BIG EAST CONFERENCE MEN'S BASKETBALL TOURNAMENT

March 13, 2026

Ed Cooley

Jeremiah Williams

Langston Love

Madison Square Garden

Georgetown Hoyas

Postgame Media Conference

UConn - 67, Georgetown - 51

THE MODERATOR: We'll get started.

ED COOLEY: Obviously disappointed with just our overall energy today. I thought we were flat right from the beginning. You got to give -- I thought Connecticut did a really good job defensively. They had just a little bit of extra juice in their step. Defensively they were swarming all over the place. They got a lot of second shots. The game was still in hand right up until about the eight minute mark. Every mistake we made they capitalized, whether we went under a screen, three ball, we helped off the corner, three ball. And then again it's hard -- and I thought we played, I thought we defended really well. I really did. But you put so much pressure on your defense when you're not able to make a shot. 2-16 from the three. I thought we had some decent looks. I thought we had uncharacteristic turnovers when we had a numbers opportunity. Then, when you give an efficient offense, a team like UConn with what Danny's done with that group, 13 extra possessions, and they got every 50/50 ball, it's really hard. They just had a little bit more pop to them than we had today. Whether we were tired, we were fatigued, when you're fighting for your life to try to advance in this tournament that's really hard. But all credit goes to them. Made some tough shots. Mullins was really good. When their center has eight assists, I think they had 21 assists or 22 assists on 20-something baskets, really, really efficient. But proud of our group, proud of the way we played in this Big East tournament. It's always a pleasure to play in here. But overall really disappointed. Happy how we played in this tournament; very, very disappointed in the overall body of work that Georgetown men's basketball put in this season. I did not see this coming from a win/loss situation, so we got a lot of things to address in order to get back to this game next year and try to become an NCAA tournament team. The Big East needs Georgetown to be good for us to continue to build as an organization in the Big East.

THE MODERATOR: Questions for the players, please.

Q. To hear your coach say that you came out flat, after all you guys have been working through since June, how does it feel to hear that from your coach?

JEREMIAH WILLIAMS: It doesn't feel pleasant. Coming off a loss obviously where we had a lot of juice coming into this tournament and a lot of confidence about ourselves. The feeling does not feel good.

LANGSTON LOVE: I just feel like Coach Cooley always is going to hold us accountable and he knows what's best and he knows what our best is. So we couldn't ask him to do anything else but then hold us accountable.

Q. I know the emotions are still raw, but is there any moment where you might think about the what-ifs, what if injuries didn't hit, what if we won a few of those close games, or do you just view it as we just didn't do enough.

LANGSTON LOVE: I mean, if you dwell on the what-ifs, you aren't going to be able to progress. So we just had to take everything day by day and just respond to how the season was going and we just tried to do our best.

Q. Obviously what Coach said and what you guys have been saying in the first few questions, with an experience like this, you took a tough loss, rebounding into next year what are you going to take as the biggest step in the right direction with obviously what went wrong in the loss, what is going to be the biggest motivation next year?

JEREMIAH WILLIAMS: I'll say the biggest motivation going into next year is just -- I mean, coming into the year before there was any records, we had very high hopes. Even at the very start of the year before we lost our big fellows, we had very high hopes. So I'll just take into account resilience, preparation, and intent. I think those were things that we were harping on in the season that kind of kept us in a lot of games and we just had to finish it. So hopefully just continue to build off that, sharpen up a couple skills in our game. And that's it.

Q. Jeremiah, obviously you're a talented player who's been coveted by different coaches throughout your career. Can you speak to what your experience in playing for Coach Cooley? And these last few days in particular, I know tonight wasn't a result that you wanted, but you showed your abilities and you project to the next level. Can you speak about your experience and how you were able to develop under Coach Cooley this season?

JEREMIAH WILLIAMS: Playing for Coach Cooley was an awesome experience. He really cares about us, cares about all the players, all the staff, the support staff. So just being around some love like that was very -- was a great thing to be around, something I really looked for in my recruitment, as well as I think it's a testament to who he is as a coach and how we performed all year. Obviously we didn't get results we wanted to, but like our group never, we never wavered. We didn't get down on ourselves. We knew we weren't who we thought we were going to be throughout the season, but we showed up every single day and prepared ourselves like we were No. 1 in the Big East. So it's a credit to Coach Cooley. I appreciate him giving me this opportunity to play for Georgetown, and it's something I'll cherish forever for the rest of my life.

Q. Forgive me if I'm wrong, it seems like you're processing with the deep breath and all. Where is your head right now?

ED COOLEY: I'm just thinking about the plan and process of developing Georgetown, and holding myself accountable. What do I have to do better. What does our staff have to do better. I'm not sitting here as a happy coach at all. This is an incredible tournament. I've been successful in this tournament as an assistant coach, as a head coach. Sitting here I feel like, you know, we underachieved in some ways, and we put ourselves in this boat, so we got some work to do. We got some work to do. But I'm really proud of our kids' resilience, and I appreciate what Jeremiah said. Obviously Langston not being healthy the whole year, we recruited Langston to be a starter for us, and he just wasn't healthy the whole year. So what you all don't know that I got to give him a lot of love on is he wasn't even supposed to play the last two weeks, but he did everything he could to try to help us, so I'm grateful for that. But just processing a lot. What could I have done better. What could I have held the players and motivated them to do a little bit better. Because, again, when you look at our body of work, we were right there. In probably, of our 20 Big East games, 16 of 'em came right down to the last minute, minute and a half. So we got to get better at that and identify some players.

Q. On a positive note what was the highlight of your season?

ED COOLEY: The highlight of my season? I would say the biggest highlight of my season was seeing my son at the very last game when we played Providence College. Had nothing to do -- and many of you know that are on the road all the time, you got to sacrifice when you're a leader, you got to sacrifice when you're on the road. And I think the thing that gives in is you don't see your family. You don't see 'em for Christmas, you don't see 'em for holidays. So there's a lot of sacrifice. So, for all the coaches and people who work and travel, don't ever forget about how important that family aspect is. Because we give more time to our players, we give more time to the university. Yeah, they pay us, but at the end of the day, man, when the door closes, you're at home with your family and that's the most important thing.