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ATLANTIC COAST CONFERENCE OPERATION BASKETBALLOctober 29, 2014Mike BreyCHARLOTTE, NORTH CAROLINA Q. Mike, obviously having some experience in this ACC, what can you say about how your team has responded and how they look going into the season? MIKE BREY: Well, we certainly got baptized by fire last year, and it was a rude awakening being a newcomer in this league. But I think we have a little better feel for the league now. You know, when you're in the Big East all those years, you have your breakdown drills before you play Georgetown and before you play Connecticut, and we really didn't have that. But what really helps us is we have this guy named Jerian Grant back with us, and he's really a key guy for us. And with him and Connaughton as seniors, I think those are two of the 10 or 12 best returning players in the league. Pretty good place to start. I feel we have a better feel for the league. I certainly have some real good senior leadership and talent in those two guys, and we feel we can play our way back into the mix of things in this league. Q. As we move into this new era of autonomy and trying to do more for the student‑athletes, if you were still at Delaware, how worried would you be about this new system and trying to compete? MIKE BREY: Yeah, great point. You know, I think if I was still sitting in Newark, Delaware, we'd be worrying about a huge separation in things. But the thing that I think would always give you peace of mind is access to the NCAA Tournament is not going to change. Still, if we won our league, the old America East, we could get in and become part of the NCAA Tournament. When I put myself back in that spot, you were able sometimes to steal a kid that maybe should be playing at the ACC level. Maybe you wouldn't be able to do that as much anymore with the resources that the Power Five are going to have. And you know what, you deal with it accordingly. I'd still take a lot of transfers from that level, when they didn't play at the highest level. But for those people, they have access to the Tournament, and they still can get in and be part of it. I think that's what you've got to hang your hat on. Q. Coming from someone that just made the move to the ACC, how hard is it to do it as a team and what can the Cardinals expect? MIKE BREY: Well, it's interesting with Louisville because of style of play. You know, they're a little bit different with that pressure, and maybe the impetus will be more on the people in the league dealing with them. But I mean, there's going to be‑‑ I think there's a thing of familiarity that you've got‑‑ there's an arc of that that you've got to go through. They certainly have a heck of a talented team to enter the league with, and if they stay healthy, they're going to be one of the better teams in the league. But their style of play is different than anybody else in the league, and it's unique, so they're probably going to be able to take advantage of that. Q. You mentioned the fact that obviously you have Grant back this season. What did he learn from having basketball taken away from him that you can see out of him now? MIKE BREY: I think he's come back more like a young man. I told him on the way down here, I feel like I'm talking to a young man now and not a boy anymore. He's come back as a leader and a captain. We had a foreign tour this summer that couldn't come at a more strategic team for our program. With him back, with the year we had, some young guys that have to grow up, but he's come back very focused. I think he feels he owes it to his teammates and some people to really get us back in position. And even though we're a Catholic school, I don't want him to feel like he's at confession every day. I'm trying to take the heat off of him. He's one of the better guards in the country, and we had a lot of close games last year. Grant was a close‑game closer for us throughout his career, and I sure hope we're in those positions more with him this year. Q. Given your play internationally over the summer, what is very important for you right now pre‑season in practice? MIKE BREY: Well, we had to be better defensively. We were horrible. We were really disappointed, and starting in the spring‑‑ it was funny, in our spring workouts after the season, I didn't have Connaughton because he was pitching with our baseball team, and I didn't have Grant. So we had six guys in our workouts, and it was a lot of three‑on‑three different defensive things. It was great to have Connaughton and Grant back in June and through summer, and we just have to be better there. I think we can be better there because our ball pressure will be better with Demetrius Jackson, the sophomore guard, who now takes over as quarterback. Kind of had an up‑and‑down freshman year. But the best thing for Demetrius Jackson is Eric Atkins is playing in Athens, Greece, now, and he gets the ball and quarterbacks the team. And he's playing with some veteran guys, playing with Connaughton and Grant. So he's really a talented young man, so I think that helps us. That's been our focus defensively. We shoot it well. We're back kind of playing how we've played when we've had success. We can spread the floor. I worry about us defensive rebounding long term, but I do think we can score it and spread people out. And that's been a style of play that's been helpful for us out there. Q. You've got quarterback, pitcher and forward all in the same answer‑‑ MIKE BREY: Yeah, I got it all in. Q. I know you've had some good battles with Syracuse over the years in the Big East and once again in the ACC. They lost a couple key guys from last year, but what do you think of the Orange going into this year? MIKE BREY: They're still going to be right there. I've been in this cycle with them in the Big East where they've lost guys and everybody said, oh, man, what are they going to be, who are they going to be. At the end of the day, their culture is so well established. It's a