Louisville Head Coach Chris Mack Talks ACC Tournament

(Photo of Chris Mack: Michael Clevinger via the Atlantic Coast Conference)

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - Following their loss to Virginia to end the regular season, the Louisville men's basketball program received the No. 7 seed for the upcoming ACC Tournament.

Next up for the Cardinals (13-6, 8-5 ACC), they will square off against either the Duke Blue Devils or the Boston College Eagles in the second round of the tournament.

Before the Cardinals head to Greensboro N.C, head coach Chris Mack took time to meet with the media. He discussed what he wants his team to improve upon heading into the tournament, the potential opponents they would be facing, and more.

Below is the transcript from his press conference as well as the video:

Head Coach Chris Mack

(On what he wants his team to improve upon in the postseason)

I think that you're always trying to improve. You're trying to learn from last game. We made some mistakes in the Virginia game, that if we are going to advance both in the ACC tournament in any type of postseason, that we have to clean up. We have some guys that haven't played college basketball a lot. You get exposed on a straight line drive, or you miss a block out or, you foul a jump shooter. I'd like to be able to clean those things up, and be at our best. That's what we're aiming to do.

(On his emotions leading up to the cancellation of the ACC and NCAA Tournaments last season)

Well in the lead up to the actual announcement of the ACC tournament being canceled, there was a lot of speculation. If you remember the night before, Rudy Gobert and the NBA canceling games. Everything happened so quickly. I think by the time the Carolina/Syracuse game was over, and we really started to prepare for Syracuse, the word was out there that there weren't going to be fans. That was sort of difficult to wrap your mind around. Then one or two of the coaches, I think when we were in meetings, said they would bet $1 to a doughnut that we weren't going to play games, and the tournament was going to be canceled. I just remember thinking like, 'Get out of here. No way'. And that's exactly what happened. It was one after the other, one conference tournament making the decision, then the next one. I think the ACC, I could be wrong but if memory serves me correctly, was the last tournament's to cancel. Clemson and Florida State were actually on the playing floor. We had not gone to our shoot around just yet, because that was a noon game, and we didn't play until later on. It was just was hard to believe. You're sort of trying to figure out travel plans, and what is going to happen, I wonder what's going to happen with the NCAA Tournament? Are they going to try to figure out what we can do to salvage that, and very quickly in the next two/three hours, we got word that was canceled. I didn't find out until just seeing it on the bottom line of ESPN. That was really hard to swallow. It was very tough few days. I'm surprised we're going back to the same hotel, to be quite honest,

(On how he guides a young team through this week and beyond)

As best we can. We've got to be able to learn from our past experiences, both positively and negatively, and get ready to play the winner Boston College and Duke. Not necessarily reflect back and think about what we missed or what we could have done. We've got to be ready to go on Wednesday. We had a really good practice yesterday, I'm hoping for more of the same. Then we'll get off the plane and get tested, and be ready to play tomorrow afternoon or early evening.

(On scouting the Duke/Boston College game)

We'll definitely pay really close attention to their game. You can't scout in person, which is something that's different this year, unless that team's playing in your same session. We're not allowed to go in person. So we opted to, instead of leave two days before the tournament, leave one day before the tournament. Lessen our exposure, being in a different place. We have different coaches that have scouted Boston College and have scouted Duke, and so it'll be just sort of a refresher for our guys later on tonight after the game has been played. We've sort of prepared a little bit for both teams here in two days leading up to tomorrow.

(On if a specific coach is assigned to one or the other)

We do that earlier in the year once the schedule's sort of made out, so that the same coach doesn't necessarily have three games in a row. I tried to keep coaches on the same programs from year to year, but that's not always possible. Because in one year, you might play three programs back-to-back-to-back, and it's just not possible, at least the way we do it. Those scouting assignments are set prior to us even playing the first game of the year. For instance, Coach (Dino) Gaudio has the Duke scout, he knows them inside and out, and he'll be the one that sort of delivers personnel and a lot of the things that we expect to see on the offensive and defensive ends.

