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BIG EAST CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENTMarch 13, 2014D'Angelo HarrisonSteve LavinJaKarr SampsonNEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK Providence - 79 COACH STEVE LAVIN: This was clearly a game of runs. We were playing well, had a seven‑point lead. Providence went on a big run to build, I think, a 17‑point cushion, and then we went on a run just inside of six minutes, if I'm not mistaken, and had the ball down one. We didn't convert, and Providence pulled away. So a game of runs. I thought we played well in stretches, but then we had periods where we didn't play with the necessary aggressiveness. You look at the stats, they're equal across the board, other not that the free‑throw game. I think they were plus nine from the foul line. But in every other area, at the end of it‑‑ rebound, I think we were minus 3. You look at assists. You look at turnovers, points in the paint‑‑ pretty much every statistic is balanced except for the free‑throw line. Providence did an effective job of getting to the charity stripe and converting, and then we shot 50 percent from the foul line, which is going to make it tough because it gives you very little margin for error, in other area if you're going to hope to be successful at this stage of the season against a quality team like Providence. I was proud of our team's collective effort against Cotton to hold him to, I think, one point in the first half or zero points, whatever it was. That was testimony to our kids' grit. And really proud of the way our team fought back, dramatic comeback and had a chance to take the lead in the waning seconds. Says a lot about their resiliency and fight‑back, and we've seen that all year, but it was on display once again this afternoon. But disappointed with the loss. Q. D'Angelo, there's a lot of plays in games, but the one where it looked like you might have the turnover on Cotton and you got called for the foul. How did you see that play? D'ANGELO HARRISON: I just thought I got a clean strip, but our job is to play and then go away. So credit Cotton or credit Providence for building that lead. If we wouldn't have gotten down so much, it would have been a different kind of ballgame, the rally we had at the end. Q. Steve, Ed just sat in that chair and said he would be shocked if you don't make it to the NCAA Tournament on Sunday. How do you feel right now? COACH STEVE LAVIN: Well, what I shared with the team is clearly at this stage of the season, it's in the Selection Committee's hands. I think, if you look at our body of work and a number of the criteria that they consider, we clearly have some pluses. But losing the first round of your conference tournament is not a good thing when you're trying to play in the postseason. But winning 11 of our last 14 games before today was a plus, and when you consider the three losses during that 14‑game stretch, one was at Creighton on a McDermott shot from long range at the buzzer. One was against Villanova, where we lost by three without the services of Orlando Sanchez. As you can see, he's pretty central to everything we do. And Chris Obekpa had his ankle injury. And then the Xavier game was an unusual week a couple days after Villanova, where our team lost five loved ones. It definitely affected our game there. I thought we found ourselves last week in the win over DePaul, then an impressive win in double overtime and Marquette. Then today was a great Big East battle, punch, counterpunch, two teams that wanted to advance in this tournament and came right down to the wire. I know the Committee will look at all those factors. I don't think it's an automatic that we're not in. I know people have been saying that, but I thinkwe didn't help our cause any by losing today, but I haven't bought that this was a play‑in game for either team. But clearly as the coach at this stage of the year, the kids know, we talked about, you want to win and advance through your tournament, continue to play on this final weekend because eyeballs are on teams that continue to work their way through the postseason tournaments, the postseason conference tournament. So you'd prefer to take it out of the Selection Committee's hands by winning today, winning tomorrow, and winning on Saturday. But now that we weren't able to do that, we have to hope that they look at the body of work of a young team that's getting better, a freshman point guard that improves with each practice and game, challenging ourselves against the Wisconsins and Syracuses, and the 11 of 14 down the stretch. I think we didn't hurt ourselves in terms of the way we played today. We just hurt ourselves because we didn't win the game, and that part is disappointing. We're either going to be in the NCAA or the NIT, and either way, we have to get ready because we want to win games and advance as far as we can to finish the season on the best possible note. Whether that's the NCAA or the NIT, we'll have to wait. Q. Steve, Chris only played two minutes today. I know he had foul trouble. COACH STEVE LAVIN: 99 percent of it was foul trouble, and that team at the end was a great hurry‑up offense. As we can see, it was pretty dramatic. As impressive a comeback as any team I've coached in my career. Can't say enough about that effort, to be in position to have the ball at point‑blank range and a chance to win it. A lot of contact, but that's Big East basketball. I just talked to JaKarr about it. He felt he could have converted. I thought it would be an and‑one if he did, but we came away with neither. That's the way the cookie crumbles. It's a competitive situation. We came up short. So we tip our hat to Providence, and we'll see where things finish out. But, yeah, Chris just‑‑ you know, two fouls puts him on the bench to start. Third foul to start the second half, puts him on the bench. Then we're down 17, and now we're in a position where against a zone offense, we're trying to put combinations out there that will help us to both make shots and then also we were in a scramble, trapping mode. So we went small to come back in this game. Q. Speaking of Chris, losing him to foul trouble was obviously huge, as you guys certainly struggled down low for most of the game then. Do you feel like that right there kind of put St. John's behind the eight ball? COACH STEVE LAVIN: Not Chris, but the team? Q. Yeah, losing Chris put you behind the eight ball. COACH STEVE LAVIN: Yeah, he's the leading shot‑blocker in the country, and that foul trouble naturally put us at a disadvantage because we prefer to have him at the rim, like a soccer or hockey goalie, and it gives our players up top the confidence to be aggressive with ball pressure. If you get beat, you've got Obekpa back there to either block shots or alter shots. That fuels our offensive attack. So in spite of that, I thought there was a stretch where, whether Chris was in there or not, Providence