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NCAA MEN'S 2ND & 3RD ROUNDS: SAN ANTONIOMarch 21, 2014Doug McDermottGreg McDermottEthan WraggeSAN ANTONIO, TEXAS Creighton – 76 THE MODERATOR: We are joined by Creighton University head coach, Greg McDermott, student‑athletes Doug McDermott and Ethan Wragge. Coach, an opening statement, and then questions for the student‑athletes. Coach? COACH McDERMOTT: We're thrilled to get the victory against a very good team. The more I watched Louisiana‑Lafayette, the more impressed I was. I don't think that watching Payton on film does him justice until you play him in person. He's got an unbelievable first step, plays with a great pace. I thought he did a good job of controlling the tempo of the game. As we've seen, the last couple of days have been a lot of crazy things that happened in this tournament. So you've just got to survive and advance somehow. Obviously, we got behind the second half, took that timeout. Ethan hit a couple big threes. The zone was good to us for a short period of time, and then Doug hit a couple big shots late to ice it. So these guys have been in this position before. They desperately wanted to get back and have an opportunity to advance to the Sweet Sixteen. I'm proud of the fact that they were able to do that. THE MODERATOR: Questions for the student‑athletes. Q. Doug, is it weird to have the other team's best player on you offensively? Usually they try to skate around, but you guys were against each other quite a bit today? DOUG McDERMOTT: Yeah, he's an unbelievable player. To do what he did on the offensive end while trying‑‑ I was trying to make it as hard as possible all night to get him tired or get him in foul trouble. So he's got a motor like none other. Got to give him credit. I just tried to make it tough on him, but he was still able to do his thing on the offensive end of the floor. Q. Doug, at the end of the game, you kind of let out, under the basket, you let out an exhale there and high‑fived your teammate. Did it feel like you guys were really in a fight today? DOUG McDERMOTT: It really did. You've got to give them so much credit. We watched them on film. They were down like 12 or 13 points with five minutes left, and they came back and made it a game at the end. So we got away with one today. We didn't play our best to start the game, but we really showed our leadership and our veteran‑‑ we have a very veteran group, and I think we really showed that towards the end down the stretch. Q. Doug, can you talk about that three‑pointer you hit in the game and that tough lay‑up, just kind of what was going through your head? DOUG McDERMOTT: You know, they're making it tough on me for a good 10 minutes or 12 minutes where it's really hard to get any looks. So we ran that play, and Ethan set a great screen to get my guy. We make that play all the time. So it felt good to get that one to go in, and that kind of got my confidence going to the next play where I drive it to the baseline. Q. Ethan, you seemed to hit some very timely three‑pointers today. Do you have a knack for that or were you looking for your shot or how did those come about? ETHAN WRAGGE: I think up until that point I was like 1 for 6, and they're all good looks, but my teammates did a good job. Jahenns hit a wide‑open lay‑up that he ended up kicking out to me. Once I kind of got that rhythm and got one going, I was able to get a pretty friendly roll on the second one. The third one, that is just a play we've been running. They were timely, but they were all good. Q. For both of you guys, you wanted to get back into this round because when I saw you guys in Philadelphia you talked about the pain that you felt after the round of 32. How does it feel to be back here and to have that chance? DOUG McDERMOTT: It feels great to be back in this position. You know, we've been in this position, this will be our third straight year where we've gotten to this game. We failed the last two years to get past this round. It's what I came back for. It's why we're all playing this game. It's what we work for in the off‑season, to get to this point. We're hoping to make a better outcome this year than we did the previous two. ETHAN WRAGGE: Yeah, exactly what Doug said. This is the point in the tournament that we wanted to get back to. The last two years we've been bounced from it. Just it's finally here almost. We're really excited, and we're going to go out and we'll be ready to go. Q. Doug, I want to ask you about Baylor. Just what you know. I know it's obviously a night you'll be talking a lot about that meeting and watching video. But what do you think about the Bears? DOUG McDERMOTT: They're a great team. They're very long. I know a couple guys from Iowa State that emphasize their length, how frustrating it can be. So we've got to be ready to go against their zone that they're really successful with. We're going to get ready for tomorrow, prepare for that. We don't have guys on our scout team that are 7'1" with a 7' wing span, but we'll try to get a good look. I'm good friends with Cory Jefferson. Over the summer we played together, so I've got a lot of respect for those guys and Brady Heslip as well. It's going to be a fun battle. We're both fighting for a lot. THE MODERATOR: Ethan, Doug, we'll let you go. Thank you for coming. Questions for Coach McDermott. Q. Coach, two things related to the Cajuns, how surprised were you that Payton was on Doug as much as he was, and how much was the energy you think he expended there affecting him offensively? Also, from your perspective, how did things‑‑ even though they took the lead‑‑ how did things change after long got into foul trouble early in the second half? COACH McDERMOTT: I don't know that I was totally surprised that he guarded Doug because I wasn't sure what direction they would go. We've seen about every possible match‑up this year. But he's their best player. He's their best athlete. He was really good when he was on Doug, so I'm not surprised. I don't think he expended any more energy than he usually does, because the kid plays his tail off every game that I've watched. So I'm not surprised at that. You know, we came out of that timeout and decided to go zone. They were really beating us off the dribble, and we just decided to try to make them hit a couple shots. Really, our plan going in was we felt like we could win if Payton got 25 points, as long as he didn't have ten assists to go with it. So we were okay giving him some tough twos, but we weren't going to let him penetrate and find those shooters and pick us apart with the pass as well. The zone was good for four or five possessions, and then they got. Like Coach Marlin always does, he got into the teeth of it and got his team a couple good shots against it, so we got out of it. But Ethan hit a couple big shots. Grant had a great play going to the basket during that stretch, and we were able to get the crowd in the game for the stretch