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EA SPORTS MAUI INVITATIONALNovember 27, 2013DeAndre MathieuRichard PitinoMalik SmithLAHAINA, HAWAII Minnesota – 83 THE MODERATOR: We have Coach Richard Pitino, Malik Smith, and DeAndre Mathieu coming in. Coach, some opening comments? COACH PITINO: Probably surprised to hear this, but I'd probably say that was the most proud I've been of the guys so far this year because we had so much to lose, they had so much to gain. We were battling so many obstacles, and certainly every team does. But travel, we were tired, and it's just the time change. It was all very, very difficult. Today it felt like this was the first time playing at 9:30 that it felt like 9:30 in the morning. Yesterday it didn't feel that way. I don't know if our bodies just adjusted. Really, really difficult. Want to definitely thank our fans. They saved us. They were awesome, and I am very much proud of these guys. They were very gritty and they toughed it out today. Q. DeAndre, just talk about at one point in the second half you guys were down nine. You're playing a Division II team. Did you feel like, hey, this is it. We have to make a run here otherwise we'll get upset? DeANDRE MATHIEU: No doubt about it. Coach lit a fire under us to come out at halftime with the intensity. We came out kind of slow. And the guys in the huddle, the team came together, it was like we've got to make a run now. It's now or never. If they would have gotten a bigger lead, it would have probably been over. We just decided to fight. Q. Coach, what did you see at the end with the press that changed things so much? COACH PITINO: The guy sitting two seats to my left finally started to defend like a fast point guard. Sometimes he gets a little passive. I think it's that Southern mentality. We're trying to get that out of him. But it was all him. That's what he needs to be. He's got that ability. I don't know if he's pacing himself a little bit. But when he started to turn up the heat, everybody else fed off of him. He was a huge part of this run. 35 minutes he played, and doing that in the press, he saved us. He was tremendous tonight, this morning. Whenever this is, whenever we are. THE MODERATOR: Maui, and it's about ready for lunch. COACH PITINO: Yeah. Q. Coach, the rebounding battle was at 38‑all. Was that the most disappointing statistic on the stat sheet for you? COACH PITINO: Not really. I'm telling you right now, I'm extremely proud of these guys. There is nothing I'm really disappointed with. Chaminade's a good team, and again, that's their National Championship. They live for that. He's a great coach. They play very loose. They play very hard. We were undersized. There is not a whole lot I'm disappointed about in this win. Q. Could you just talk about finishing off the tournament this way? I'm sure it was disappointing the first two days, but finding that motivation this morning like you've kind of touched on some of those adverse situations? COACH PITINO: We've played six halves, three games, six halves, and I thought we played really well for four halves. I thought we played very hard regardless who scored against Syracuse. I thought we played great the first half against Arkansas. They just outplayed us the second half. Today we were a little lethargic, but we finished out strong. Obviously, you'd like to play a perfect game. We're still learning; we're still growing. But, again, I've got to give our players so much why for just finding a way to win this game in a very tough situation. Q. For Malik, how did you feel about the team's energy coming into the game? Was part of that really your body adjusting and feeling like it was a 9:30 a.m. game? MALIK SMITH: Yeah, it really felt early today compared to yesterday because yesterday we were playing an SEC team. It really wasn't hard to get up for that game. Today we were playing a Division II team that had nothing to lose, like Coach said. We came out slow. In the second half, we picked it up and got after it. Q. What does this win do for you guys moving forward? You come back, you play Florida State in a little bit here. You lose this game and then there is a lot of confidence issues going into that game, but now, how do you feel? MALIK SMITH: I think the biggest thing is it gave us a little bit of confidence back. After losing two games, your confidence starts to leave you a little bit. After today's win, we got a little bit of that back. DeANDRE MATHIEU: It shows us how hard we have to play. Every play has to be like that second half when we went on a big run. Like Malik said, it would have been rough practices for us. So it just gave us confidence, and it stopped the rough practices. Q. Coach, I know you say you're happy with how they ended it. But what does the team have to learn from the first half to the second half? COACH PITINO: Probably that anybody can beat us on any given night. That just showed us. If mentality‑wise we don't bring it every game, we could lose. Conversely though, it shows us if we go in with the same mindset that Chaminade has, we can beat anybody. Again, I can't overstate enough that I'm really proud of these guys. I'm very, very thankful. We wouldn't have won that game if we didn't travel as well as we did with great fan support from our Minnesota fans. They were phenomenal. Q. With Andre Hollins, he had a really big shot down the stretch, but do you feel like he's maybe a little bit not quite himself in the last couple days? COACH PITINO: No, I think today was just foul trouble. That was his big issue today; he had four fouls. I thought he had a good tournament. He did a lot of things good defensively, showed great leadership, so, no, I don't worry about that at all. This was, for me, I thought a once‑in‑a‑lifetime experience. Hopefully one time we'll be invited back by Coach Odom. But this was unbelievable for our basketball program. These guys got treated so well just by everyone in this tournament. Our guys really loved it. Hopefully they can enjoy a little bit of today because we're not leaving until late tonight. Lot of fun. We really appreciate being invited. Hopefully we'll be invited back at some point in the future. Q. Coach, can you just talk about what's coming up for you guys and how much this week is going to help with that immediate future? COACH PITINO: Well, I think the biggest thing, when I got the job, I called Brad Stevens, because they played in this last year. I said what advice would you have travel‑wise, because you don't know what the right thing to do is. He said get out of there as quickly as possible. He said get in early as possible, and get out as quickly as possible, and I would probably schedule a Division III team first game back. I said, well, we don't have that choice. We're playing Florida State. So we're going to get out of here right away. We'll get them off tomorrow, and we've got to get the rust out of them Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday. Get their body back to normal time zone, so that is the biggest thing. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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