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NCAA MEN'S REGIONALS SEMIFINALS & FINALS: LOS ANGELESMarch 27, 2013Malcolm ArmsteadCleanthony EarlyCarl HallGregg MarshallLOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA THE MODERATOR: We have Malcolm Armstead, Cleanthony Early, and Carl Hall. Questions for the student‑athletes. Q. Cleanthony and Carl, how did you all do this? You lost so much of your rotation from last year. You had a lot of injuries this year. Obviously, some struggles in the Missouri Valley Conference, yet you're here. How did you pull this off? CARL HALL: We just got all our guys back at the right time, and we started clicking at the right time. It's just you've got to have your team clicking at the right time of the year, and it just so happens we got all our guys back, and we're kind of playing good defense and getting stops. Then we've got a deep bench. So that helps too. We've got a strong team and 11 guy that's can play. CLEANTHONY EARLY: I totally agree with Carl, and I just want to make the emphasis on playing tough, having heart, and just like he said, coming together at the right time. And I think we had guys that did that when they stepped out and got injured. And there were a couple of guys that stepped up. Q. You guys are playing La Salle. I wonder if you know where that is? MALCOLM ARMSTEAD: Philly, right? I think it's Philly. Q. That's right. They didn't know where you guys were? CLEANTHONY EARLY: I didn't know where Wichita was either before I went there. Q. Seriously, tell me what happened? CLEANTHONY EARLY: I just found out after. I had to do my research. Q. When you signed? CLEANTHONY EARLY: No, I knew where it was after a while. But when I first heard of it, I couldn't even pronounce it correctly. Q. How do you like it? CLEANTHONY EARLY: It's pretty cool. I love it. Q. Could you guys talk about the aftermath of beating Gonzaga? What it's been like since you guys got back and how have you reacted to that? MALCOLM ARMSTEAD: It was a good win. The community was very excited, but it was just a regular basketball game for us. It was a good start for us. It proved a lot to the country and also to ourselves. But it was just something that we had to do. Q. Follow‑up for Carl and Cleanthony, obviously, you've had a lot of success, and with that success there's been a lot of talk about your coach and whether or not he might be a candidate at other places. Do you all ignore that when that kind of thing happens in the postseason? CLEANTHONY EARLY: You kind of have to because you understand the position he's in and the position we're in, and we've got to understand that we've got to "live for today" and continue to play through that. CARL HALL: I'm not going to be here next year, so I don't know. I haven't heard anything. I'm just enjoying being out here. Q. The Wichita State‑La Salle match‑up isn't getting the build-up and hype that a lot of these other match‑ups are. Does that bother you guys, and how would you sell this match‑up for people to watch? CLEANTHONY EARLY: It's just the Sweet Sixteen game, so hopefully people are excited to watch regardless. But we've got to come out there and play hard, and they're clearly a good team. We pride ourselves in being a good team, and playing defense and rebounding. So I think it's going to be a really good game. Q. For a team like you to have six losses in the Missouri Valley Conference and yet you're still here, what's that say about the league that you all played in? Do you feel like the MVC was underrated this year? CARL HALL: It's kind of tough in the MVC when you're going on the road and teams scout so good, and everybody knows your sets make things difficult for you. And during that time we had injuries, too. A lot of people getting hurt. It's been a long season, and a long season for us. So like I said, we're just glad we got the guys back at the right time with Ron Baker coming back, and he's getting healthier because his ankle was hurt, and I broke my thumb. So like I said, we're just enjoying this and trying to take it one game at a time. Q. You guys were up against it in the final minutes at Gonzaga, and it was a quick onslaught from three to get you guys over the hump there. What was the flash point, the turning point in that game to get you guys back on top? CLEANTHONY EARLY: Just continuing to play hard and fighting, not giving up, even though they were the No. 1 team, we always felt like we had a chance going into the game and being in the game. We've just got to continue to keep that mentality. THE MODERATOR: Coach, if you could make an opening statement and we'll take some questions? COACH MARSHALL: Okay. First of all, I love the weather. We left some snow on the ground in Wichita, and this is beautiful out here. We've enjoyed our time so far practicing at Galen Center at USC and now are looking forward to an open practice. Our guys are excited for the challenge. It's been a wonderful week spreading the good word about Wichita and Wichita State University. So it's time to lace them up and play again. Q. Coach, could you talk about what you've seen from La Salle that kind of impresses you the most about them? COACH MARSHALL: Well, first of all, played with a great amount of confidence. Their ability to break down defenses off the dribble, create shots for one another, and just the multitude of guys that they have that can do that.  