NIT Pre-Championship Press Conference
Fran Fraschilla (emcee), Gregg Marshall (WSU), Shaka Smart (Texas), Casey Alexander (Lipscomb), Jamie Dixon (TCU)
April 1, 2019 | New York, N.Y./ Marriott Marquis
 

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Fran Fraschilla: If we can get everybody situated as the coaches sit down we will get started. Good afternoon, everybody. My name is Fran Fraschilla. It's great to be here at the NIT. It's an event I've grown to come to love being a part of. With ESPN and my colleagues that are here, we'll be televising the games this Tuesday and Thursday. Before we get started, I want to congratulate all four coaches on great seasons, great runs to the NIT semifinals, the opportunity to come to New York and play in Madison Square Garden, get your kids to extend their season into April, which is kind of cool. It's only a very few teams left playing college basketball and these four excellent teams are part of that. Also, the great experience of having their student athletes come to New York City as well. Many of them for the first time. Before we get started with the coaches, I want to just introduce the NIT selection committee. They are over to my left and your right. Barry Collier, just raise your hand. Ronnie, you just threw me off. Ronnie, hold your applause till the end. Doug Elgin, Mike Montgomery, Dave Odom, Oliver Purnell, Gary Walters, Judy Rose, and Vaughn Williams. Committee Chair Reggie Minton is not here today as he is involved with the final four and Minneapolis. All these ladies and gentlemen have been part of the basketball community for many, many years and they help select our teams. We appreciate their wisdom and insight and thank them for being here. First coach that we're going to have up is probably, I would say, maybe six weeks ago didn't probably think he'd be in a post-season tournament like the NIT. 2011, they used this tournament to explode their program. The Wichita State Shockers won the NIT in 2011. Seven straight years, they went to the NCAA, obviously made an appearance in the final four. One of the youngest teams of college basketball. They returned 11 percent of their playing time from a year ago and things did not look good in mid-January. I was following the Shockers and all of a sudden, they caught fire. They have a great coach. He's been named National Coach of the Year. They've won 14 of their last 17.  They have really, really played well down the stretch. For those of you who are local media, Markis McDuffie is a senior. He played at St. Antony's High School for Bob Hurley Junior and so, this is a great homecoming for him because I understand he is a New York Knicks fan. Like many of us, he is still suffering but we may get Zion. That'd be cool. Having said that, Gregg Marshall, Wichita State.
 
GREGG MARSHALL: Well, first of all, I'd like to thank the selection committee for inviting us because there were times in late January, I didn't know if we'd be invited to our conference tournament. You must have put a lot of stock on the last 10 games. But  we are very pleased to be here. This is a great experience for our team. We've been playing one and done basketballs for basically a month. We've traverse the country a couple of times. We've been to Greenville twice and in Bloomington once and now New York City and that was our goal. Early February we started talking about winning four games in Memphis and our conference tournament's going to be difficult but the NYT is not a bad consolation prize. I started talking about our experience and eleven what it did for us as a springboard as Fran mentioned was a tremendous experience force. But that was an entirely different group. That was a veteran group that didn't take care of their business in February so they were relegated to the Unite. This is a young team and we have been we set a goal to take Marcus home in early February and now we have to try to change that goal. Now, we want to try to in the end our season on a win. But we know that we've got a very difficult task in front of us with Lipscomb. When I watched coach Alexander's team the pace that they run offense. The precision that they run offense is one of the best things that I've seen in college basketball all season. Obviously he has great pedigree and a great mentor and coach Byrd. That's a that's going to be quite a challenge and then you get a team from Texas if you're fortunate enough to advance. So we know about the quality of those teams from the Big 12. But we're excited to be here. This is a wonderful experience for our guys just playing one and done basketball for the better part of a month now and. Is that it. Questions that's all. Okay. Thank you.
 
