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BIG EAST CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENTMarch 14, 2013JayVaughn PinkstonJay WrightNEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK LOUISVILLE- 74 COACH WRIGHT: I just want to congratulate Louisville. They played an outstanding game. Their guards completely dominated the game. 18 turnovers in the first half was just a credit to them. The game was allowed to be played very physical. It was very fair. We just did not respond to the physical play. That's what happens, you turn the ball over like that. But you've got to give them credit. I thought they were well prepared. A lot of things we did against them the first time in the press, they took away. I think we didn't physically respond well enough, and that was the difference. Q. Jay, we're in the time where referees do let players decide the game. Last five‑game stretch, I think you're averaging 17, 18 turnovers. Obviously, it's to say a worrisome trend. As you go forward, how do you address it? COACH WRIGHT: That's our weakness as a team. We don't have that jet guard that can just break down a defense. So we've got to do it. We've got to do it bypassing and precision, execution, and that's been our consistency‑‑ our inconsistency this year is sometimes we execute, and that's very difficult to do. If you've got a really good quick guard that can make great decisions and break down a press, that's easier to do, but if you don't have that guy, you've got to really execute, and we have done it at times. The first time we played Louisville, we did it well. I thought we did a decent job the second half last night, but we did not do it today. You start off the game that way, and you make 18 turnovers in the first half, you just‑‑ It's a big difference coming out and playing from behind nine points in the second half than it being a tie game and then pressing you and the shots they take, there's a big difference. I thought that was them getting that nine completely at halftime and still being able to press was big. Q. Jay, when Rick was in here, he mentioned how turning you over and keeping you off the foul line was part of their game. Was that more of their guard getting up on you and pressuring you and making you uncomfortable? COACH WRIGHT: Yeah, we could‑‑ once you get behind on them, they're not the kind of team you can press and turnover. They've got great guards and great quickness. The first half was the key. They didn't allow us to get the ball up into the front court where we could get the ball inside and get to the foul line. J.P. (JayVaughn Pinkston) and Mouph (Mouphtaou Yarou) here, when we got the ball inside, were pretty effective. We couldn't get the ball over half‑court. It was their guards. Their guards were in us, man. They did a heck of job. That takes a lot of effort. They were very, very good. Q. Jay, so what is the next three days going to be like? What kind of a wait will it be for you guys, and what do you do? COACH WRIGHT: Mike, I think we've got a good enough resume, but I honestly haven't been able to‑‑ I haven't followed it to know it well enough. So I will‑‑ believe it or not, I have people around us that follow this very closely. I'll get all the info about where we are. We have class tomorrow. So we'll try to get back tomorrow morning early so we'll get the class, and these guys will get a day off tomorrow. We'll regroup on Saturday, and then we'll see where we are. I know we'll be playing in some postseason, and this group loves each other. We want to keep playing, keep getting better. This one, you got to swallow. This is tough to take, but it's part of life. It's part of college basketball. Learn a lot from it. Q. Jay, you've talked all year about how young your guards are, how at times you have to kind of ride the roller coaster. When you only have 24 hours to prepare for a defense like that, how difficult was it? Do you think their inexperience showed tonight? COACH WRIGHT: Their inexperience definitely showed. I think our inexperience as a team definitely showed. I talked about that all year. When your 5 man is your leader, he can't go back and get the ball and bring the ball back up the floor. He needs perimeter people to get him the ball, and that's where we're inexperienced. That's been our‑‑ it's who we are. And I really thought playing St. John's would prepare us better. As good as St. John's was in their press, these guys were another level. Q. On Monday, you mentioned JayVaughn was sort of‑‑ not concerned, but just coming back to New York, you had some issues with players on that. How do you think he performed the last two days? COACH WRIGHT: I think he was great. I think he learned a great lesson these last two days. I think he played his two best games in New York. In relation to how good of a player he is, he's had horrendous games here. That probably isn't even the right word. He hit a seven turnover game here. It's just because he gets excited to be back here, and he loves New York. And he really concentrated these last two games on his defense and rebounding and playing solid and not worried about where he was. I thought he learned a great lesson. He did very well in these two games. He did a lot of little things defensively that don't show up in the stats. He did a great job on Sampson last night, did a real good job tonight in terms of getting charges. That's one of the positives we can take out of the tournament. I think he's grown a lot, and he's important to our team. Q. Coach, is there some sense of relief now that the few games you'll be playing now are against teams that don't know? COACH WRIGHT: I think we'll get to that. I've got to be honest with you, I can't feel that right now. This one‑‑ look, we have played well against good teams. We've played‑‑ actually, against most good teams we played, we played really well. It still stings that we didn't perform tonight right now. This team could win a National Championship. Louisville, this is a really good team. You take their talent and then put on top of that the fact that they've been there, that experience is so valuable. If you look at all of our teams that have advanced, the year before, when we went to final eight, the year before we went to Sweet 16, the year before we went to Final Four, the year before we went to Sweet 16. They get that. They went to the Final Four, they're going back through this again. This is a very good team. We lost to a really good team. I'm not as disappointed with losing as I am in our performance in the first half. Q. Coach, at this time of the year with so much youth on the team, is this where you expected your team to be? You talk a little bit about, to the extent you are where you wanted to be, and what surprised you, if anything? COACH WRIGHT: I'm very pleased with this team. Very pleased. Disappointed in the performance tonight, we pleased with where the leadership of this team is, where the growth of this team has come to. I'm trying‑‑ we're trying to teach them the urgency that you have to have at this level. Adults, we understand it because we're older, but when you're young, you don't understand that urgency, and we're trying to teach them that. This was another failure, I think, for us. Not getting that through them. After a couple good wins, you've got to put another one together, you can't relax. That's where we've got to grow. Q. JayVaughn, you faced pressure before, but this seemed to be a little bit more intense tonight. Now, was it, and on top of that, how do you bounce back from this? JAYVAUGHN PINKSTON: I think they played well. They just turned us over a lot. But now we're just going to have to get back into the gym and keep getting better working on fundamentals and playing Villanova basketball. JOHN PAQUETTE: Villanova, thank you. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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