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SOUTHEASTERN CONFERENCE MEN'S TOURNAMENTMarch 11, 2007Stan HeathMichael WashingtonSonny WeemsATLANTA, GEORGIA THE MODERATOR: We're ready to begin with Arkansas. Sonny Weems will be joining us momentarily. We'll get started with Coach Heath, ask him for some opening comments and we'll take some questions for Michael. Coach? STAN HEATH: Well, we faced a well-oiled machine. I'll be very surprised if they don't win it all. It would take an off-night for them to get upset. Every time you have a breakdown or you make a mistake, they really capitalize on you very well. I thought we could have shot the ball better. We missed some shots that we've been making at a much higher percentage. That would have allowed us to at least keep us in a little more range. But unfortunately they wouldn't fall. And the runs they got were just too much for us. THE MODERATOR: Let's start with questions for Michael. Q. Michael, you came in with some quick baskets after Charles Thomas got hurt, can you talk about what his injury meant to you today. MICHAEL WASHINGTON: You know, I had to step up and take his place. When you need people to step up and step their game up, and that's what I had to do. I had to take his points from yesterday, he had 18 and 8. Q. Are both of you in agreement with Coach, that they're the team to beat going forward now? SONNY WEEMS: Yes, I think so. I think they're a great team, you know. They play with great swagger. They play together a lot. So I think they'll be one of the teams to face in the NCAA Tournament. MICHAEL WASHINGTON: Yeah, they're a great team. I believe they're the best team in the nation right now. Q. How tough was it to penetrate on their defense from the guard play? SONNY WEEMS: They play zone a little bit, and they have a lot of big men with -- a lot of long, athletic big men. So it was hard penetrating, trying to shoot over them, because they're a lot longer than we are. So I think it gave us problems at that end. MICHAEL WASHINGTON: I have an advantage to take people off the dribble, so I knew what I could do, what my strength was, so I took them off the dribble. Q. For the players, there was a general perception that yesterday's win pretty much put you guys in the NCAA, and Coach Heath said he was careful not to talk to you guys about anything but the SEC Tournament. Nevertheless, was there a feeling of accomplishment yesterday that at all made it more difficult to prepare for today's game? SONNY WEEMS: No, I don't think so. We were focused on winning the SEC Championship. That's what we came here for. We packed for four days to play. We expected to win. But, you know, we came up short. Right now we've just got to move on. MICHAEL WASHINGTON: Yeah, we came to win the championship for the SEC. We played our hardest and they outplayed us. THE MODERATOR: Okay, fellas, you can return to the locker room. Thank you. Continue with questions for Coach Heath. Q. Coach Heath, did fatigue have anything to do with the shooting, or was it just an off-day? What are your thoughts on that? STAN HEATH: It's hard to tell. Four days, four games in four days is not easy. I'm looking at two guys that I think can shoot the ball very well, Patrick Beverley and even Stefan Welsh can get it going, and we went 1 for 15. I don't know, the first time we played Florida last time, too, we were 1 for 15 for the game, too. So some of that has to do with their defense. They're long, they're quick. They make you hurry yourselves a little bit more. They take you out of your comfort zone. I think it's a little bit of both, trying to play so many games in a short amount of time. At the same time playing against a great defense that makes it tough for you to get shots. Q. Stan, how much did it affect you guys when you lost Charles early, and what is his status with the leg? STAN HEATH: Well, they took X-rays, and the information I have right now is it was negative, and it's a sprained ankle. It's a severe sprain, but over the next couple of days we're treating it with ice, with rest. I believe he'll heal up and be fine. So the prognosis is pretty positive for the future, but he wasn't able to go today, which was unfortunate for us. Q. How much did that impact what you were trying to do early? STAN HEATH: It just disrupts your rhythm, your chemistry on the court, to have a guy who has three years of experience under his belt, and has played in the SEC Tournament before, and now we're relying on the freshman. And Michael played great. He played terrific. But there were times out there where Michael defensively trying to handle Noah, was pretty difficult. No one's a great match-up against Noah, but Charles has done a pretty solid job the last times we've played them. Their post guys had been somewhere around 10, 12 points, where today their post guys pretty much dominated the game. Q. Continue on with Michael a little bit. What has he done here lately in practice and in games to just keep coming on, and just the potential that you see in him? STAN HEATH: His upside is so obvious. Anyone's watched us the last five or six games can recognize his talent. He's active, he can make shots, he can put the ball on the floor, he's a very good passer as well. You know, there's no question the future is really bright for Michael, and the way he can impact our Razorback basketball team. Q. Stan, were you okay with all the three-point shots in the first half? Were those the type of three-point shots you like to get or was the offense impatient at all? STAN HEATH: No, we were impatient. We took some quick ones, fast ones. We were trying to -- you know, for the first time we really played young. We played immature. We were trying -- we got it down a little bit, and we were trying to get back into the game as quick as possible. You know, we kept talking about just possession by possession, not trying to get it all back at once, that's where Florida