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NCAA MEN'S 1ST AND 2ND ROUNDS: WICHITA

March 14, 2018

Travis DeCuire

Wichita, Kansas

THE MODERATOR: Coach, welcome to Wichita, and let's assess scouting report on Michigan.

COACH DECUIRE: Phenomenal basketball team. I'm reading right here. Says please speak up. I'm trying my best. My voice has been gone for about a month. So please bear with me.

Tough matchup. Very experienced team, experienced program. Anytime you're up against a program that expects to be in an NCAA Tournament every year you're going to have a tough task. Take care of the ball, shoot the ball, defend.

That's pretty much the scenario in winning, and they do it about as well as anyone in the country. We look forward to this opportunity. Our defense is what got us here. We turn people over. We outrebound people. And we execute offensively as well. We've got some guys that can put the ball in the basket. Great depth, versatility.

So we look forward to every opportunity we have to find ways to create our own advantages, and if we can keep ourselves in the game early, gain some confidence as the game progresses, the key for us is to just find ways to change that assist to turnover ratio for them and find the glass. If we can do that, I think we'll have a chance.

Q. Coach, that second half against Eastern, that defensive just entire half, is that about the best defense you've played this year and do you guys feel the momentum from that heading into the tournament?
COACH DECUIRE: Yes. We've had moments, you know, second half at Georgia State, second half in the Legends Classic against Santa Barbara. And then it kind of carried over from there. In December we pretty much played like that almost every game with the three wins at home and then to go to the University of Washington and go down the stretch and come close to a victory there. So it became a habit in December.

And you learn better from losses than wins, and we had a streak of wins, and I think that the consistency faded a little bit, and it took a couple of losses for us to get it back. And fortunately for us we found our mojo in February, early March. And here we are. When we needed it most, it performed for us. So we'll have an opportunity to go out and showcase what we've done defensively all year on the national stage.

Q. Coach, you've said multiple times this year this is probably your favorite group you've been able to coach. What factors make this team different than any other team you've had?
COACH DECUIRE: I love every group I've ever coached. So I don't want that to be taken wrong. But there's a relationship that you build, a bond that you have with each team. And this is a group that I've had the longest of any, and so there are some heart-felt relationships that we have, and when you're battle tested together after recruiting a group and going to war with a group, you kind of fall in love with them, you know.

And I think what separates them from what I've had in the past, the chip that these guys carry on their shoulders individually and collectively. We've got a group of young men that were either recruited at a higher level or believe that they should have been recruited at a higher level.

And every opportunity they've had to prove that they've risen to that occasion, whether it was at Pitt, Stanford, Washington, Penn State. We've had guys step up and play to that level. And we're just waiting for that opportunity to have all of those guys do it on the same night.

Q. Coach, I know your mantra all season is compete with desperation. I guess for lack of a better way of saying this, like who is the most desperate player on the team or is there one player that really embodies that mantra?
COACH DECUIRE: That's a tough one. You're asking me to pick a favorite player. I can't do that. But the guy that probably exemplifies what we stand for in that regard is probably Michael Oguine. He plays his motor is revved up at a very high level on both sides of the ball. And that's typically what we're talking about when we're talking about competing with desperation is a guy that plays full speed as hard as he can for 40 minutes, and Mike is probably the closest to that of anyone on our team.

Q. Coach, when you watch the film of Michigan, what jumps out at you more, their offensive ability or their defensive ability and why?
COACH DECUIRE: To the common eye, offense always stands out the most because you see the ball go through the net. You see the deep threes and things like that. But I think their defense frustrates you into bad shots and then your turnovers becomes extra possessions for them and a team that's efficient as them offensively, you can't afford to give them extra possessions or you'll never get yourself out of a hole.

So I think the turnovers that they force, the bad shots that they force. A lot of things that they do don't show up on the stat sheet. So the games I've watched I've seen guys settle for just okay shots, not great shots, 30 percent shots. And if you have enough will inside of you to move the ball, make them work around, space them and get the best shot you can get every possession, then you'll give yourself an opportunity to win. But not very many teams have done that.

Q. Just as a followup, what makes you believe your team has that patience and that will to do exactly what you just said?
COACH DECUIRE: Am I giving you a scouting report? (Laughs). I'm just saying you got Michigan on. I'm joking. I'm joking. Our schedule. You know, we've scheduled the best competition we can every year in November, December. And I think our conference is as strong as it's been in 20 years. And so I think when you play against high level of competition and you play against a ton of different styles defensively, offensively, you're forced to make changes through the course of the game.

So you prepare for one style on a Thursday. On a Saturday you prepare for another. And through our schedule we've played similar basketball teams, similar defensively and more so offensively in terms of their offense. And so the terminologies, the plan, the things that we've discussed with our team for the last three days aren't new. And the patience is something that you fight for. It becomes your culture. Either you have it or you don't.

And as a staff we've fought for that all year. We have guys that can score. And so it's very difficult to get a guy who can score 18 to 20 a game to turn down a shot for a better shot. So there will be nothing that we ask our team to do tomorrow night that we haven't asked them to do all year, and that's why I believe we can get it done. I'm not guaranteeing it. I just believe.

Q. Coach, as opposed to Michigan, you've played "win or go home" basketball all last week in Reno. As opposed to a conference that gets at larges in teams like Michigan, how is that a positive for you guys, the games you had to grind out there and right here you have to do the same thing?
COACH DECUIRE: I think it's our culture. We've played every game. For 33 games it's been win or go home. Every time I'm in the locker room, every practice, every prep. Every film situation we've treated it like an NCAA Tournament game. So when we got here this wouldn't be any different than the other 33 games we've played.

I didn't want to get here and say okay, now we gotta play here. No. Our conversation is just play the way we've played for 33 games. Our defense will be the same. Our offense will be the same. I want the same guys to get the same shots they've been shooting all year long, and we just gotta stick together and fight. And whoever the high hand is, that's who gets the ball.

THE MODERATOR: One final question?

COACH DECUIRE: Thank you. Go Griz.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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