Fran McCaffery 21724
Fran McCaffery Interview
Transcript
00:00 Right in the classroom for coach. Coach Owen said Patrick said you guys needed this win
00:10 like you need a parachute falling out of a plane. Do you agree with that? Or do you think
00:14 that might be a little dramatic? I'm a little confused on that. I'll have to ask Patrick
00:20 to clarify that. I imagine you didn't hear the quote when it was said. Owen said it was
00:27 in the shower. It was what? In the shower is what Patrick said then. We all know Patrick's
00:34 a goofball. Just leave it at that. Another game where you guys bounce back the trail
00:40 a little bit. What does that say about your team and how did you guys make that happen?
00:43 Well, it seems like we're either up or down. It would be nice to get a lead and keep it.
00:51 But I think we all recognize this league is kind of what it is. Everybody's good. I say
00:57 that all the time. But everybody has players. Everybody's got a coach that's really good.
01:02 They run stuff. And they challenge you. They challenge you to think and they challenge
01:07 you to make plays. You've got to be able to stay the course. It didn't look good. They're
01:13 draining threes early. Up 12-14, something like that. That thing can go to 25 quickly
01:20 with this team. We kept it manageable. I thought the crowd was great. They really helped us
01:25 in that stretch in particular. So we go in down three. In the start of the second half,
01:30 we were really good. I was really impressed. I was really proud of Tony Perkins in particular.
01:36 Another good start to the game. Put Brock in. Brock was great. Tony took the second
01:43 half over. Not that I'm surprised. That's who he is.
01:46 I think you said they were hitting everything.
01:50 We were also late. We were late on our double teams. We were late on our rotations. They
01:56 were open. Yeah, they were hitting them. You just can't hope that a team like Wisconsin
02:02 is going to miss. Some point you've got to make them miss. You've got to be in the vicinity.
02:06 You've got to be challenging. Chase them inside the line. Contest. And we did that in the
02:11 second half.
02:12 Owen, we're talking about how great he is every single one of these. 20-12, 6-4. What
02:19 did you see from him?
02:21 I've been saying from the beginning that the thing that makes him unique is he has a bag.
02:26 And a lot of times you don't expect that from your 6'10" center. And I've been encouraging
02:31 him all year to be that guy and to attack in the open floor. Spin. Shot fake. Rip and
02:39 drive. Shot fake hip to hip. I think the next phase of his game will be he'll be shooting
02:46 pull-up jumpers out of that. You can see his free throw. His stroke is good. And I'm going
02:52 to give him the green light to shoot the ball. But again, like you said, his ability to affect
02:57 the game at both ends is what makes a big difference. That's how he won. He's blocking
03:03 shots. He's rebounding the ball. Starting our break. Giving others an opportunity to
03:08 make plays. And he did it today standing on foul trouble. So he's learning.
03:13 His stamina seems, I mean, he's a big guy, but he plays all these minutes. He's been
03:19 playing these minutes.
03:20 Well, that's grown. I mean, he was struggling with that earlier. He was getting gassed.
03:26 And it's part of the reason why he was in foul trouble. And so he recognizes, we need
03:33 you on the floor. We want you on the floor. I don't want to take you out because you have
03:36 two fouls or three fouls or four fouls. But a lot of times, he'll just be resting and
03:42 a guy will duck in on him. Then he pushes the guy and the next thing you know, he's
03:45 sitting next to me. So that's all part of it. Learning how to defend without fouling.
03:52 Stay on the floor. Then you get your rest, the media timeouts. If there's a timeout,
03:56 if there's a free throw. And obviously, he makes a great impact when he's out there for
04:04 everybody.
04:05 How about the 10 guys that played for you today, underclassmen, four of those were freshmen.
04:12 How does that make you feel about the future of the program knowing that you're getting
04:15 that out of those young guys?
04:18 I think from the beginning, I felt comfortable with those guys. There was some stretches
04:23 where I didn't play them as much. We kind of went with our veteran guys. And I really
04:29 don't want to do that necessarily. I want to play all those young guys. And you see
04:34 what Brock's capable of. And I think Price is really making great strides. Lodgy was
04:40 really good today in stretches. I felt bad I didn't give DeSante a shot today. I went
04:48 with those other guys. But I feel good about our young guys and our guys that are returning
04:54 and our guys that are coming in.
