Nov. 19, 2000
Head coach Mike Montgomery opening statement:
Well, we needed a game, we wanted a game, before we went to Puerto Rico. I know the first question you're going to ask is how did this game come about? Truthfully, the Puerto Rico Tournament was trying to arrange a fourth game, and they thought they had it. It was going to be a home game in the States, and then the NCAA said no. We wanted to play a game, but there was volleyball on Thursday and Friday in the facility and Big Game yesterday - that's one date open. So we scrambled and San Francisco State was gracious enough to come down and play. To be honest with you, I thought their attitude towards this game was very good. They came, they played hard, they changed up defenses. They gave us a lot of different looks and they played hard. Going in, I would have felt we would have been a little more talented, I don't think that's a mystery, but they played hard. Just what you get from a game is a different level of intensity and we had that. The ball was moving, we were playing hard, the kids were excited. We have got to find out what our rotations are going to be and who has a little more game in them when the lights, we've got to find that out. It's what we needed. Now we can get on the plane tomorrow morning and now we'll play some real good teams and see where we stack up. Mike [McDonald] got off to a great start and shot the ball extremely well. The last two time we've played, he's just buried the open shot. If he can continue to do that, that just makes us that much tougher because having the ability to shoot the ball from all five positions on the floor makes you pretty tough to defend - particularly if the ball is moving, which it has been. Curtis [Borchardt] - we are slowly but surely bringing along, we're not trying to push too much. Jason [Collins] had sprained his ankle the other day in practice, it started to bother him a little bit, so we backed him off. Of course, Justin Davis is still down. He hasn't practiced at all, so we can't use Justin. We're moving along, trying to get everybody healthy and get the group that we're going to have ultimately together.
Q. Was Mike's shooting something you met with him about individually at the end of last season?
A. We said to Mike, there's no reason not to make open shots. You're a good shooter, you can make open shots. We still want our point guards thinking in terms of running the club, but the last two games in particular the circumstances have been such that they pretty much left him and he's just gotten looks. Part of the good thing is that the ball has been passed quickly and he just does not hesitate. He's not going to be that open all that much, but to be able to hit open shots is really critical and there's no reason why he can't do that.
Q. You said Puerto Rico was trying to arrange a fourth game for you?
A. It was an interesting concept. They thought they could get another game and they were going to play them at the home site of what they considered to be the top eight teams in the tournament. They played that along quite aways, and it was going to be a home site in the United States. They were thinking about trying to play all the games in the United States. You know, the Puerto Rican Invitational in Atlanta. They thought they could get a fourth game, and that first game would be here, and then they would go from there. It just didn't work out.
Q. At what point did it not work out and you had to start scrambling?
A. I can't remember the exact date. The Puerto Rico Tournament is an exempt tournament, they do not count against our 27, so we didn't have to play a game here. We would still have 29 games, two of which are exempt, but this gives us 30. We wanted to play, get the exposure before we went down there.
Q. What was the reason the NCAA gave for not allowing the fourth game?
A. Well, it would just open Pandora's Box with exempt games. Why wouldn't you just have 80 game tournaments and play game after game after game as part of the Puerto Rico Tournament? It didn't make any sense, I couldn't see how they would allow that. If they did that, then Hawaii, everybody would be doing that.
Q. Is there any likelihood that Justin will play?
A. He hasn't practiced. He has not practiced for three weeks. He has not run a sprint, has not jumped. Highly unlikely.
Q. Do you have a few goals in Puerto Rico?
A. Try to win games. The foundation has been laid. We kind of have an idea about what to do about most anything. We've at least talked about half-court traps and full-court presses and been through as much as we can. So now we just have to adjust whatever anybody throws up against us. The zone was what I would expected San Francisco State to do, and we pretty much shocked them out of that. Then they came with pressure and some different things, but now it's for real and we want to play good basketball and try to win games.
Q. How far along is Curtis?
A. He still has some pain, he doesn't practice every day or all day every day. I would say that conditioning-wise, he's probably 80% and I would guess that his ability to jump is probably around 75-80%. He's not as explosive when he gets in a certain spot as he might be. He's still just a little bit ginger with the thing, and the more he plays and the mores he practices, it will go away and he'll get better.