has you. The minute you're playing into their hands, you play a little faster than you need to. You take hurried shots, you miss them, you turn it over, they make you pay. Q. Stan, when Rhodes went to the basket, how tough was it for some of those plays not to finish? STAN HEATH: Pardon me? Q. How tough was it not to have those plays finished? STAN HEATH: When you have opportunities around the rim, finishing and converting is important, trying to get out at least, and we came up empty quite a few times. They were bang-bang plays, and some of them went down. Steven had a few lobs that he got, few that he didn't get. Darian had the ball a few times and didn't finish. To win against Florida, those threes need to go in. Those plays around the basket need to go in, and if you're not going to get every one of them, they need to be somewhere around an 80 to 90% clip; we came up well short of that. Q. Coach, Sonny mentioned Florida's swagger, is there a way to coach against swagger, or is it just getting them out there? STAN HEATH: I think the only way to have a chance against Florida, you have to come off fighting right away. If you stand around in awe or kind of try to feel your way out against them, they can throw a knockout punch in the first four or five minutes of the game. I was pleased and very comfortable with our ability to stay at pace with them early on. Unfortunately, the knockout punch came a little bit later. Q. Sort of following up on that, Stan, you watch a lot of basketball during the season, and seeing Florida in the last few games as you scout them and today, where would you evaluate them in terms of championship form? STAN HEATH: They're at championship level basketball right now. They are a well-oiled machine. They have so many weapons. Even guys that -- Hodge comes in the game and he can hurt you. All of those players. We played them the last two years, and last year especially, we played them twice and we split. And both of the games that we played last year, really, we got beat by their guards. Green and Humphrey really just torched us from 25 feet, in and out. Anywhere outside that three they were making them all. This game we tried a little bit different strategy of trying to stay with them a little bit closer, make the big guys score. Unfortunately it got a little bit worse. Q. Okay, have you talked about Michael Washington yet? STAN HEATH: We did talk about him a little bit. We just talked about -- as a matter of fact, Dudley, you asked that question. Q. Okay. Can you talk about Sonny's week. Even in the last seconds he was out there contesting the shots. Just talk about his week. STAN HEATH: I thought Sonny had an outstanding tournament. He showed a lot of leadership in our basketball team in huddles and locker rooms, just the energy that he brought to the floor. You know, every game I assign him to probably the best offensive player on the other team on the perimeter. He had Jamont Gordon, he had both Byars and Foster. I had him with Tre' Kelley as well to start against South Carolina, and he was able to do a good job, very good job defensively against those players, then also be very effective offensively for us. Tonight I think Sonny fought real hard, worked real hard. But probably had a little bit more difficult time with Brewer than he had with the other guys. Q. Obviously, you think you've done enough to get in, you've talked about that. Y'all going to be in the air when they announce the tournament. How tough is that? Have you seen the commercial where the guys are carrying around the bubbles? Is that what it feels like right now to you? STAN HEATH: Obviously, we'll be in the air, and thinking, and scratching our heads, praying and hoping, the whole thing. You know, there is nothing guaranteed in life. We feel we have exceptionally strong arguments to be an at large selection. Our league is, I think, the best in the country, but worst case scenario, it's second. And to penalize ourselves because we beat up on each other, because we have quality opponents from top to bottom, I just don't think would be right. You know, there are so many other leagues you can play in, and boy, it's almost hard if you didn't get five wins, because there are three teams at the bottom that are not very good, and that's not the case in our league. It's going to be hard being up in the air. I'm going to have my cell phone, they're going to be mad at me, but my cell phone's going to be trying to get some information while we're in the air. Q. Stan, I was just wondering your view, right before the half, there was a pile-up around the free-throw line in front of y'all's bench, do you remember that? STAN HEATH: In front of our bench? Q. Well, on the free-throw line, there was a pile-up after the shot, going for the loose ball, curious of your view how that unfolded? STAN HEATH: Just from my point of view, it just seemed like a loose ball. I didn't see maybe what the officials saw. So I just asked the question, just I'd have to look at the film. From my position, it just looked like a loose ball. We were going to go after the free throws. Q. Stan, can you just talk about the week you guys had, and what you think it did for you. STAN HEATH: I told our guys to hold their heads up high. They accomplished a lot. To play in the SEC Tournament championship game is huge. Obviously, we wanted to win. We were disappointed we didn't get the win. We weren't here just to show up. We wanted to do everything we could to win this game, and we just weren't able to do it. But I'm proud of our guys. I think over the last three weeks, we've just grown up tremendously. We're playing some of our best basketball. Tonight I don't know if we did or didn't, Florida has something to do with that, I'm sure. But I still think we could have made more shots than we did, on a normal day. THE MODERATOR: Thank you very much. End of FastScripts |
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