, did you, when you played C.J. back in high school, think that he could play at a higher level than he's at or did you not see what he was capable of then? KENNY FREASE: I really always saw how, like I said before, how good of a scorer he was. Honestly, I didn't really‑‑ I really didn't know him that well as far as talking to him about the schools that were looking at him or whatever it was, but whatever decision he made, I'm sure him and his family and whoever he had helping him with his decision knew that that was the right place for him to be. And obviously now a chance to go to the Sweet 16, Lehigh, they got a really good program there the last couple years, and I think that he made the right decision for him. Q. Kenny, C.J. said he had a chance to talk to you last night, what did you guys say? KENNY FREASE: I saw him at halftime of the game. I just said what's up to him, told him good luck, and asked him sort of the score of the game because we didn't get to watch it on the bus. So I didn't really know what the score was. I said what's up. I hadn't seen him in a while, it was good to see him. Q. Dezmine, a lot of compliments made to C.J. and while Tu may have to take care of him, one of the compliments about C.J. is how the other players on his team are really better because of what he does. Can you talk about the way that you and the rest of the team have to play to sort of limit that? DEZMINE WELLS: Well, like Tu said, he's a great player, so no one person will shut him down. It's going to be a team effort. And the way that our defense is built, it's built for players who score like he does. So as long as we go about what we do, our defensive philosophy, we'll be good. Q. Dez, can you be a little more specific about what your defense is designed to shut down guys like him and other examples of your doing that this year? DEZMINE WELLS: Well, our defense is a pack line defense. We play inside the box. We play corners and elbows. And we‑‑ our defense is built to keep players out of the lane. We go over there and practice that and that's our defensive identity, our drills or whatever. So just to keep players out of the lane. He has a really good jump shot too, so that's just a personal challenge that whoever is going to be guarding him at the moment has got to be willing to accept, and so we just got to accept the challenge and take it on. MARK LYONS: We're a pack line defense. We keep our defense tight, and we just got to contain them. He's going to get his shots off regardless of how good of a defense we play, so he we just have to contain him and make him take tough shots. Q. Brad, Lehigh obviously comes into this game with a bit of a reputation as a Cinderella team knocking off a giant like Duke, but you guys have been here before at this level, whereas they just won their very first NCAA tournament game in program history. Does that experience for you guys help you at this stage of the game? BRAD REDFORD: I think it's definitely going to help us. Any time you have experience, we have a lot of older guys here who have been in the tournament, been in a lot of big games, but Lehigh has as well. Like Kenny said, they have been a very good team the last couple years, and they're playing very well. They have a great player and he's given those guys a lot of confidence. We just really have to focus on the task in front of us and they pose a lot of problems for us and it's a matter of just going out, executing our game plan. Q. Brad, you guys, I'm sure, are a lot more familiar with Lehigh now than you were maybe yesterday. When you look at them, did they remind you of anyone? And do you take anything away from them playing Fordham like you guys did? BRAD REDFORD: We have had a little bit of chance to look at the tape. But C.J. McCollum, their best player, we have to do a really good job of containing him and it's not just the guy that's going to be on him, it's going to be all of us collectively trying to keep him out of the lane and getting it out shooters also as well. But we'll look at some more film tonight and have a better game plan going into tomorrow. THE MODERATOR: All right. Thanks, guys. We'll take questions for coach. Q. C.J. McCollum is someone that knows Kenny Frease pretty well since they played high school ball about 11 miles apart, is he one you guys recruited out of high school? COACH MACK: Kenny Frease? (Laughter.) No, we didn't. Sometimes the hungrier kids are the ones that aren't talked about ever since they were in 8th grade about being the next coming or a Top‑50 player in the country. And it just goes to show that hard work and a belief in your self and the continuation of working on your skills can get you where you want to get to. He is an amazing player. I've already watched three games on him and talked to a few coaches that have played against him over the years and what he's done in his short time at Lehigh has been nothing short of incredible. Q. A lot of props for C.J. and well deserved, I'm guessing that on your scouting report there's more than that that you're telling your team about. Could you talk about the rest of their team? COACH MACK: Yeah, well, I think it starts, number one, with the pace in which they play. They're a very fast team, they average almost 77 points a game. You don't do that by walking the ball up, which is what we had to deal with last night. We have had