run. Q. Greg, with Doug, he had gone through sort of a not particularly strong offensive stretch right up until he made that big three‑pointer. Is that just something that happened organically and that time the play worked? Or does Doug assert himself in situations that call for him to step up? COACH McDERMOTT: I think Doug takes what the defense gives him. They double teamed a couple times. He made a great pass to Austin. Austin hit a big shot, a big three out of the double team. Then Doug lets the game come to him, which is for someone who scores as much as he does, he'll go through a stretch where five or six minutes he'll take eight shots, and then he'll go five or six and won't take a shot. It's just the way he plays. He's not going to force the issue very often. But in those situations, obviously, we ran the play and he had the option to curl it or pop it. The next time we just gave him an isolation and cleared out the side of the floor, feeling like at least he was going to get fouled, worst case scenario, if he went to the basket. He has a lot of trust and confidence in his teammates. Obviously, they pass him the ball an awful lot, and Doug's more than happy to reciprocate when one of his guys is open. Q. Just wanted to ask you, were you guys aware of the Duke score? Were the coaches aware of the Duke score? Was there any discussion of that when you found out what happened and give it more than a thought? On top of that question, could you talk about the wide‑open nature of this tournament? There have been a lot of upsets so far. COACH McDERMOTT: I was aware of the Duke score. It had ended right as, I think, our guys took the floor for warm‑ups. We didn't discuss it at all with our team. But what we've talked about with the team after yesterday, there were several upsets, and a lot of near misses as well. I think it speaks to what we've seen all season. A team would get number one, and they'd lose twice in that week. It happened all the time. I just think there are a lot of good players in college basketball. I think experience can trump length and athletic ability. When you're able to put a team together that's got four or five guys that have played together a long time. I think you saw that in NorthDakota State last night. I think you saw it at Mercer today. Obviously, we're a very experienced team. We're not here because we can run and jump and take rebounds at the top of the square. We're here because I've got a group of guys that have played together a long time, and they really understand each other's strengths and weaknesses, and they've got a high basketball IQ. I think there are a lot of teams across the country that maybe aren't in the so‑called BCS leagues that are really good basketball teams because of experience, and I think you're seeing some of those teams advance. Q. Coach, can you talk about your match‑up with Baylor and how you plan to deal with both their length and their 1‑3‑1 zone? COACH McDERMOTT: I haven't watched a lot of them to this point because I was scared to death of this first game, but obviously my time at Iowa State I've coached against Coach Drew a lot and have had a little success but not much. Their zone is as good as I've seen it, thinking back to the time when I coached against him. I think it's a little bit tighter. There aren't as many holes in the middle as there were in the past. If they do make a mistake, they cover up so quickly because of that length and athletic ability. Obviously, they protect the rim extremely well with Cory and Isaiah back there. It's going to be an interesting challenge for us. But the reality of it is if you make the round of 32, everybody's good. So we're going to have to be ready and hopefully we can execute our plan. Q. I wanted to ask you a little bit more about Doug, and just his tenacity. The way he keeps working. Obviously, the defenses are geared to stop him and harass him. But I think just the way he keeps bumping and grinding and gets into the flow of it. Can you just talk about his poise, his tenacity and just how tough he is? COACH McDERMOTT: You know, he doesn't outwardly ‑‑ I don't think he looks like a tenacious competitor. But in his gut the kid absolutely hates to lose, and he's always been that way. He's able to channel that in the right way where he impacts winning without taking away from what we need him to do within the scope of our team. But when he's locked in and he's focused, there are not many better. I think his teammates feed off that. His rebounding, I talked to him before the game about going to get 15 rebounds and he'd try to do it in the first half. So when he's locked in like that, he's obviously a very good basketball player. He really enjoys taking big shots, and he's made a lot of big shots especially this season but throughout his career. Today he was fighting and grinding the whole time to try to get us a victory. Q. Greg, 60‑58, I think, when Jahenns goes down the middle. Ethan's in the corner and Manigat's pretty much got a lay‑up? COACH McDERMOTT: Pretty much (laughing). Q. He kicks it out and the crowd kind of gasps. What were you thinking? COACH McDERMOTT: My initial thought was, why not take the two points Jahenns? But it gets back to what I said, there is a guy Jahenns who has played with Ethan for four years that knows he just hit a couple, and knows that shot is probably as good as a lay‑up, only it counts for one more point. We're good because of that. Jahenns could have had two points, which would have been a huge basket for us. But he's willing to give up what might have been good for him to try to get his teammate an open shot. We've been good all year because we had games like we had tonight where we have 18 assists and six turnovers, and that's just who we are. I'm not surprised at it. I'll look at it on film and see if he should have taken the lay‑up, but obviously, it was a heck of a play and a huge boost for us. Q. Coach, how important was Austin Chatman's play today? COACH McDERMOTT: I can't believe we've gone this long without talking about him. He was so good; not just making a few shots, but he got into the teeth of that defense. He made some plays for himself. He made some plays for his teammates. We switched him on to Payton for a few possessions just to try to put a little quickness on him. We ask him to do so much. To play fast and to run in transition, you have to have somebody that steers that ship, and Austin does that. He gets it there quick, and especially the last three weeks or so, he's been making unbelievable decisions at the end of our break. But he's a really important part of this team that doesn't get talked about enough. We wouldn't be where we are today without Austin Chatman, and we wouldn't have won this game without him today. I thought he was outstanding. THE MODERATOR: Thank you, Coach. COACH McDERMOTT: Thank you. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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