(On if he thinks they have generated enough experience over the course of the season to be able to make a deep postseason run)

It remains to be seen, but i think tournament play is all about being connected, playing your best. I think we have a very close knit group. I think we have a hungry group. We'll figure that out on Wednesday, but I can't worry about the number of games we've played, and whether that equates to enough experience. We got to go out there and be the harder playing team, and that's something that we can control. Can't control how many games we've played, or how many minutes we've played. So don't really worry about it a whole lot.

(On Samuell Williamson peaking at the right time)

Sam's done a great job for us. I think early on in the year, he wasn't finding his way very well. To his credit, he never stopped believing and he's never stopped working. I've said it in other press conferences, he's as hard of a worker as I've been around. He's a guy that gets in the gym in the morning, and he'll stay after. If we would open up the gym all through the night, he'd be back here at 9pm if he could be. He puts a lot of time, and a lot of effort, and a lot of hard work into his game, and it's really paid off in a big way the last couple months. We got to continue to try to find ways to get him in that (midrange) spot, because he's certainly really effective. He's doing a lot of other things, like rebounding and defending, that have really helped our team as well.

(On how important it was to get another consistent contributor outside of Carlik Jones and David Johnson)

To get anybody to be really consistent is a plus for any team, and that's that's really who Sam's become. He's become a consistent guy for us. You know if you remember back at one point, we brought him off the bench because he wasn't playing very well. Love the way he responded, he's kept responding. Put him back in the lineup, nothing's changed. I think he's playing with a lot of confidence. He's a big part of our team, and I'm happy for him.

(On why he did not recruit Carlik Jones during his time at Xavier, what has he done to elevate himself since then)

I think that, Carlik would probably be the first to tell you, he wasn't a slam dunk to qualify for college. He obviously had to sit out his freshman year at Radford. So to say that, 'hey, we're going to take a guy that we don't know if he's going to qualify', we weren't willing to make that that gamble. Having said that, I don't want to put it all on the academics, because basketball - he's six-foot-one. There's a lot of six-foot-one players around the country who had really good High School careers, and don't have nearly the career that Carlik's had in college. So, sort of the combination of the two. Monitoring the academics, and not necessarily seeing something that really stood out. Obviously, he had a great senior year. Terrific senior year, and then he manifested that into a great first playing season at Radford, and then ultimately a great career. We were recruiting other guys. Quintin Gooden and Paul Scrubbs, guys that had really good careers at Xavier. I don't know if we necessarily made the wrong decision. It's really worked out for Carlik. He had an unbelievable career at Radford, he got his degree. And, you know, First Team All-ACC. I think everybody's path in life is a little different, but I don't have any regrets in how we handled it, because no one really had a crystal ball at the time.

I think that when you take a step up in competition, you're going against bigger players, and stronger and more athletic. You're not necessarily sure how a guy will respond. Carlik just really understands how to play, how to use his body, how to keep guys off balance, better than most. Although you could see those things in high school, it was against high school competition. He's been able to continue to do that, no matter how big someone is, no matter how strong they are. It's not just evaluating a guy's shooting ability, or his vertical, but his understanding and IQ of the game. A lot of times, you don't necessarily see that against the higher end competition. AAU a little bit, but he wasn't playing on a big AAU circuit. So it's a challenge. That's why I think sometimes, those needles in the haystack happen. He's found it, and he's been unbelievable to coach, and I keep saying how much humility has for a guy that's First Team All-ACC, and has been a huge part of our team.

(On if he could come back next year)

It's conceivable. I think what he'll do is, like all of our seniors, sort of sit down and see what his options are. Talk it through with his family, and people that are close to him, as well as his coaching staff, and he'll make the best decision that he can for himself. I think he's open minded, but that will be visited here when our season comes to an end, hopefully not for another month.

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