Fran Fraschilla: Three these teams are going to be heading to practice so we don't want to keep them and they've already had a great opportunity spend time with you. The next team Texas coach by Shaka Smart. A battle this year they played again this season without their leading score from a year ago Andrew Jones some of you know the story he's battling leukemia looks like he's on the road to recovery and we're hopeful that he'll play next season some other injuries to key guys there in a year. This team was good enough at times to beat North Carolina, Purdue, Kansas State all conference champions from power conferences some excruciatingly close losses in a very competitive Big 12 as evidenced by what you saw Texas Tech due to a Gonzaga and Michigan. The league was as good as it's ever been because of a competition from one to 10. By the way every single team in that league has been the NCAA tournament the last three years. Tells you about the league but Shaka did a great job keeping his team together down a stretch that coming off I think a stretch where they're playing their best basketball of the season. Some quality young players they are playing without their future first round pick. Jackson Hayes which is added to the adversity but he's he's got some really exciting young players particularly in the backcourt that are blossoming before our eyes. Shaka Smart coach of Texas Longhorns
 
SHAKA SMART: Thanks Fran. Thanks everybody for having us here. Thank you to the committee. I think if you add up the wins on the committee, you're going to be in the thousands. It's great to be around you guys. As Fran mentioned, we're really, really excited just to be here in New York. When we got selected to play in the NYT, I think just like every other team, we had to quickly adjust our focus to being the best we could be in this tournament and trying to advance and make it to New York, and got a chance to coach here as an assistant coach over a decade ago actually under Oliver Purnell at Clemson and we just had a wonderful experience going all the way to the championship game at the NYT. So I told our guys, it's going to be a lot of fun if we're able to make it to New York, but we have to beat some really good teams to do that. We got in late last night, you guys went right to Carmine's, you got a chance to enjoy a local dinner there. This morning they got a chance to experience the 9/11 memorial, so we're trying to mix the experience of being in New York with trying to prepare to win a basketball game. We play T.C.Us Who's really gotten the better of us the last couple of games and so we're going to have to play much much better than we did in the two regular season match ups if we want to advance. Our guys are super excited to play on Madison Square Garden. I think we only have one player on our team that's ever played there before, and that was in a high school all star game. So this will be a sweet experience for them and for us. But like coach Marshall said, we're really really grateful to be playing and coaching in April just because 90 something percent of basketball teams are done playing, and for us to be here as part of this group of four teams means a lot. We're looking forward to doing everything we can to try to advance and try to win a championship. Thank you guys.
 
Fran Fraschilla: The formula for the NIT is the same every year, maybe with the exception of Wichita State who got hot with a really young team in the last month, the other three teams were fighting for NCAA bids and all could have not only gotten into the tournament but won games and I think that's clear. Lipscomb is a perfect example. If you look at what Lipscomb and Belmont, and Wofford, and UNC Greensboro accomplished this year, some really really good basketball. This Lipscomb team can really play. Casey Alexander is the coach, he's done a wonderful job there. This team ended up 28 and 7, could have easily been an NCAA team, but here's what they did. They got selected to the NIT, they went on the road and they beat a very good Davidson team up in Davidson. That's not easy to do. They went back on the road to North Carolina, went to UNC Greensboro a team that had close to 30 wins. Another one of those teams that could've been an NCAA tournament team and hammered them, hammered a really good team, play great. Then because of the schedule and the seatings, they stayed on the road and went to NC State where they won a thrill, 94-93. It's one of the best games that I watched all year, I watched on tape. It's one of most exciting games I've seen this year. They have a young man who's a senior who you enjoy watching play. His name is Garrison Matthews. He dropped 44 on N.C. State, and for the committee because they know how tough Reynolds Coliseum used to be to play in. Think of all the great players have ever played around at Reynolds Coliseum, all the great opponents and that's North Carolina, Maryland, Wake Forest etc. Garrison Matthews had the most points ever in Reynolds Coliseum for visiting player 44. But it's more than him. They've got a terrific team, terrific program, really well coached. Lipscomb Bisons, Casey Alexander.
 
