Syracuse - 105, Chaminade - 56
THE MODERATOR: We're joined by Eric Bovaird, Ross Reeves, and Isaac Amaral-Artharee. We'll start with an opening statement from Coach.
ERIC BOVAIRD: That was a rough one. That was a rough one. I told the guys that was probably one of our most embarrassing losses in my 13 years of coaching. You can look at a lot of different reasons potentially as to why, but we all have to be better. We have to be better coaches. They got to be better players. We got to just do things better. I was actually feeling pretty confident after the first two days. Even though we did get beat, we had a lot of great stretches against really good teams, and tonight, I felt like we just went away from that all in the first half.
THE MODERATOR: Questions for the players.
Q. Like Coach said, your first two games very competitive stretches. A lot of these games are how you start. What happened early on that kind of got you out of the flow? For both players.
ROSS REEVES: I think that's a good question. We started slow the past two games, and the thing about yesterday is we started slow the first eight minutes and then the next 12 minutes we were playing together as a team, we were moving, we were excited, I guess, that we had that energy, and it seemed like today, we just got on the court and we couldn't find a way to get energy -- not even the energy, just like the momentum that we needed, and we should have that every game we play. It's not an excuse. That's why we lost, is because we came out just dead, it seemed like.
Q. For both players, how would you sum up this experience of playing in this tournament and do you think there was some mental and physical fatigue taking on teams like this for three straight days?
ISAAC AMARAL-ARTHAREE: Probably definitely some physical fatigue playing against these a lot bigger teams, more athletic teams than we're used to playing in our regular season, but it's always a great experience. Yeah, we look forward to the challenge, but this last one was pretty rough.
Q. For both of you guys, I know people that know you, have seen you guys play, know you guys are a great shooting team, 1 through 5, but in the last three days, you guys didn't really get to show that. Do you think -- I know some teams have trouble adjusting to the big arena, it's a lot bigger than McCabe, even the Lahaina Civic, so do you think it was just this huge arena might have thrown you guys off just a little?
ROSS REEVES: Personally, no, I don't think it was the arena. I think for today or even maybe yesterday too, I think there was a little bit that have fatigue. I noticed a lot of our shots were short. So I don't think it was at arena. For me personally, I didn't shoot good from outside. I just think it was the fatigue. I had to get more legs into it.
ISAAC AMARAL-ARTHAREE: I don't think it was the arena either. Just couldn't really adjust to the game, how it was being played. Usually we're able to get better looks than what we were able to get.
Q. Ross, like you guys talked about, not a lot right happened for you guys today, but I think you had a sequence where you stole the ball in the open court and then next trip down you stripped a guy, drove it the whole way, and got an and-one. For you personally, I mean, can you take -- like distill that moment as I did that against Syracuse and look what maybe I can do from this point on?
ROSS REEVES: To be honest, my first thought was the possession before when I got the steal I missed the Euro step layup and so -- and then when I made that second one I was a little frustrated on the first one. That was my first thought like, dang, I could have been a little momentum, we could have been going. I mean, it's super cool to play these teams, but it's still, like I said in the last press conference, I feel like we can play with these teams. Like, we're a really good team when we play together. So, just, it wasn't like, Oh, my gosh, it was Syracuse. I was like, Okay, I could have had the first one, but let's just move on.
THE MODERATOR: Thanks, guys. We'll take questions for coach.
Q. I know a lot of frustration like you said today, but this tournament experience as a whole, you have not been able to play on Maui for awhile now, on the actual island, what did you make of the totality of this tournament here that came together this week?
ERIC BOVAIRD: Yeah, I thought it was great. The whole environment, the venue, the everything that went along with it great. It's still, it still doesn't have that -- only Maui has that true Maui feel, you know. I don't think it can be replicated anywhere else in the world. I thought everybody did a great job of trying to make the most of it. It was a great experience, good venue, everything along those lines, but it's still not Maui. There's something special about the Lahaina Civic Center, and that area that makes this tournament truly, truly special. But we all know that, you know, everybody wanted to have it there, but unfortunately we, through some bad situations, we weren't able to have it there this year. I know the intention is to have it there in the future, but this is, you know, I thought that this was the second best choice to have it, the second best place. I thought that everybody did a great job. It was well run. Everything was really smooth except for the Chaminade basketball team playing well (laughing), and that's my responsibility.
Q. I know all three teams you played are super teams, but Syracuse in particular with their size and athleticism on display in their opening minutes and getting in that up and down game, do you think, you know, a lot of times when you play teams like that, more of a possession by possession kind of approach can keep the score within reach.
ERIC BOVAIRD: Yes, you're exactly right. See, it's kind of tough for us because we play a completely different way whenever we play at our level of competition. We're usually a very fast, very high scoring team. We get out and run, we shoot a lot of threes, we are constantly attacking. But you're exactly right, I mean, probably, as a coach, probably the best thing to do would be to slow the ball down and limit the possessions and so forth. But when you practice a certain way all the time, it's so hard to completely just switch, you know. Because you find success doing something and all of a sudden -- it would be tough to go to these guys and go, Okay, now we're going to stop everything we practiced for three months and we're going to do something completely different. But, would it give us a better chance of potentially winning? Possibly. And would the scores not be as lopsided? Yes. But the reality of it is I wanted -- you know, this tournament is awesome for us because it gives us a chance to play against nationally-recognized teams, incredible athletes that we're not going to face the rest of the year. So it's going to not only -- it's just going to make us better and better. This one was very rough. We got a lot to analyze and a lot to build from that we're going to work on starting Saturday.
THE MODERATOR: Thanks, Coach.
ERIC BOVAIRD: Thanks, guys.
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