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ATLANTIC 10 CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENTMarch 14, 2014Isaiah ArmwoodMike LonerganNemanja MikicBROOKLYN, NEW YORK GEORGE WASHINGTON – 85 COACH LONERGAN: That was a nice win for us, great turnout, GW fans, we really wanted to keep them here for at least another day. Our guys played really hard and got a nice lead at halftime and thought we rebounded real well the second half, missed some free throws and had some bad turnovers. But give Coach Kellogg and his group credit. They kept in that game. We were up 13, 15, 17, and they wouldn't go away. So very happy to get this win. Q. Your early threes, how much confidence did that give you and how much do you think that helped the team down the stretch, and you made a couple more after. NEMANJA MIKIC: I think lately, the last couple games‑‑ (indiscernible) ‑‑ getting shots and I've been pretty muchgot a lot of open shots lately. They just didn't go in the last couple games and when Coach, teammates believe in you, they passed me the ball when I was open and they dropped down tonight. Q. Where this program has been, and you, your thoughts on winning the game‑‑ this is the first step. ISAIAH ARMWOOD: Yeah, it's a good feeling. It's a good feeling. We've got six players in double figures scoring. We score a couple times and they came back and cut it down to maybe eight, so we wanted to keep stretching that lead. So it's definitely a good feeling to move on to the next round? Q. You kept their bigs to ten total points; talk about the battles inside with the bigs. ISAIAH ARMWOOD: It's definitely a battle, Cady Lalanne is a big body and long and athletic. So you have me and Kevin in there just barreling and Kevin did a good job ‑‑ he got two put backs so that was big for us. Q. This is your last A10 tournament, how does it feel to have this big game at this time? NEMANJA MIKIC: It's terrific. This whole season has been great, 24th win. We are looking forward to the game tomorrow against VCU. We won one, we lost one, feel like we ‑‑ indiscernible ‑‑ so it's exciting. Q. It was just touched on but facing VCU, can you talk about facing them and trying to get to the finals tomorrow? ISAIAH ARMWOOD: It's definitely a difficult challenge but they beat us on our home court and it's a neutral site now. So we have to be able to handle that pressure and stay out of foul trouble, I think we'll be all right. Q. You guys talked about getting another shot at Mass after last year, must be that much more special? ISAIAH ARMWOOD: Yeah, that was the end of our season and that wasn't a fun thing at all. No matter how rough our season was last year, we didn't want toend the season short. And they beat us early in the season on our home court; the only loss we had on our home court this year, so getting them back here was definitely a good thing. Q. You guys split the season series, each defended home court well, both teams travel well, what's it going to take for you guys to beat VCU tomorrow? COACH LONERGAN: Well, we are going to have to really handle the ball better than we did tonight in the game there. What really helped us in the first game is keeping Savage (ph) and did a great job of handle the ball and did taking some of the pressure off of Joe. And you know, now without Keith in, as you saw tonight under pressure, we don't have a lot of ball handlers. Kevin Larsen is going to have to help us out, and Maurice is going to have to do a much better job, I think he had six turnovers tonight, so it's kind of going to have to be a team effort. It's easier said than done. They have got a heck of a team, and the defense is incredible. Not a lot of turnaround time, so it's not an ideal matchup for us; but you know what we are excited about playing, we can play loose and hopefully we'll just trade shots, not turnovers. Q. Six players with at least 12 points and bench scoring which has been an issue recently. COACH LONERGAN: It's great. We shot well, some guys but having Nemanja score, I don't know, he was really good early in the year and I looked at the first game against UMASS, we had one basket and two rebounds combined. That's kind of what we've been getting out of our bench. We have some guys that play hard but no real production as far as points or rebounds. I haven't lost confidence in him because he's getting open shots and he makes them in practice. I just told him, maybe it's not the right thing to do ‑‑ I said, I what I remember from last seasonis you hit inside the backboard with a three late if the game. It's not too late to turn things around. And you know, this is the time of year‑‑ what a great time of year, March Madness, and the A10 Tournament, especially. But seniors step up this time of year, and it was a really good three games in a row coming in today and Isaiah was great, and to see a senior, just a smile on his face after the game makes you feel really good. But it's a seniors' time of year right now and we need our seniors to step up. Q. UMASS is a team that's made a name for itself as kind of start slowly and starts to build momentum in the second half. Is that something you addressed with the team at the half? COACH LONERGAN: Yeah, I tried to, and you know, coming off time‑outs, certain things, we just had some silly turnovers. But they are so athletic. You know, we just threw the ball right to them, and Esho he's had a great couple games in this tournament. He's a handful. And Isaiah got in foul trouble early, so we really had trouble stopping them, and Chaz is so quick, and they had some guys hit some threes and we missed free throws.  I thought the game would never end be to be honest with you. It was the longest 30 minutes of my life. Q. Can you talk about the 1‑3‑1 and how it worked? COACH LONERGAN: We've been playing it a lot and we had to play it a lot with Isaiah in foul trouble and with Nemanja is out there, you really do have to play a lot of 1‑3‑1 and Joe is not 100% so it's really hard to guard such an athletic team in man‑to‑man but we do have good length. It's a good defense and it takes some threes away. Where you get hurt is sometimes when they penetrate in that middle, and the first game we played UMASS they were penetrating just throwing lobs and things like that. We did a better job guarding against that tonight but you know, I just thought it was a hard‑fought game and obviously we were more well‑rested and I think that definitely helped us. Q. Not suggesting your guys need a wake‑up call, but when you with you see St. Bonaventure knock off Saint Louis, does it give a higher seed a wake‑up call going into the first round? COACH LONERGAN: Yeah, I guess we are a three seed and we earned it and that's great. I was happy last Sunday, people helped us out, we were three instead of tied for fourth or whatever. But you know what, sometimes I feel like a tenth seed; we were picked tenth, so I don't feel like we are sitting here like Saint Louis or VCU. We are playing but I don't really feel like we are the favorite. I think it's great for basketball what St. Bonnies did. I like Mark Schmidt, and it just shows you how good our league is, it really does, from top to bottom, and you know, people on TV can say what they want, but you know, this league's getting six bids, maybe five, but I'm pretty sure it's getting six; and if people watch our tournament on TV today, I think they can see that it's just as good or better than the BIG EAST, SEC, ACC, whatever; it's right there. Q. You turned them over 17 times; the point guard matchup, just talk about that and how important it was. COACH LONERGAN: I thought we did a better job in this game. Chaz was penetrating really getting six hands in. We talked about just digging in and creating turnovers. He keeps you on your heels but we did that and we left some guys as shooters. We feel that some of their guys are not shooters, so we got away that. But I think we had active hands and it really created a lot of turnovers, and late we did the same thing with a couple jump balls that we didn't get jump balls and we had some reach‑in fouls. I thought that was the key, we were aggressive and we didn't play on our heels and when he drove we didn't sit that and kind of watch the Chaz Williams Show. We really didn't quit on plays. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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