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NCAA MEN'S 2ND & 3RD ROUNDS: SAN ANTONIOMarch 21, 2014Kadeem BattsEd CooleyBryce CottonLaDontae HentonSAN ANTONIO, TEXAS North Carolina – 79 THE MODERATOR: We have Providence head coach Ed Cooley along with student‑athletes, Bryce Cotton, LaDontae Henton and Kadeem Batts. We'll ask Coach Cooley to make an opening statement and then take questions for the student‑athletes. Coach? COACH COOLEY: Great basketball game, high‑level game. Both teams played with a lot of intensity and passion. You know, we recovered from some mistakes. We went with a bigger lineup to try to slow down some of their perimeter shooting and thought it worked for a second. You know, they had the ball at the right time and made a timely play. I thought the game was well‑officiated, well‑played. You know, credit to Carolina for making the right play when they did. But at the same time, I'm really, really, really proud of our student‑athletes. I thought they played great. Nobody gave us a chance at the beginning of this year. Nobody gave us a chance when we went through turmoil. Nobody gave these kids a chance to even come in this game and play the all mighty blue bloods. I'm proud of our kids. These kids have overcome so much. If this is the way we've got to go out, there is no better way to go out than to play hard, leave it on the floor. Proud of our seniors and proud of our grit and energy. Tough, it's tough. Quite frankly, I thought we deserved to win, but sometimes in life it doesn't happen that way. You've got to get lucky at the right time, and we didn't. THE MODERATOR: Questions for the student‑athletes. Q. Bryce, obviously, the ends left a sour taste in your mouth. But how much fun was that while it was happening? BRYCE COTTON: It was a great game, you know. Like I said going into it, it was going to go down to the wire because they had a great team full of great players just like us. And unfortunately, we just didn't come up with the win. Q. You and Marcus Paige had a little chat right before McAdoo. I think it was the second set of free throws. Could you share what you two were saying and you had a chuckle over? BRYCE COTTON: No, just talking about the game and how it was very exciting and everything was going down to the wire and both teams were making runs back and forth. We were just talking about how it's been fun. Q. Bryce, how would you rate your performance compared to the rest of your career? Where does it rank? COACH COOLEY: A‑plus. BRYCE COTTON: I mean, it wasn't enough, you know? I definitely left it all out on the floor just like the rest of my teammates, but obviously, it wasn't enough because we didn't come up with the win. Q. LaDontae and Kadeem, Bryce, tonight, you guys have been watching him all year, do you think he took it to maybe one extra level than what you've seen? LaDONTAE HENTON: He always‑‑ I mean, he's a great player. I expect that from him‑‑ coming from him all the time he puts in and practicing. We believe in him, and the coaching staff believes in him. And he had it rolling tonight. He's one of our leaders. He and Kadeem Batts are our leaders, and we're going to play off of them. KADEEM BATTS: Yeah, he's a great player. Wish things would have fallen our way a little bit. I would have played better a little bit, but Cotton did everything he could do. We just couldn't come up with the win. Q. LaDontae, you had the drive with about 35 seconds left and you missed it. Did you think you might have been fouled in that situation? Just talk about the miss? LaDONTAE HENTON: Either way it goes, I feel I should have made the shot. It was at point‑blank range. The ball just didn't go in for me. Q. Again, LaDontae, can you describe what it was like going on the boards against them? Because they seemed to be pretty tough on their own glass. LaDONTAE HENTON: Yeah, the coaching staff made it a point of emphasis that they're a great rebounding team. So for us to stay in the game, we had to do a lot of rebounding, and that's what I tried to do. I tried to crash the boards. No matter the size, they are a big team, really big, real athletic. I just tried to get to the boards whenever I can. Q. Bryce, you were down 9, I think a couple times in the second half. Did you sense that it was slipping away, that you had to pick it up offensively? Because I think you guys had an 11‑0 run to get back in the game. BRYCE COTTON: Yeah, all year I think our tendency has shown we're a second‑half team and we have a tendency to make runs late, and that's what we did again tonight. But NorthCarolina did a great job making their own runs as well, and it just worked out for them though tonight. Q. Bryce, did you notice when you started catching fire, did you notice their defense shift or adapt to how they were defending you? If so, how did you react to that? BRYCE COTTON: No, I didn't really notice them adapting whatsoever. But they did a great job always stepping into the paint whenever I would drive. I was just trying to make the right play and pass it to the open guys, and they did a good job of hitting some big shots as well in crucial points throughout the game. Q. Bryce, I'm just curious, you've been accustomed to playing these kind of minutes, so this isn't new to you. But how tired were you down the stretch, and could you just take me through your