Video & Transcript: Richmond Pregame Presser 3-16-22
CHRIS MOONEY: Well, we're thrilled to be here. Excited to get started. We've had a very exciting conference tournament, and we had a good practice yesterday. I was fearful that we would have a little bit of a letdown yesterday, but we had a good practice, and looking forward to get started today and the game tomorrow.
Q. Hello, Chris. What's it like to be here knowing where you were two years ago, and you couldn't make it, and now you've got the six guys who stuck around after all the ups and downs and many downs last year? What's it like to have this group here this year?
CHRIS MOONEY: It's a great feeling. You know, two years ago, we were in the hotel in Brooklyn when everything was canceled, and we had to talk to the guys about that. The one thing I said when we got back to Richmond before we left until the middle of the summer was that this isn't something that -- that event wasn't something that would be made better or made whole. It's not like you didn't play well the first half, we have to try to play well the second half. It was just something out of everyone's control.
It's so hard to be in a position to be an at-large team. It's just incredibly challenging, and, you know, for these guys, obviously, to come back, six seniors to come back, two walk-ons paying their own way for an extra year, and the four scholarship players all had 1,000 points before this year, they could be anywhere. It's incredible. So counter to what so much of what college basketball is today. This is great.
Those guys who were in that room and experienced that pain of the tournament being canceled, so for those players in particular -- for everybody, it's incredible, but for those players in particular, it's very special.
Q. Congratulations, Coach, on your success.
CHRIS MOONEY: Thank you.
Q. What strengths does your team possess that makes you confident that you will advance to the next round in the tournament?
CHRIS MOONEY: We're very experienced, of course. That's a big one. Even our players who come into the game -- a lot of them are experienced, have been in games, have been in big games. You know, we generally take care of the ball pretty well, and I think we play together. That would be my -- I think our best strength is that we play together on both sides, on offense and defense. We really share the ball and have a good understanding of how to play and play together.
To me, that's our best chance is that, obviously, we're going to play Iowa, champion of the Big Ten, great players. Our best chance is to make sure we play together, have five guys playing together every possession, and hopefully can do as well as possible.
Q. I wanted to know, you and Fran are Philly guys.
CHRIS MOONEY: Yeah.
Q. What's your relationship like with Fran over the years, and how close are you guys?
CHRIS MOONEY: We're pretty close. We've gotten to know each other very well over the past few years. You know, I can remember his Lehigh team. That's a long, long time ago. When he was an assistant coach at Notre Dame, and I was kind of just coming up and getting into coaching, I knew who he was obviously because of his Philadelphia years. He is kind of a legend in Philadelphia.
And then subsequently on some of the Nike basketball coaching trips, we've hung out a lot and had a lot -- he is a great storyteller, very funny. He has been a really, really good friend to me and somebody that, obviously, I look up to, and his success has been impressive.
Q. How are the Phillies looking? I'm just kidding.
(Laughing).
Q. I knew that would get you. With everything kind of you've gone through, I know what it means to your players sticking together, but you've had some tough times here.
CHRIS MOONEY: Yeah.
Q. What does this mean to you to be here?
CHRIS MOONEY: It means a great deal, obviously. I think this is -- this is such an extraordinary accomplishment for a team. It's different if you are a high major team than it is for us, and we have a tremendous conference, but it's still different. And to be able to make it here is great.
For me personally, I have to tell you that I don't -- there's no more vindication or anything like that. I don't really think like that. Sometimes the Yankees qualify for the wild card, and they say nobody thought we could do it. Well, the Yankees, everybody kind of thought.
I don't really have that mindset. I feel like it's so common, especially in sports, to worry about the doubters. It's irrelevant to me. I would rather worry about the believers and the investors. We have that. We have guys and our staff and our administration, and we have plenty of investors that are more important.
Rather than try to prove some people wrong, I would rather try to prove those people right. That's the way I've always looked at it. So I don't feel any better because of that, but I feel great that we're here for sure.
Q. I was curious before the bracket draw versus Iowa, how much were you aware of what Keegan Murray had been doing on a national stage, and since the draw, maybe what has stood out to you in studying him?
CHRIS MOONEY: Well, before -- so Darius Stokes is our video coordinator. He played at Iowa. His father was a great player at Iowa. Our athletic director, John Hart, is an Iowa grad, football player.