04:55 Josh Dix just strikes me as a guy with an NBA-level IQ already. Just good floor game,
05:00 hit some big midrange. But it just seems like he's always in control and really doesn't
05:04 press. And I think that really helped the offense today. I guess, could you kind of
05:07 elaborate on him?
05:08 Well, the other thing is, he's our best defender. So, AJ Storrs is a handful. That guy, he's
05:15 certainly one of the best players in our league. But the numbers he's putting up, he's among
05:20 the best players in the country. So, put Josh on him. He's a little bigger than Josh, but
05:24 Josh was able to hold his ground. And then come down and obviously impact the game tremendously.
05:30 So, he's special. I've said that all along and he's proven it.
05:37 What is it about Tony, he talked about half-time he told the guys, "It's on me, I'm going to
05:42 come out stronger." And then he delivers for you in the clutch. What is it about him?
05:46 Well, that's character. A lot of guys, coach takes them out, they're not playing well and
05:51 they pout and they complain and they start whining on the bench and try to get other
05:56 people to agree with them. And, you know what? He said, "It's on me." That's character. He's
06:07 a guy that I knew exactly what he would do. I know him. I know who he is and what makes
06:15 him tick. He was angrier at himself than I was. So, let's give him credit. I'm really
06:22 happy for him because when you start out like that and finish like that, it's a tremendous
06:28 feeling as a competitor.
06:29 It seems like the culture of this team, whether you guys are down 20, up 20, you guys get
06:34 after each other, but it just seems like there's such a unique chemistry with this group and
06:38 that's really kind of helped you guys stay in the race.
06:39 I think that's improving and they're coming together. We've said all along, it's a different
06:46 team. It's a team that didn't have an established leader at the start. We call that time out
06:55 and Patrick runs up to me. We put that play in yesterday that we ran for Tony's. We're
06:59 going to run that play. So, we diagram it and they ran it. Sorry, Mike, I didn't mean
07:07 to interrupt you.
07:08 I'm sorry, too.
07:09 It's just on my guy, Mike.
07:17 The emotion that your players and even your assistant coaches showed after the game was
07:22 beyond normal, I thought. Was there more to it than just the win?
07:27 We lost a couple tough ones. The other night was tough. We were leading most of the game
07:32 and then we lost it. Same thing in Indiana. We took the lead. So, that's hard in this
07:39 league. Every game is so difficult. It's a ranked opponent. We have a huge crowd and
07:47 they were awesome. We got home at 3 a.m. the other night and didn't have a whole lot of
07:56 time to get ready for this. We've already played them, so it's not that big a deal.
08:01 You have to show some toughness with little sleep and then one day of practice to get
08:06 ready for these guys. They present a lot of challenges. They're two big guys inside or
08:12 a handful. Chucky's really tough. Storer, like I said, is one of the best in the country.
08:16 They got multiple shooters. Klesment, Nacijan, Blackwell. They got a really good team.
08:22 At the end of regulation, Tony missed a shot that could have won it. Then at the end of
08:27 course overtime, you had to set it up for him. Did you like that he was able to drive
08:32 and get the layup?
08:33 Yeah. He did the same thing at the end of regulation. I thought he would draw a foul.
08:41 He thought he was fouled. Considering how the game was being called, I think it could
08:46 have been a foul. They don't call it. I get it. It's like, "You know what? We're not going
08:52 to put you on a free throw line with one second. You got to go make the bat." I get that. I
08:57 didn't complain about it. Tony didn't complain about it. Coming back, we wanted to run something
09:03 specific and it worked.
09:05 Can I ask a question? I can't remember who specifically said it, but a couple weeks ago
09:10 someone said that when everyone's clicking offensively, you guys can compete with anybody
09:14 and you guys showed that tonight. Four players with 17 points. Can you just talk about the
09:18 offensive perspective?
09:19 I think we have a lot of different guys. We have a lot of weapons offensively. For us,
09:25 it's going to be defense and rebounding. You look at the rebounding numbers, the fact that
09:31 we out-rebounded them. Crowell and Wall had two offensive rebounds. That's rare. That's
09:39 a credit to our guys that were playing them and it wasn't just Ben and Owen. It was Lodgy,
09:47 it was Evan for the mitts, it was our wing, it was Peyton Sanford. You've got to rebound
09:52 the ball against this team. If you give them second and third shot opportunities, you've
09:54 got problems. So, really proud of them.
10:00 (paper rustling)
10:03 (clicking)