last possession? BRYCE COTTON: I felt the same way I did every game. Playing in elimination games where you know it could be your last, you're not really worried about how tired you are. I had so much adrenaline, so fatigue wasn't a factor for me mentally. Q. Bryce, has it sunk in yet that that was it for you at Providence College? BRYCE COTTON: It's still sinking in as we speak. It's been a crazy year, so many ups and downs. Even though this hurts, we still have a lot to be thankful for, but right now, this definitely hurts a lot. THE MODERATOR: We'll let the student‑athletes go. Gentlemen, thank you. We'll take questions for Coach Cooley. Q. Ed, first, I could tell you that I thought that was probably the best that Bryce has played, and two, maybe the big three at the timeout that Paige made. Did you look for that and expect that to happen? COACH COOLEY: Of course. He's a great player and he's made big shots his whole career there, especially this year. Coming out the timeout we told them if one guy's going to shoot a three, if possible, it's going to be Paige or McDonald. Credit the kid, he made a great shot. I've seen Bryce perform like that in practice, but when you get to this stage and you're able to do that‑‑ I've been saying the whole year I think Bryce is one of the top guards in all of America. It's just for whatever reason he didn't get the national love. I think today if there is somebody in this national tournament that does that, they would be considered Superman. That kid has been doing that for us all year. We've played against tough competition all year. Everybody knows he's not coming out. I thought he was a legit first‑round pick tonight. Q. Ed, you said you felt that your team deserved to win. Could you please put into words why you feel that way? COACH COOLEY: I thought we played really hard. We didn't play smart in some instances. You use the term deserve, but you didn't earn it, you know? I thought we deserved the win just based on how we came back, and I use this phrase a lot. You may deserve something, but until you earn it that's when you get over the hump. Hopefully if we're on this stage again next year, we earn a win. Today we deserved it. We didn't earn it. Q. Coach, we can see the emotion on your face knowing that that was it for Bryce. Even though he's leaving, what's that kid meant to your program moving forward? COACH COOLEY: Those seniors. I'm hurting for our seniors. I'm hurting for our organization. We've been pounding rocks for years at Providence College, and we'll continue to pound rocks until we win this whole thing. My goal coming to Providence College was to play with the best teams in the country every single night. We're not there yet. Progress, patience, perseverance, that's what I hurt for. I hurt for our city. I hurt for our state. When we lose, I feel that because there is so much pride and passion around our organization. I feel for those kids. They gave it up for us this year.  They could have easily packed it in, easily packed it in; and for us to do what we did, they can't take away our championship. We earned that. We earned that. That's something we earned. Q. Just talk about going with Carson more in the second half other than Josh. Obviously you wanted to go big? COACH COOLEY: We needed some length. They had 21 offensive rebounds. I mean, they hammered us on the glass, and I think that's how they won the game. We took 50‑some‑odd shots and they took 70‑some shots. We just needed more length on the perimeter, a little more length on the interior. For a minute there, I thought it was going to work. I really did. Q. Just go over the last play. Obviously, just trying to defend the rim there when Brice Johnson threw up a wild shot and McAdoo snuck in there? COACH COOLEY: Quite frankly, I thought he traveled, but the referee didn't call it. Then they did what they did all game. They got a second shot. I'm not complaining. That was a visual. I thought, wow, okay, this is going to be a walk. We get the ball back with 8 seconds and anything's possible. Then we weren't attention to detail. We didn't block out the shooter of everything. When you're in these type of games, your discipline and attention to detail has to come in. And we had two really, really bad plays at the end of the game because we didn't even get a chance to shoot to tie the ball. Crazy things happen in March, and I was hoping for one last miracle. Q. Coach, that was an incredible up‑tempo game for about the first 35 minutes. It seemed like the last five to six minutes your team slowed it down a little bit and tried to make it a half-court game. Was that something intentional you did or was that just the pace of the game? COACH COOLEY: We've played like that the whole year. I don't know if we tried to slow it down. We're very opportunistic. If we can get out on the break, I thought our transition was pretty good. Again, you've got to play time and score. I thought we dictated the pace and tempo, especially the last ten minutes of the game, that offered us the opportunity to get it to where it was. I don't know that we slowed the game down; I just think we were very opportunistic when we had a chance. THE MODERATOR: Thank you, Coach. COACH COOLEY: Thank you. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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