Then, they seemed to make plays down the stretch. I was watching the game, again, against Ole Miss. I watched it live, and they're down five with a couple of minutes to go. Hit a three, get fouled, get the offensive rebound, I think, with only one guy on the foul line. Not only get it, but score it. 1 against 4, and tie the game on one possession. Then Garland makes the big drive at the end. They're making plays. They're playing with a lot of confidence. John has them really exuding confidence and belief in one another. Q. Coach, you lost a lot of time from last season. Had you to rely on some younger guys and you had multiple injuries this year as well. How on earth did you pull this off to reach this level? COACH MARSHALL: Our team last year having the five seniors who are also our five leading scorers was a more talented team offensively than this team. You lose those guys, and you have nine new faces out of 15‑man roster. But my assistant coaches had done a wonderful job in mining the different fertile grounds of players, high school, prep school, junior college transfers. We had two players sitting out that are now starting for us, Malcolm Armstead, a transfer from Oregon, as a point guard in his fifth year, and Ron Baker who was red shirting as a freshman. Then you add Cleanthony Early, a dynamic talent as a junior college forward who is doing things that I've never had a forward do, scoring in so many ways with tremendous athleticism and upside. I think he's got a chance to play at a really high level someday. Then, not that he's not playing at a high level right now, but you know what I mean. We also added Fred VanVleet, a top 100 high school point guard who committed to us before he shows up in the summer, has all kind of BCS schools calling on him, and to show what type of young man he is, he honors that commitment. Though he could have easily broken his word and his commitment and chosen to go to several BCS programs. So you add those guys to some returners like Carl Hall, Demetric Williams, Tekele Cotton, Jake White, Evan Wessel who is red shirting now after breaking his finger. And they just find a way. They're tough, and they defend much better than that group last year. Q. Coach, you mentioned and I wanted to expand upon the comment about spreading the good word about Wichita State, we know Florida Gulf Coast has gotten most of the publicity in this Sweet Sixteen. Is that a disappointment for you guys do you guys wish you were more in the spotlight or the La Salle‑Wichita State match‑up? COACH MARSHALL: Not really. I'm glad for Florida Gulf Coast. Don't know much about it. I know more now just because they're doing well in the NCAA Tournament and know they have a beach on their campus. That is a pretty good selling point. We have a university with great research. We're one of the top air nautical engineering schools, because Wichita is known as the air capital of the United States. We manufacture airplanes and small, private aircraft. We've got Koch Industries. Pizza Hut started there. Coleman camping equipment started there, Rent‑A‑Center. So there are a lot of‑‑ it's a great entrepreneurial spirit in Wichita, and we have great businesses and there are a lot of folks that have followed the leads of some of those pioneers in those businesses that are starting their own businesses now. We have a wonderful business school and entrepreneurial education. So we have great basketball and following tradition. Going back to the 60s, and the Final Four and the Elite Eight in the '80s, and great players like Dave Stallworth and Cleo Littleton, Xavier McDaniel, Cliff Levingston, Antoine Carr. So we've had our share of great basketball. It's all coming together for us again. Our administration gives us wonderful support. We fly on private planes every time we leave the ground. We have 10,500 fans at every game. It's a great place to coach. Q. What is that like to fly on private planes? Obviously, a lot of planes at your resource, what is that like? COACH MARSHALL: They're kind of like sports cars. Instead of a school bus, they're more like Ferraris and Jaguars. They go pretty fast. They can maneuver into tight spaces. I hope we don't find any tight spaces, but I use them for recruiting at times. I've had that at my disposal, that is a great benefit. Our players don't understand how well they have it. To go from bus, to private plane, to bus, and literally cross and being here in a couple of hours and be in our hotel. Q. Let me let you know, the La Salle players having chartered for one of two time this is year know how good they have it. Coach Giannini credits playing in the Atlantic 10 night in and night out as having prepared his team for this postseason run. The Valley has put itself on the map. Obviously, with Creighton and what you've done this year and in the past, you were in the NCAA Tournament a couple of years ago. How would you compare a night‑in, night‑out schedule in the Valley, and how does it stack up against what the A‑10 did this year? COACH MARSHALL: I follow the A‑10 because I feel like those schools are our contemporaries and I pull for them. We played at VCU and won there this year, which is hard to do. You guys did it as well. Not too many teams can do that, go in that environment, face the havoc and win. I went to the University of Richmond. I'm very familiar. I coached nine years in the shadow of Charlotte, NorthCarolina, so I know about Charlotte and I know about a lot of the schools in your league. You guys had five teams make it. You're a multi‑bid league. The Mountain West is in kind of the same boat, and we are as well. We play a true round robin. We have ten teams, so you play Bradley and you play Southern Illinois and you play Creighton and you play Northern Iowa. Those schools are hard to win at, okay. I remember being in Cancun in a preseason, preconference tournament, which we won against Iowa in the championship game, and I'm watching the tournament in the Bahamas. All I hear is Rick Pitino talking about what a great team he just faced in Northern Iowa. They won. Louisville won. But he was going on about Northern Iowa. Then he plays Illinois State, who finishes in the bottom four in our league this year, and he wins a game at the buzzer against Illinois State. He's talking about what a great team Illinois State is. Our league is a very good league. It's a basketball league. If they have football, it's played at a lower level, and there is great tradition at these places. So winning on the road in the Valley, just like winning on the road in the A‑10 is beneficial this time of the year. Q. What are one of the things that I don't know if you noticed, but when you made your run in the tournament, you played the Valley and Saint Louis. That was the last of the regular season for La Salle. Our hotel was right down the road from where you were playing. So the Explorers did win that game, but very much both teams postseason lives were on the line that weekend and about a mile away from each other? COACH MARSHALL: I didn't realize that. I have watched that game since then. I didn't know the date was the same. Saint Louis is a tough place to play, and they had a great year as well, and that is another team from your league.  