trouble at times with those stretch fours, those guys that can hit 3‑point shots from their front court. And although Knutson doesn't necessarily take a ton of threes, he has a great touch. He will shoot some threes. He made a big one last night against Duke. John Adams is a guy that can do it inside and out and you can see his 3‑point percentage. And McKnight, the way he pushes the basketball really, really helps their pace. And we have a great respect for Lehigh coming in. You don't do what they did, and that is be the first team seeded 14 through 16 to beat Duke. 28‑0 I think was their record coming in against games that were seeded against teams that were seeded 14 through 16. You don't win in Greensboro Coliseum, an hour and 20 minutes from Duke's campus against an excellent Duke team if you're not really well put together yourself. Q. Can you be specific about why C.J. was not on your radar? Was it just a height issue with him as you were recruiting in high school? And also, talk about what you need to do to stop him specifically. COACH MACK: Well, I don't know if there's anything that you can do to stop him. You have to make his looks as tough as possible. Even in games they have lost, he's taken an awful lot of shots. He takes 18 to 20 shots. The difference I told our team is does he go 1‑19 or does he go 5‑19. We have got to do a great job of being there on the catch. We have to do a great job of contesting his shots and being able to not get knocked off on his drives. He does a great job of bumping you legally, creating space to get separation for his jumper. And it's a big challenge to our back court. As to why we didn't recruit him, recruiting is a crap shoot. For every C.J. McCollum out there, there's a bunch of C.J. Smiths you never heard of that had similar type of stats in high school. Again, if we all had crystal balls and we could figure out who that kid would be walking out the door of Xavier versus who he was walking in the door, it would be a lot more winning records in college basketball and a lot happier coaches. Q. I have a two‑part question. One, when you're looking at Lehigh, are you able to look at the Fordham game that you played against Fordham that they played as kind of maybe a litmus test of comparison to seeing what kind of team they are? And two, can you give us an update on Andre Walker? COACH MACK: Number one, I probably won't watch the Fordham game simply because Fordham plays all two‑three zone and I'm not going to get an idea of what Lehigh's going to run against us, having seen them in person a little bit last night, and then watched them in several highly competitive games down the stretch again, I think just like Notre Dame was more of a team we saw over the last four to five weeks than who they were in November and December, same thing applies to Lehigh. We're going to worry about who they have been over the last two to three weeks. And Andre is here with us. We're going to have a light practice, and we'll probably keep him out just for precautionary reasons. But I fully anticipate him being able to play tomorrow night. Q. You mentioned Lehigh and their ability to push the ball and a lot of that stems from their defensive pressure. What concerns you most about their defense? COACH MACK: Well, they're very, very scouting specific. They really try to take away your strengths and they really try to exploit what you're not good at. And then you combine a guy ‑‑ you put a guy on the floor like C.J. McCollum who's Top‑5 in the country in steals, they really pressure back court. So I think that they have a very good mix of being athletic but also being cerebral and understanding what you're not at your best. And I think that's what they have done in the majority of their games this year. So we just have to make sure that offensively we move the ball from side to side, we exhibit patience when we need to, we push the ball, and we really try to get the ball into the paint. When we get the ball into the paint via post feeds, via drives, via offensive rebounds, and we get to the free throw line, that's when we're at our best and that can't be any different tomorrow night. Q. One of the nice compliments about C.J. is he makes the rest of his team rise up and play better. In defending him, you will have things you'll want to do there, but what about the rest of the team as far as helping make it so he doesn't make the rest of his team better? What does the rest of your squad have to do? COACH MACK: It's easier said than done but what we have to do is we have to keep their guards out of the lane. When they get into the lane, options open up for them. The drive kick, if you stay too tight on the shooter in the corner, and they shoot the pull up jump shot but it starts with where are they making that play from? Are they making it outside the lane or getting inside the lane? And so when a ball screen's set, we have to do a great job of forming a wall so they can't get in there. And we just have to do a good job on guarding the basketball and dribble penetration. Again, easier said than done. That's why their record is what it is. They have got two highly charged, energetic playmakers that we're going to have to do a really good job of containing. THE MODERATOR: All right. Thank you, coach. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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