confident culture. They win. It's a tricky place to play. One of the things I've learned about being in the ACC is it's much tougher to win on the road than it was in the Big East, so holding serve at home becomes so important. The road in the Big East, you were playing Villanova down where the Sixers play. You were playing Seton Hall in the Rock, Georgetown ‑‑ when we played DePaul, our people bought all the tickets. That's not the case in this league. Because they really are tough to deal with in the Carrier Dome, that's always a great place to start. Q. What did you take away from your experience flying with the Blue Angels? MIKE BREY: Well, I didn't pass out or throw up. One of my former walk‑ons is a Blue Angel pilot. He's been working for me about a year. He said, "Coach, we give these guest rides. You've got to come down to Pensacola." He got me at a weak moment. The week before I was definitely trying to get out of it. I thought maybe the Ebola scare would be a reason. I was looking for anything. We were up for 45 minutes. We pulled 7G's one time. I got close to passing out. We went the speed of sound. We were flying upside down. There's a great video on it, and I got through it, but it was an amazing experience. I used to get a little nervous with turbulence on a commercial jet. That's nothing now. I'll sleep right through it after that. Q. Do you have to make the Tournament in order for you to call it a successful season? MIKE BREY: Yeah, you know, us getting back to the NCAA Tournament, we had been to four in a row and six out of seven before last season, and we had been to 14 straight postseason appearances, which was a record, NIT or NCAA, and we did neither. Getting back and being part of the NCAA Tournament is‑‑ you know, one of the things I said on our media day, I'm proud that that's been kind of the bar we've set. We've been disappointed when we don't make the Tournament. When I got there, we hadn't been in the Tournament in 10 years. So we've created that, and I think certainly for Grant and Connaughton, they want to finish their career playing in the NCAA Tournament. Q. Having been an assistant at Duke, how big was it last year one of your first big ACC wins was against Duke? MIKE BREY: Yeah, that's all we show in our highlight tape from last year. We just show clips from that game. It was a heck of a way to get your first ACC win, the first ACC game in the history of our program, and certainly beating them‑‑ great win for us. I compared it‑‑ when I got to the Big East and we were trying to find an identity, when we would beat Syracuse or Connecticut or Georgetown, those were program wins that kind of gave your program credibility. You get into this league and certainly when you can beat a Duke or a North Carolina, I think it gives you great credibility. I've got two guys sitting here that certainly can relate to that; Coach Cremins and Coach Odom remember that well. But it was great. I just wish we could have maintained the momentum a little better off of that. Q. Obviously I know this is outside of your program and I'm sure in your mind fortunately not something you have to deal with, but given what Carolina is going through right now, how good is that for Williams? And as a coach how would you approach a situation like that? MIKE BREY: Well, my situation, I wouldn't comment directly on the North Carolina situation, but I dealt with an academic situation losing Jerian Grant last year, and it was a pretty powerful loss to our team and at a key time. So it does become a distraction. I think as coaches, you're always trying to eliminate distractions for you, and then certainly then for your players. I think for Coach Williams, that's probably going to be the biggest challenge. As a matter of fact, at lunch he even kind of alluded to that, focus on the season, because they've got a heck of a basketball team. I dealt with it last year, and then throughout it, you're working to get Jerian Grant back. You're trying to keep that line of communication open when he's away, yet I'm coaching the team I have. All dynamics that guys that are in coaching, you've got a lot of balls in the air at times. Q. I asked this of Commissioner John Swofford: College sports in general is in a state of flux right now. What do you think about paying athletes or cost‑of‑living stipends? What's your thought on that? MIKE BREY: I think it's in a state of good flux in that the autonomy that's coming with the five power conferences and certainly our league being in it, being able to do some things for our student‑athletes that should be done. I'm not a pay‑for‑play guy, but cost of attendance certainly should be entertained. Being able to take care of them more, flying their parents to postseason. We did a foreign tour this summer, and I asked my compliance officer yesterday, I said, with this new autonomy, I could go on a foreign tour every summer, right? He said, probably will. That's an unbelievable experience for our guys. I think we're going to be in a position, if you're in one of the Power Five, to do some things with your student‑athletes that they deserve. The thing that we talked about at lunch just 20 minutes ago was we need to do a better job in basketball getting together the five power conferences, game rules, points of emphasis, officiating, how we take care of our guys, travel. I think we've got to get more organized because we've been given the green light for this autonomy. You saw the rule change where we could feed them differently. We need to be suggesting some things and be on the front edges. I think it's a good time. I just think as the basketball industry‑‑ we've got to get as organized as the football industry. Those football guys are really good, man. We've got to get as organized as far as what we need, dictating different things. But I think it's a good position with the state of thing, the change. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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