So I followed you. I remember Coach Giannini when he was at Maine. We met when I was at Winthrop. So it's a pleasure to be playing against them. One of the small guys is going to survive to the Elite Eight, at least, and maybe two. You never know what's going to happen between the two Florida schools. Q. When Ron Baker got to Kansas, did you ever think he would have this sort of impact on a team? COACH MARSHALL: Oh, I've trumpeted, and you can go back‑‑ I don't always get them right. I've had my share of recruiting mistakes and whatnot. But I've said many times if Ron Baker were a stock, you better get in now. I've always believed that he was going to be a good player. Chris Jans, my assistant coach, my associate head coach, did a wonderful job of identifying him and bringing him at that point to our elite camp. You can't call it that anymore, so I don't know what you call it. We saw him in his state championship run in his senior year, and he just knows how to play. He's tough. He's one of those throwback guys. A quarterback on the football team, pitcher and shortstop on the baseball team, just an all‑American, three‑sport athlete. I'm sure he's going to pick up golf at some point and be a scratch golfer. That is the type guy he is. He is one of our best defenders. He's obviously one of our best shooters. He can handle the basketball. He's an emergency third or fourth point guard, if you need him. So he's very strong. He's country strong. I call him country strong, even before he got in the weight room, he has big, strong hands, big hips, big shoulders. He might have tossed a few hay bales back on the farm or something. But I tell you, he's going to be a good player. He and Fred VanVleet have a set up in the back court very well. We have some other good players coming in, Tekele Cotton and Evan Wessel. One of the things that's interesting about our team this year is when Carl Hall got healthy from the broken thumb, everyone said Wichita State is now healthy. We still had 40% of our starting lineup from the first eight games on the sidelines. Ron Baker finally comes back for the conference tournament in Saint Louis after missing 21 games and immediately helps us win. In the very first game back, he hits three threes and helps us win the game. Evan Wessel was our starting three man, and our best three‑point shooter before he broke his finger in the 8th game, and we have decided to try to apply for a medical red shirt hardship for him, so he'll join those two guys as sophomores next year. Q. Carl Hall's transformation under this coaching staff from a guy that really struggled to get in shape, to a guy that now is arguably the leader of this team. Can you just talk about that? How many players in America would cut their hair before the NCAA Tournament? COACH MARSHALL: Well, when you started talking about the transformation of Carl Hall, I thought that's where you were going. But I had nothing to do with the haircut, the timing, nor the decision. He had the hair. He was good enough to have the hair when I recruited him, and I took him with the hair. So I wasn't going to be hypocritical and make him cut it. But I think a guy like Carl, who marches to his own drum now, he's a wonderful young man, and he is the heartbeat of our team. He's always chattering about something. You know what kind of day Carl is having by the amount of noise that he's making. He didn't even think anything about it, cutting his hair, and the Sampson deal. He just thought it was a good time to cut his hair. Sent it to his mom in a box. Q. Obviously, you've had a lot of success, and this is a great moment for the program. With that always comes speculation for someone in your position about your future with the program. How do you deal with that when it's out of your control and you're trying to keep a team focused? COACH MARSHALL: I really don't deal with it. I do my job. Doing my job is always, for me, been the number one goal. We live well in Wichita. We love Wichita. Everything is in place for us to be there for a long time. By treating this job, as I did with Winthrop, like it's the Celtics or the Lakers in LA, it's taken care of us. So we'll deal with anything like that when it comes along. But right now, that is the farthest thing from my mind. My focus is on La Salle and trying to get to Saturday for an Elite Eight game. Q. To follow up on Carl, just in the locker room talking to him. He was beating himself up a little bit about not rebounding the last couple games after the Creighton game that you won in Wichita. He was very upset with himself for free throw shooting. Is he driven to be the absolute best he can be? Has he always been like that? COACH MARSHALL: I don't know if he's always been like that. Unfortunately, we've only had him for two years, but I want him to be beating himself up a little bit about that because he didn't rebound against Gonzaga like he could. Now he's in there battling with Kelly Olynyk who is going to be a lottery pick in the NBA draft when he decides to come out. He's 7'. Carl is 6'8", once he cut his hair, he may be more like 6'5.5". So bottom line is he's spending a lot of energy defending and pushing the guys around. Now he did hit a big jumpshot, and that is a testimony to how hard he worked this summer. He could not do that last year. But he hits the shot, people forget, that put us up 1 against Gonzaga coming back from the 8‑point deficit. So, yeah, he didn't make some free throws down the stretch, and he's had that problem against Creighton earlier in the year but we were able to still win. He normally rebounds. I tell you what, he had a great practice today, so I anticipate him being the Carl Hall that we all know and love and count on tomorrow. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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