Yeah, so I was pretty aware of him. We would watch some Iowa games on the road because Darius was interested, and then subsequently having drawn them, Murray is amazing. He can score in so many ways. He is so fluid, athletic, calm, incredibly in control. He is tremendous. He is better than I thought he was before we started watching them.
I'm not sure what he is projected in the NBA draft, but I imagine very high. He's a great player. I don't know -- if you average 23 points per game, I'm not sure that anybody has guarded you very well in that conference. He is an amazing player and someone that will take the whole team to defend and to make sure that we make him make as hard of shots as possible, which he is capable of, but still want to make them as hard as possible.
Q. Outside of Keegan Murray, just looking at Iowa's offense, obviously high-octane. They like to get out in transition. What do you see as the keys to kind of slowing that offense down and making sure they don't get out and run?
CHRIS MOONEY: They're great in transition. What makes them unique is it's not -- it's not a particular fastbreak or a system fastbreak where everybody is in the same spot every time. They're kind of similar to their half court offense. They're playing together and reading each other.
Bohannon is such an incredible shooter with such range that generally the idea is you want to get back and be tight in transition defense. Against them you can't really do that because of the shooting, especially Bohannon and Murray.
I think the biggest thing is not turning the ball over so that -- they run off of rebounds and off of makes as well, but trying to get back and have as many guys back and building a wall at the hashmark as possible.
Even still, they're going to get transition. It's just so much a part of who they are. They're so good at it. Every guy seemingly brings the ball up if they get the rebound, so it's a different kind of transition than a traditional, like, Carolina fastbreak or numbered fastbreak.
They're just very good at crossing the court and finding guys in a little bit different areas. Nobody is in the same spot every time. That's a huge challenge for us. We need to limit that. I don't think you can take it away, but we need to limit that to the best of our ability.
Q. Chris, congratulations on being here.
CHRIS MOONEY: Thank you.
Q. The Rhode Island job obviously is open, and I just wonder from your perspective, having been in the league for so long and industry-wide, how you see the potential of that job and where you see it going forward?
CHRIS MOONEY: Yeah, well, I was sorry to see David be let go. I think he is a very good coach and a really good man. They've had three coaches since I've been there, and Coach Barron a couple of times, they had great seasons, especially great first 20 games.
And then, obviously, Danny did a tremendous job there. I thought David did a very good job. Two years ago, I think they were 21-9. It's hard for coaches that that doesn't count or that's kind of not quite as important if they had gotten an NIT or NCAA bid that year.
I think it's a really good job. It's a beautiful place obviously. They have good -- the facility is great. I think the fan base is great. I think they'll be able to attract somebody really, really good. I think -- I love the athletic director.
I think industry-wide, it's interesting. There are three openings in the Atlantic 10 right now, and I think they're all good jobs. We have a great conference. There's an incredible amount of commitment in our conference, and I think probably in my time at Richmond, that's what I've seen grow the most is the amount of teams that have better facilities, new practice facilities, that charter, that are just very, very invested. So I think Rhode Island, I would assume, is similar and, therefore, since it's such a pretty place, great location, good history, I think it's a great job.
Q. The amount of times you have overcome double digit deficits including in the A10 tournament, how much has that faded in some ways, and how much is that the experience that these -- the experience and depth that you have on your roster?
CHRIS MOONEY: It has. We've overcome, I think, double digit deficit maybe seven times second half.
Well, I think a lot of it is there's high character, and I think what shows itself in belief that we can do it. So often if you see college games and you see teams start to get sluggish when something bad happens or start to just throw up three-point shots when something bad happens, I think we're old enough not to do that, to know that if we can increase our energy, if we can continue to really kind of keep pushing.
One thing, I think we're good at pushing the pace on offense. Naturally we have a great point guard in Jacob, and so not only does he provide steals in those situations, but he is very disruptive, and he is also great at pushing the pace and having a great feel for how quickly we should shoot, what shot we should shoot, and can set up guys or take his own shot. I think that's a big part of it, the experience and having a great point guard.
And the belief that we've been in these situations before, these guys have been in so many games. You know, naturally we've been in games where we've been ahead, behind, tight games, overtime games. We can draw upon a lot of that experience.
