Iowa State - 82, Lipscomb - 55
LENNIE ACUFF: Congratulations to Iowa State. Boy, they've got a nice team. I was really impressed. They just physically, there's so much force. When you go into this thing, you know the draw is a big deal, who you end up with. It's all about match-ups when you get to this. And they're one of the few teams in the country to just pound the ball inside. They just really took advantage of us at the 4 and the 5.
We're fighting, but we just didn't really have an answer. In order for us to win, we knew we had to shoot it well. We made five 3s in the first ten minutes. I don't think we made another one for 20 minutes. That was our hope.
But, really, tip my hat to T.J. He does a great job. Obviously, he's been great since they got there. They're going to be a real factor. I know at one time they had, like, 18 baskets and 12 or 13 assists. When they play like that, they'll be awfully good.
I'm so proud of our team. It was -- I think we're up one with, like, ten minutes to go in the first half, and they hit us like 10-0. That makes it tough. And we tried to get it to halftime, and we got some good looks that we normally make. But they just force you to get it off a little quicker. They have a little bit more length than we normally see.
The second half, I thought they really did a good job defensively. We just couldn't get inside the 3-point line. We didn't have an advantage.
But nothing that happens today is going to take away from what our team did. This is as good a group of young men as I've ever been around, and they kept fighting and gave us great memories. God has been so good to us.
We are so thankful to be at Lipscomb, and thank you to everyone. We brought a great crowd. We only have 3,000 undergraduate students. They embraced our team, and it was great to see all the Lipscomb folks here.
Congratulations to Iowa State, and good luck to them going forward.
THE MODERATOR: Thank you, Coach. Questions for the student-athletes.
Q. Jacob, what did it mean to be able to play here in front of your home crowd? Not knowing what the future's going to hold next in your career.
JACOB OGNACEVIC: Yeah, it was great playing in Milwaukee, especially in Fiserv. I haven't played a college game since I've been in college and my last game here was when I was in high school. So just being able to play back home and in Wisconsin, I had a lot of people here and a lot of family and friends being able to watch. That just meant a lot to me, and I'm happy we ended the season in my hometown.
THE MODERATOR: For both of you, kind of getting here and the accomplishment of getting in the NCAA Tournament.
GYASI POWELL: You dream of this since you're a little kid. For me personally, I've been to three different schools. To do this at this school means everything, like for Acuff to just accept me and then the players in the locker room every day, just everything that we did to get here is amazing. Out there on the court, great environment, just the draw of the team we had is amazing.
THE MODERATOR: Any other questions for the student-athletes? Thanks, guys.
We'll take questions for Coach now.
Q. Coach mentioned the inflection point in the first half. What adjustments did you see Iowa State make for you guys offensively?
LENNIE ACUFF: They turned up fresh and got more physical. We had a hard time. Any time in any possession, there's a defining moment. We couldn't win it. We couldn't win the spot on either end. They would knock us off our spot. We had a hard time getting separation. That's how we play is get inside the lane and kick.
They're just really good defensively. Everybody we talked to, you try to come up with all these things you can do against them. I probably watched 15 of their games. Everybody struggled against them. Yeah, BYU scored a bunch of points. BYU is making 18 threes over hands. They've got an NBA lottery pick at the point, the 6'8" throwing strikes. It's real easy to say what you should do against them, but doing it is a whole 'nother thing.
Really impressed. Like I said yesterday, they play with tremendous conviction. They don't deviate. The other thing, when you do something as long as he's done it and they play like they play, he knows how to fix it. He made adjustments that bothered us. When you can switch 1 through 5, now that makes it tough on anybody.
THE MODERATOR: Anything else for Coach?
Thank you. Congratulations on a great year.
LENNIE ACUFF: Thank you.
FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports