Head coach
Isaac Brown met with local media Tuesday to talk about how his team is recovering from Sunday's double-overtime marathon with SMU and what he's doing to prepare them for Thursday's trip into the Temple of Doom – a.k.a. the Liacouras Center – a place no Shocker team has ever won. Read on for the transcript:
HEAD COACH ISAAC BROWN ON…
… Thursday's opponent, the Temple Owls:
"They've got a lot of big wins this year. They beat Villanova, Rutgers and Houston. They've got great size and four of the better players in the league at the guard spot. Their two leading scorers were coming off the bench and Dunn was preseason first team all-conference. He's got a knack for drawing a lot of fouls. Good three-point shooter. He battles. He can really score the ball off the bounce (and he is) one of the toughest guys to defend in this conference. (Zach) Hicks, the four-man, is probably a top-two shooter in our conference. He had a game last year where he made 10 threes. And then the big kid inside, (Jamille) Reynolds… is unguardable one-on-one. You've got to do a good job not letting him touch it."
… Practice drills to combat turnovers:
"We do a passing drill, number one, at the end of practice to see if guys are focused, because you've got to be locked in (during the drill), in order to make the passes and make the layups. And we keep (track of) turnovers during practice. If you turn it over, you may have ten 22s at the end of practice. A guy that turns it over five times, he may have five 22s. If you don't turn it over, you don't have to run. That's something that we talk about every day. We've been talking about that since the first loss of the year, about valuing the basketball. The teams that don't turn it over are the teams that are successful, the teams that get to the NCAA tournament."
… Adjustments, if any, to the practice schedule after Sunday's double-overtime marathon:
"We had Monday off, so I gave those guys time enough to go get in the cold tub (and) try to get their legs back. Today will be a normal practice. We'll go for about an hour and 30 minutes and try to get into Temple and the things they do on offense and how we're going to defend them. We'll work on going against their press -- they seem to do that a lot against us, that 1-2-2 press -- to make sure we can handle that without turning it over. I think those guys, having that day off yesterday, will come in fresh and ready to go today for practice."
… Improvement on the offensive end these past few weeks:
"(We're) getting stops, getting out in transition, beating the defense down, not having to go against a set defense, playing inside out, throwing the ball to
Kenny Pohto and all the big guys inside, getting stationary threes and taking good shots. Like you said, when we don't turn it over, we shoot a great percentage. Getting the ball into the hands of Craig Porter and
Jaykwon Walton, and everybody else spotting up and getting good shots. Those three guys, including
Kenny Pohto, do a good job of getting guys the basketball in positions where they can score.
… Recent improvement with cutting and off-ball movement on offense:
"I thought, in the last game, that there were two plays that showed that we have gotten better offensively.
Isaac Abidde got a steal off a deflection from Craig Porter and -- instead of him rushing to take a shot -- he got the ball into the hands of our best player, Craig Porter. And when he got his feet set, Porter was able to knock down the three. I thought
Melvion Flanagan got the ball late in the clock and caught it with about 15 seconds left and, instead of him forcing his shot, he got the ball to Porter and then Porter drove and got Flanagan a wide-open shot. So, I think those guys were figuring out who you've got to get the ball to: Craig Porter,
Jaykwon Walton,
Kenny Pohto on the block,
James Rojas on the block. If you can get those four guys the ball in position, it helps you to get a wide-open shot."
… The team's inconsistency from game to game when it comes to turnovers:
"We've had games where we value the basketball… We've (also had) games this year where we turn it over a lot down the stretch. You know, we've had multiple leads in the last two or three minutes, but we didn't value the basketball. When you don't take very good care of the basketball, it's hard to get your defense set. Last game, having 25 turnovers, to be able to come out and win, we were fortunate. But you're not going to win (many( basketball games if you turn it over more than 20 times.
… Fewer minutes down the stretch from Rojas and Pierre:
" I think Isaac Abbide played well, and when he plays well, he gets the opportunity to stay on the floor. I think
Xavier Bell and
Melvion Flanagan, both of those guys came in and gave us big minutes. Rojas and Pierre have just got to be ready to go this game. You know, all our guys have gotta value the basketball. It's something we must look at. We don't have a lot of guys with a positive assist-to-turnover ratio. I think it may be three guys -- Pohto, Porter and
Shammah Scott. Those other guys have to value the basketball and take care of it."
… The quest for WSU's first win at the Liacouras Center:
"I've been hyping that up all week… Since we joined the AAC, we haven't won at Temple on the road. This will be a big game. These guys have the opportunity to go in there to do something that no Wichita State basketball team has done."