was a little more aggressive at attacking the rim. And then we reclaimed momentum, and we took it to them, and as a result, got high‑percentage shots and ended up scoring more points in the paint than they did. So it really was an interesting game of runs. We got out early, playing well, thought we had good control of the game. They made a run to go up 17. We made a final run to close it to within a point. But we didn't get it done, and Providence moves on. Q. Steve, you're now 1‑4 in this tournament. I know every team is different. COACH STEVE LAVIN: Sure. Q. Has there been, as you look back over the past three years, has there been a sense of urgency that maybe your team hasn't had? Has it seemed like the competition has genuinely jumped? COACH STEVE LAVIN: I'll take you right through it. Coaches know basketball in their career pretty well. First year, we beat Rutgers but lost to Syracuse. D.J. Kennedy was hurt in the early minutes of the game. He's one of our best players. I think that was a Sweet 16 or Elite Eight team, if he doesn't get hurt. We blew out Duke, blew out UConn, beat Pittsburgh in The Garden. We won at Cincinnati, Marquette, and Villanova that year before D.J. got hurt. Second year, I had cancer. I'll take the blame for that. The third year, we didn't have D'Angelo because some coach thought it would be smart to suspend him. But I'm glad we have him back. And then this year we just battled our fannies off. We fought our fannies off today, and we lost. So that's the four. I'll leave you to evaluate it as the pundit. Q. JaKarr, last minute of the game, it's a run‑out, and it's you and Jordan passing the ball back and forth to each other maybe a couple of times each, and you get the layup but you don't make it. What happened on that shot? Were you too far under? JaKARR SAMPSON: I mean, I feel like I just missed a shot, you know. I feel like normally I would make it, and I'm disappointed in myself. I just feel like I missed a shot. Foul or no foul, I missed a shot. I felt I should have made it. Q. D'Angelo, you guys seemed pretty loose and confident a couple of days ago. Do you think that in the time in between that you guys got tight? I mean, you sort of sounded like you guys had your best game coming. Where do you think it went? D'ANGELO HARRISON: Just a combination of a few things: We missed free throws. We missed a couple of shots in that first half. We weren't playing St. John's basketball that we usually play. But you saw that, I think, the last six, seven minutes. If we did that the whole game, it would have been a different kind of ballgame. We just waited too late. We were just flat until the end. Q. Coach, I just want to know what do you think is the biggest argument for the Big East Conference the way it is now this year to have maybe about five bids going into the NCAA Tournament? COACH STEVE LAVIN: I think‑‑ no disrespect to any other conference, but people are talking about six in the Atlantic 10 or seven in the Pac‑10. Take a look at what Georgetown, who didn't finish.500 in our league and got beat in the first round by DePaul, one of the last place teams in our league‑‑ oh, yeah, what was it? JaKARR SAMPSON: Seton Hall. COACH STEVE LAVIN: What about it? JaKARR SAMPSON: Beat Villanova. COACH STEVE LAVIN: Yeah, exactly. The idea, I think that speaks to the depth in our league. Georgetown, I'm not wrong, they beat VCU and Kansas and Michigan State, teams out of other strong conference that are getting consideration with five, six, seven teams. Look at what Villanova did at the top of our league all year long, beating the likes of Kansas and other quality programs. And yet the middle and the bottom of our league can beat those top teams. Or even a team like Georgetown that couldn't finish.500 and couldn't win in the conference tournament the first round, yet they were thumping teams in other conferences. We played Syracuse to the wire and Wisconsin to the wire. We challenged ourselves all season long. I know the Committee looks at those factors. The eye test. Are you a team that's getting better? A young team with upside? In our case, not only with Rysheed Jordan, but some of the underclassmen, it's clear we're getting better. We didn't help ourselves by losing in the first round today, but I think when you look at this league, it's clear how competitive it is from top to bottom, and the quality of basketball, if you have basketball people that know the game, and you watch the quality of play in this league, it's pretty special. Q. D'Angelo, just describe your emotions. It seemed like you were pretty upset after a comeback like that, just falling short. Knowing you guys probably didn't put yourself in good position. D'ANGELO HARRISON: Disappointed. We've got to put away this game. We have basketball in front of us, tomorrow or the next day, just figure out where we're going to be and work hard again so we can get this next one. Q. Steve, I know you're still optimistic you'll make the Tournament. If you don't, will you consider this year a disappointment or a failure? COACH STEVE LAVIN: No. This group is‑‑ they've taken us for a ride that I'll never forget. To have a team that started the league 0‑5. One time we were 9‑8 overall and 0‑5, and now we're up here finishing the league 10‑8 in a three‑way tie for third. Independent seedings and the Alan Greenspan minutia for how you separate the three teams that are tied. At the end of it, we finished third for the second time in four years. To finish third in the Big East is no easy task, or tied for third. But to win 11 of our last 14, to finish 10‑8, to have 20 wins after being 9‑8 at one point, and to go through a couple weeks ago five loved ones that were lost, the injury to Obekpa, Sanchez's newborn child‑‑ it's been a unique couple weeks but memorable, and we still have basketball ahead of us, and a 20‑win season in this day and age is no easy task. This group, if anyone, the beat writers that are around them on a regular basis, they've made fans of a lot of people. They're just a first‑class group, and they represent our school in a first‑class manner. I couldn't be prouder of probably any group I coached in my career. Never had a group dig themselves out of a hole 0‑5 in New York City under the bright lights, and to finish 10‑8, and to be playing the quality of basketball that we are at this stage of the year. Considering where we were earlier, just says a lot about their character, testimony to the fact they were raised the right way. We're fortunate to coach them. Q. JaKarr, one of the big reasons for the early deficit was the glass; just a lot of offensive rebounds. Did you feel they were overpowering, they were outhustling? Was it an energy thing? What did you think was going on there? JaKARR SAMPSON: They have more energy than us. Outhustling us and everything. Just more energy. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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