CASEY ALEXANDER: Well thank you, this is the part where I will readily admit that one of us does not like the others up here. Not quite as much name familiarity but we are as equally excited about being here and and having our program play in this prestigious event. It's really a privilege and one that we're really excited about, coach for the record tomorrow. We're using Garrison Moore as a decoy than anything else tomorrow. Just so you know our journey here started really last year our first instead of a tournament trip and then the return of all five starters and five seniors. It's really been a magical ride for us we took a trip to Italy and all yes we had a lot of expectations. Put on our team to win the league and go back to the incident tournament and really had a phenomenal regular season. I felt like we played very well one twelve in a row at one point and so it was really good. But a lot championship game loss to liberty, who as you've seen as a real high quality team as well. Even made it tough for our players to respond quickly and and be ready to go for the entire team. But a lot of resilience and  bounced back with that win at Davidson and it's it's really been pretty easy from that point on to have our players excited. For them to also understand just exactly what they're playing for we had no false dreams, visions of being here today and playing tomorrow. Just one really on our radar. The thing that our team has done best is just stay on task and stay in the moment and treat each day and each game like it deserves and that's really been the formula for why we're here.While we are going in tomorrow even though we obviously have unbelievable respect for coach Marshall and what his program is about what they've done it's why the experience and that mentality will allow our players I think to go in there and play with confidence and and give it a shot. So thanks for having us.
 
Fran Fraschilla: Thank you Coach, I'll ask coach to speak is a guy that's very familiar with Madison Square Garden. He's coached fourty one games in there. That's more than some K nicks coaches have Coach sooner. That's a lot of games at Pittsburgh. Big East tournament the various the various tournaments that are held there Jimmy V etc.. Having lived in Dallas the last sixteen, seventeen years. I saw the opportunity and the potential of T.C.U basketball. They brought back one of their own an alumnus three years ago and this is the third straight year T.C.U is in a post-season. They were an N. C.W Caliber team minus some injuries. Towards the middle and end of the big twelve season. They're probably playing their best basketball of the year right now they've got a really solid seven man group, some old, some new. But the one constant is their coach who's been the post-season every year but one in his career Jamie Dixon T.C.U Horned Frogs.
 
JAMIE DIXON: Thank you Fran. It's obviously a great honor to be here and be amongst these great teams great programs. Familiarity obviously with Coach Martin Texas and playing twice. Lipscomb coach Alexander beat our tails this year. Out worked us, out coached us and killed us, and then obviously coach Marshall with Wichita State. We played a few times. I think we got you started on your run to the final four. So it's been good for his career as well. So it was certainly for us coming up here, we thought we're going to get to the NCAA tournament, like I think pretty much everybody, and then it was a devastating day for us when we found out, and how we were going to respond. The first game was hard. Sam used sometric apprexis going into it. So I felt fine. But after that, it became all about getting to New York, and that's what's so great about this thing. You have that goal of getting to New York City and when you win that third game and they start playing New York, New York on the speakers afterwards, it's a great celebration. You really feel like you've accomplished something. So all of us really feel like we've got the most out of our guys late in the season, and so it's great to be here. It's a special place for our family. Obviously, we've played here. We took our team up to West Point. We practiced there yesterday and they got a little history, a little tour, and got to see what the cadets do for our country and they get to see what West Point means to my family and to myself. So it's been a special trip for us already, and we know we're going to play a great team in Texas, and obviously we played twice before. But they all know each other, and I made it very clear this is the first time we're playing Texas because this is the one we need to win, and they all know each other. So it's a very interesting game coming up for us, but we are thankful to be here and be a part of this great event. Thank you
 
Fran Fraschilla: Once again, committee did a great job of selecting the field. These are four great representatives of college basketball, and we hope everybody comes out tomorrow night. First game is going to be Lipscomb and Wichita State at 7:00. Both game followed by Texas and TCU, and again another neighborhood kind of game because kids know each other so well. That'll be really fun. Those games are on ESPN tomorrow night. Bob Wischusen and I will be on the call, and Brooke Weisbrod is here somewhere. She'll be on the call with us as well, and then a championship game will be Thursday night. The winners of both games, that'll be on ESPN. So we thank everybody for coming and we look forward to seeing you at Madison Square Garden tomorrow. Thank you.