Q. Your team, obviously, had to win four games in four days to get here. Holding teams under 64 points a game, 62 against Davidson, a team that averaged 75, what did you see from your defense as they kind of locked down in those four games and what are you hoping to see as you try to contain an offense that averages nearly 84 a game in Iowa?
CHRIS MOONEY: Yes. Well, we have defended very well, and it was very different kind of teams. Dayton's offense is great, but different than Davidson's, which is different than BCU's.
The familiarity, obviously, that helps every time, so that was one thing. We really -- we really had a good game plan, but we also really fought. The mistakes that are going to happen on defense on nearly every possession, whether a guy gets beat a little bit or is a step slow for a close-out or whatever, team-wise we played very well and helped one another.
Iowa is incredible on offense, just prolific. In watching the -- was it the Rutgers game in the conference tournament when they were down, what was it, 15-3, or was that the Indiana game? Indiana game. I mean, there's just such little panic.
Again, Murray plays so easily that everything feels a little bit easier when they score, so for us to defend them, I don't know if it's going to be because of how many points they have at the end of the game. I just don't know if anyone can really guard them for 40 minutes and just hold them to a low score, but for us, it's going to be about making it as difficult as possible.
They rarely turn the ball over. We're going to have to have some turnovers and generate some turnovers and be good on the backboard, but I don't necessarily know if it's going to be in the points department. I think it's going to be more a total effort and cumulative effect of great effort and hustle that help us to play well defensively.
Q. For both of you guys, obviously in 2020, you certainly had a résumé of an NCAA tournament team going into the conference tournaments and then COVID obviously postponed the tournament.
How much sweeter did that make this run to the Atlanta championship and then to the tournament this year?
GRANT GOLDEN: Like you said, it made it a lot sweeter. We thought that was the best record in school history that we had in 2020. Everything that we had set out to accomplish was right there in front of us. We were going to have an opportunity to go play up there in Brooklyn, so to have that all taken away certainly hurt a lot, and the fact that all of our guys decided to use that COVID year and come back this year and try to accomplish that goal and the fact that we got there really means a lot to all of us.
Q. This for Jacob, I think Grant just mentioned it, but the amount of six-year seniors that you have on this team, how important -- how, I guess, not valuable, but how cool is it to have the six of you together for so long and the bond that you have established and to be going out like this at this type of stage?
JACOB GILYARD: It's been really cool, the experience itself. These are guys that I've played with for five years now, so to be able to accomplish this with them is great. We're a pretty close team on the court. I think we all kind of feed off of each other and play well together, but we're extremely close off the court. The relationships that we have with each other are incredible, so to go out this way or to be able to be here with these guys means the world to me.
Q. Congratulations on your success. What are some of the lessons that you have learned from Coach Chris?
GRANT GOLDEN: Somebody asked me that question in an interview yesterday before we left campus, and I think the biggest thing for me is something he always preaches to us is you can never feel sorry for yourself. Just feeling sorry for yourself is the worst thing that you can do in life.
Obviously there's a lot of highs and lows throughout your life, but during the lows, if you feel sorry for yourself, there's no way that you can pull yourself out of that funk and get through those times. So the biggest thing for him is making sure that you never feel sorry for yourself so that you can always pull yourself through those times no matter how low they get.
With me in my life and the things that I've been through, that's certainly something that's resonated with me the most.
Q. What are your impressions of Iowa, and do they compare to anybody that you guys have faced this season?
JACOB GILYARD: I would say they don't really compare to anybody. I mean, they've got an All American. We haven't played anybody that has that type of player. It's going to be tough for us. They're a really good team. Offensively the numbers speak for themselves.
I think in the last two months, they've probably been one of the top five teams analytically. They're a really good team. We're excited to be able to play against a Big Ten team. Doesn't really matter who it is. To be in the tournament, all you have to do is win one game. We're going to take it one game at a time and see where we go.
Q. It's for Grant. You just talked about not feeling sorry for yourselves. How big of a message was that among you guys after last year and then to know that you are coming back for this extra season and the opportunity that brought? And to make it even more convoluted question, and I'm sorry, but to have Nick Sherod, what he went through and to be here as well?
