Kevin Keatts: "I Just Think They're Good"

What, man, he's worked, He's worked extremely hard. A typical freshman, comes in, man, loves the freedom that he has in college, probably having a good time off the court. Big-time scorer out of high school, but really has to adjust to how to score at the college level, a little bit more physicality, games a little bit quicker, but has stayed and locked into the process and gotten better and worked hard every day. Usually at some point, a freshman will turn a corner, and we start seeing that with him about two or three weeks ago in practice and the times that we put him in a game, and I'm just happy for him. He's worked so hard, and our team needed some energy, and I thought he provided a lot of energy and made shots for us on Saturday. 

 

Well, in this world, it's very easy to criticize, and certainly we're in a business and a sport that you can be criticized, but we tell our guys, lock in, I mean, everybody in this world can be criticized. The unfortunate thing about it is that we don't know what most people's job is, and so we don't go to their job or we don't tweet and we don't do all that other stuff. We tell our guys, just lock in, trust your work, trust the folks who have, that you're around every day. Don't ever get too high when they say some great things about you, like Michael had 13 assists, and I don't want people, when people say how great you play, that's reality. Stay even-keeled, and when you don't play well, you're going to get some criticism. So I think our guys understand that. He was also a part of a team last year that lost the last four that got heavily criticized but, heavily celebrated after we cut the nets down last year, and so I think he's mature enough to understand that that happens in this business.

 

He played between him and Paul. The first half of the Carolina game didn't go as any of us expected, but there was a silver lining. We scored 47 points in the second half. Our guys completely came out and didn't like the way we played, and I thought the two guys that really, really played well in the second half were Dontrez and Paul, and it's kind of carried over. They were good in practice. They were locked in, and, you know, Trez is playing really good basketball for us, and, the games that we have won, he's been a big part of that, and, I thought he was completely locked in and focused, and I think a lot of people after our loss wrote us off as a team that may lay down and may not play well, but, that's not what our program's about, and, we got some guys with some pride in the locker room, and, we beat a really good Wake Forest team on Saturday because our guys just came out a little bit more focused and hungry than, obviously they've been in a long time.

 

Well, I think someone asked me this the other day. I think there should be 80-some teams in the NCAA tournament, so, of course, I think everybody should go to the tournament that qualifies. The decision is way above my head. I don't know. I'll leave that up to the decision-makers. We just have to obviously try to put ourselves in a situation to try to get there, but I don't know where it came from. If it was voted by the coaches, I don't remember ever voting for it, so I don't know where it came from, but, if you said to me I would love for everybody to have a chance because, getting in there, if that was the case last year, then it may not have been an NC State story, or in the past, so at the end of the day, I think everybody should go, but that's above me. 

 

It's a big game, and it's a big game for several reasons. It's the next game on our schedule. It's the next game after playing a really good game at home against Wake Forest. There's great opportunity, and, going down the stretch, you want to try to finish strong. We were completely opposite last year. We didn't finish strong, and so it's a good game, and I say it whether we were winning or whether Syracuse's, record is where they're at or our record, but it will be important for us because we want to try to finish strong as we can going down the stretch, and I think our guys understand that part of it, but we want to try to build some momentum. We have won two out of the last three games that we played, when you talk about Boston College and also Wake at home, so we want to try to build on that. 

 

We don't. I would say, at this point, it would be safe to say that we probably won't see Mike James. I typically will evaluate him every Monday and just kind of figure out where he's at. Obviously, it's early in the day. We practice here at 2:30. I'll get a chance to see him a little bit earlier, but I haven't talked to him or the doctors or trainers today. He may walk in, and I may say, may tell you later on in the week that, man, he's ready to go, but I wouldn't anticipate that.

 

I just think they're good. I mean, you know what? Their record may not indicate it. Our record may not indicate it, but, you know, they do a good job. JJ Starling is really good. He puts a lot of pressure on your defense, and they have great size. They can score inside and out. They got some guys who are starting to play together. It's a good team. They mix it up. Obviously, they’ve done a really good job of playing some man-to-man and then mixing in some of the traditional 2-3 zone that they play, but they're competing. They've lost a couple games similar to us. They really came down to the stretch, and they came out on the other side of it, but I just think, when I think of them, they got a legitimate, very legitimate wing scorer and then a really good post guy and some supporting cast around them, and I think that makes them really good. 
 

Yeah, Noah, Michael, and listen, he's, when you're the head coach at, one of these programs, you're going to get criticized by every fan base, and you're going to get loved on at times, but also when you're the point guard, similar to a quarterback position, you're going to get criticized. I think Michael is old enough to handle that because he's been through the highs and lows, and there's no higher situation than it was when, obviously we won what we won, and he made the big shot against Virginia. I just want him to continue to grow. I, being criticized is one thing, but we had some open looks this year that obviously just didn't go in, and I think a lot of times Michael would get blamed for that, but he's probably had some games, maybe not that where he was going to get 13 assists, but he could probably had, nine or 10 if we'd made some of our open shots, and so I just think he stayed the course. He understands. I think he's criticized a lot because he's not the traditional, point guard that we've had here in a job-care joiner that can score the ball and pass, and, he's really a point guard, and sometimes those guys don't, don't get the credit. I said this on my radio show. If the running back, gets 200 yards, very seldom are you going to see the lineman get any credit in the newspaper. Well, if we're making shots, then sometimes a point guard is doing a good job getting the ball to the right spot, and that's kind of how I see it with him. 

 

Well, going down the stretch,  you want to have small wins, and so when you look at it, I thought that was our best complete game where we put two really good halves together, but I also threw this in. If you look at the second half of the Carolina game and then you look at, Wake Forest first and second half, I thought, for the first time in a long time, we had played three really good halves of basketball, and I thought we played on both ends of the floor and we moved the ball. Think about this 23 assists on 29 made field goals. Pretty impressive. We made 13 three-pointers, and I thought our defense was really stingy against a very good Wake Forest offensive team.