University of Massachusets Athletics
Steve Lappas' Weekly Conference Call (Jan. 31)
January 31, 2005 | Men's Basketball
Jan. 31, 2005
Here are head coach Steve Lappas' comments in the weekly Atlantic 10 Basketball Press Conference. UMass went 1-1 last week and hosts St. Bonaventure on Saturday in a televised game.
Question: What did you think about your week with St. Bonaventure and Richmond?
Lappas: It was a tough week. A very tough game at Bonaventure, they played extremely well and everyone in this league knows it's a tough place to play, their fans are great and they went crazy and it helped their team. They have three guys that can really put it in the basket as well as anybody in this league.
Then on Saturday we played a tough Richmond team. The game was up for grabs in the last three minutes. We didn't make enough of the good plays and they did, so basically that's what happened.
Question: Are you surprised about St. Bonaventure and how hard they play even with their record?
Lappas: Yes, they've definitely been in their games but I'm not surprised, I watched tapes and knowing how it was going to be. You have to give them a lot of credit, Anthony and his kids come out every game and look to give as good an effort as they possibly can. I really think their fans help them a lot.
Their fans certainly didn't act like they were watching a 1-16 team playing. That's a tribute to them. It was a great environment and I think when you have an environment like that you always have a chance. I think the rest of the teams in this league are certainly going to be wary about going up there or playing Bonaventure where ever. You have to be wary of them, no doubt.
Question: We've talked to other coaches about the youth factor, in your game against Richmond, do think this was a problem?
Lappas: No, we're 7-0 in games that were decided by four points or less, so I can't complain much in what we've done in close games. The thing about close games, which I think every coach will attest to, there are things you need to do in close games. You need to execute, you need to make foul shots, you need to take care of the ball, you need to get a good shot every time down, but also the factor in there is that you need to get the right bounce and the right break.
You're going to have breaks go against you. We've been fortunate to get a lot of those breaks for us in those close games. Yes, we did do things right but you can do a lot of the right things but you still have to get a bounce here and there. We've been fortunate, in this game we just weren't as fortunate and we didn't execute well.
Question: We were talking earlier about freshmen and maybe they aren't really freshman anymore because of AAU experience opposed to twenty years ago when they were true freshman. Do you see that?
Lappas: Not really. I think what makes them freshmen isn't what they did before. If another team has seniors, they are that much more experienced then you are even if you played in the AAU circuit, if you're a senior, you played in the AAU circuit plus four years of college basketball so you're going to be more experienced.
Freshman can do well it's just hard if you have a bunch of them playing at the same time. If you stick in one or two good freshmen with a couple juniors and a senior that has always worked since the beginning of the freshmen being able to play on the varsity level so to speak.
It's if you have five of them out there at one time or four of them out there that's when it gets tough. There has always been good freshmen playing on good teams if there is a good balance.
Question: What about the week that Maurice Maxwell had?
Lappas: He's really starting to come into his own. He had a great week. He's playing very, very well, he's shooting the ball well, he's got a great all around game in that he gets assists, he gets rebounds, he gets steals, he scores. There aren't many perimeter players that are a triple double waiting to happen but he's definitely a guy who will have a triple double or two before he's done playing because of his versatility.
Question: You've got a week between games, what do you look to accomplish and is it a good time to have a week off?
Lappas: I'd rather be playing on Wednesday after coming off a loss, but that is the way it is. We're going to get some rest this week. We've got a lot of guys who are playing a lot of minutes so getting a couple of days off in this time period is good for us. Then start getting ready for St. Bonaventure.
Question: Do you like playing the teams so close together like that?
Lappas: No. I hate it. We did the same thing with Saint Joseph's. Like with Saint Joseph's if a kid gets hurt like Jeff Viggiano, the games are 10 days apart so you loose the kid for both games. Plus getting done with teams in your division before the end of the season isn't great either. So we won't play Saint Joseph's or St. Bonaventure in the last six games of the season.
It doesn't help in the jockeying in your division but that's the way it is. It will be an easy game to prepare for in terms of our preparation because we just got ready for them the other day. We'll only have two of their games to watch in the mean time so there isn't a whole lot we can do with St. Bonaventure because there isn't a whole lot of difference from last week when we played them.
Question: You mentioned Jeff Viggiano, and how his stats have gone up in the past three games, how does he look on the floor?
Lappas: He looked a little bit better in this last game. It was the best that he looked. So hopefully we can get him out there a little bit more as time goes on.
Question: Looking at the stats, what makes Stephane Lasme such a good shot blocker?
Lappas: Quickness, timing, he's off the floor very quickly, he's a good jumper and he has long arms and he's got great timing. Any great shot blocker has to have good timing and it is something that you can't really teach.
