C
ChrisWellbaum
Guest
Frank Martin, PJ Dozier, Duane Notice, and Sindarius Thornwell met with the media in New York Thursday. Here is a quick recap of the press conference.
Martin said he and Baylor coach Scott Drew became friends because they started in the Big XII around the same time. Drew also hired Tim Maloney as an assistant. Martin called Maloney a "dear friend."
On the other side of the bracket is Wisconsin, a team that knocked Martin out of the tournament twice. He praised Wisconsin for the way it always seems to make a deep tournament run. "You can be a team that lost 12 games, and you make a run in the this tournament and everyone forgets all your sins before you got in the tournament. So, Wisconsin's earned that right."
Martin joked that he is keeping the Gamecocks focused by "making all those faces that people like having fun with." He said he and the staff have tried to spend as much time with the team as possible to ward off distractions. Martin said before the first game of the tournament, he told the team, "I'm the only person in this room that's ever been in this tournament. Don't stop listening to me now."
Notice talked about what being in the Sweet 16 means to the seniors. "When we came here, three, four years ago, coach didn't promise us that we would be in the Sweet 16, but he promised that if we believed in him, and he believed in us, that he would provide us with an opportunity to kind of make our dreams come true. And it's kind of coming into fruition right now."
Thornwell was asked what the hardest part of the building process was. He said the first two years were the hardest. "Freshman year, we were just so young. And then we had a lot of games where we could have won, but we just were so young and didn't hardly finish games," he said. "Sophomore year, we just went through so much with guys getting hurt, from knee injuries, it was time where we were only playing with like seven or eight players for the rest of the season. And just losing was just not fun for us."
Martin said he and Baylor coach Scott Drew became friends because they started in the Big XII around the same time. Drew also hired Tim Maloney as an assistant. Martin called Maloney a "dear friend."
On the other side of the bracket is Wisconsin, a team that knocked Martin out of the tournament twice. He praised Wisconsin for the way it always seems to make a deep tournament run. "You can be a team that lost 12 games, and you make a run in the this tournament and everyone forgets all your sins before you got in the tournament. So, Wisconsin's earned that right."
Martin joked that he is keeping the Gamecocks focused by "making all those faces that people like having fun with." He said he and the staff have tried to spend as much time with the team as possible to ward off distractions. Martin said before the first game of the tournament, he told the team, "I'm the only person in this room that's ever been in this tournament. Don't stop listening to me now."
Notice talked about what being in the Sweet 16 means to the seniors. "When we came here, three, four years ago, coach didn't promise us that we would be in the Sweet 16, but he promised that if we believed in him, and he believed in us, that he would provide us with an opportunity to kind of make our dreams come true. And it's kind of coming into fruition right now."
Thornwell was asked what the hardest part of the building process was. He said the first two years were the hardest. "Freshman year, we were just so young. And then we had a lot of games where we could have won, but we just were so young and didn't hardly finish games," he said. "Sophomore year, we just went through so much with guys getting hurt, from knee injuries, it was time where we were only playing with like seven or eight players for the rest of the season. And just losing was just not fun for us."