GRANT GOLDEN: This group has been through a lot, like you mentioned. There's been a lot of downs. Guys with different injuries. The COVID thing happened in 2020. Last year, obviously, was a tough year for all teams, but I think us more so than a lot of teams got hit a little bit harder.
I know me personally, I probably spent over a month in hotel rooms and stuff for quarantine and everything like that, so we certainly had a lot. There are certainly a lot of times where we could have felt sorry for ourselves and sort of quit and sort of said, you know, maybe this just isn't it, but the fact that nobody did and everybody stuck with it and decided to come back, sort of like I said earlier, just made it all that much better on Sunday.
Q. How much did you get hit up by other schools? Maybe not directly, but indirectly, to transfer, and why did you guys end up staying at Richmond?
GRANT GOLDEN: During when the entire country was in quarantine, when COVID ended the season and everything, I certainly had a bunch of schools sort of reach out to my high school coach and try and figure out what I was going to do with the fifth year and everything, so I know that there were a lot of options out there, but I had always said if I was going to decide to come back and everything, this year, whatever it may be, that it was going to be at Richmond.
How Coach Mooney and his entire staff and how these guys have impacted my life is something that I can't even describe, so I couldn't even imagine taking the court with anybody besides them.
JACOB GILYARD: For me, it happened after my sophomore year. I'm not as old as Grant. I'm just a fifth year. He is an old guy. Once I decided to come back after the COVID year, I knew there wasn't -- there wasn't anywhere else I would rather be. Richmond was always what I was going to do.
Q. Because of Mooney?
JACOB GILYARD: Yeah. I would say -- my teammates are probably right there along with Coach, but, yeah, no, Coach Mooney played a big part in it, how he went about it. He didn't force anybody. He didn't try to put himself on anybody to make sure that we were going to come back or that one guy would come back. He let us make our own decisions, and he has done that throughout our whole career. He treats us as adults rather than kids in college.
Q. Jacob, just was that a collective decision, or was it maybe organic? Did you guys just come to realize that on one day, or --
JACOB GILYARD: When he first announced it that we would be able to, I think everybody was kind of like, no, we've been here long enough. As the season progressed, we had to go in quarantine a couple of times. Didn't make the tournament. Things didn't really look as promising as they were before the season, and I think it was kind of -- in the back of everybody's head, at the end of the day, it's a personal decision for everybody.
You know, you get guys saying they'll come back if you come back and vice versa, but I think at the end of the day, it was a personal decision for everybody, but I think everybody -- somebody else played a role in everybody's decision.
Q. During that COVID season, what are some of the things that you worked on during that time to elevate your games to make the team a little bit better?
JACOB GILYARD: I think for us, we played together for so long. We kind of know exactly what people like to do, you know, kind of where guys' spots are, when they want the ball, where they're going to get the ball.
Within our offense, you have an idea of what you want to do. For everybody, it was kind of personal. You know, how are you going to expand your own game to make this team even more dynamic? For me, it was working on shooting the ball better, shooting more off the dribble, trying to get in the lane, work on my floater. I'm sure Grant has his own things that I don't know too much about, but I think it was more personal for everybody.
Q. Keegan Murray, I'm sure you've been talking about him in the scouting report. What have you seen on film from him? Not to give your strategy here, but what types of things do you think you can do to stop him?
GRANT GOLDEN: He is an incredible player obviously. He can score at all three levels. I think that's one of the most impressive things and one of the things that stands out the most on his film, and I think another thing is he just plays really hard, runs the floor great, gets out in transition. The whole team gets out in transition really well, but sort of his energy, you can see just sort of ignites them a little bit.
I think with players like that, obviously, the saying is, I don't know if you can stop them, you can only hope to contain them, so hopefully we can just go out there and make everything tough for him and make him earn every basket that he gets.
Q. I was actually just going to ask about Keegan, but I guess since that's been taken care of, what other Iowa players have stood out to you when you've been watching film on them so far?
GRANT GOLDEN: Obviously, Bohannon, unbelievable shooting ability, really I think does a great job of controlling the pace for them. Like I sort of said there, getting them out in transition when they need to go and everything like that. Obviously, Keegan's brother, another one that really stands out on film. Shooting above 40% from three, really skilled off the dribble, but all of their guys, all of them, bring something to the table. It's going to be a tough game for us, but we're looking forward to it.
