• last year
Porter Moser Pre-Providence (12-4-23)
Transcript
00:00 What a matchup. I mean, this is a storied franchise with great players and coaches.
00:04 I mean, this is up your alley, isn't it, with the history?
00:07 It's a great Big East team. A lot of tradition with Providence.
00:12 So, and they're really, really good. I mean, they got one loss. It was an overtime. And,
00:19 you know, Pierre was out after the first couple minutes. And I think it's a top 15 team.
00:23 Just watching so much on the tape, how physical they are. They're good on both ends.
00:29 They're old. They got star power. They're physical. I just, I think they're unquestionably
00:36 an NCAA tournament team, top 15 team. They're not going to be bothered coming
00:40 in here either, are they? I mean, they've already played four major programs.
00:44 Yeah. Three in one.
00:46 Yeah, no, they got older guys. I mean, Bryce Hopkins, those guys, Devin Carter,
00:50 they've been through a lot in the Big East. And so, no, they're not, we're not thinking that
00:57 they're going to be bothered coming in here. I know you've had tests already this year,
01:01 but how exciting is a week like this early in the season? You have Providence tomorrow,
01:04 Arkansas this weekend. What do you find out about your team in early weeks like this?
01:08 Well, it just focuses on Providence. I mean, we just, our guys are, have been really good about
01:13 taking care of what's right in front of us. And no matter what the opponent is,
01:17 it's a confident respect for their strengths. It's about doing what we do at a high level.
01:25 And, but we got a very confident respect for Providence. I mean, we know how physical
01:29 defensively they are. They're elite, they're top 10 or 15, whatever the number is defensively.
01:34 So our guys are excited. They've been really good about what's in front of them. And they think
01:39 that they know it's going to be a high level game. Such an emotional night, Thursday. Has energy been
01:44 issue or concern? Emotional letdown?
01:48 No. We've had great practices. The guys, we all just kind of said the same thing. It was great.
01:55 It was awesome. Let's go get Providence. And they, everybody really thought it was a great
02:03 night. Enjoyed it. Thought the students were awesome. And we're hoping, we're all kind of
02:08 hoping that they come back and that they create an atmosphere at the LNC. And everybody, everybody
02:14 come in here because created a home court advantage because we're needed. But there
02:17 hasn't been, the guys, it was, they really enjoyed it. And then we moved on. We took a day off and
02:23 then we've had two great practices. You mentioned after the game, when you're on the mic,
02:27 we'll show this over the LNC now, how much are you looking forward to seeing if it had a positive
02:31 impact for you guys in terms of the students and the crowd and things like that? I just think it's,
02:36 the students have been great. And then they were, they were such, I think they had fun watching the
02:40 videos. I think they had enjoyed it. And so to create it. And I think they, our team, they're
02:47 getting behind our team. And I think our guys play hard. We're playing faster, more athletic,
02:52 but we're not playing crazy. We're still defending. Sometimes when you commit to playing faster,
02:58 it's at the expense of your defense. And our guys know our defense is still our top priority
03:06 trying to create offense from that. So I think it's a team that I think people recognize how
03:11 hard we're playing. Thursday, talk about Sam, is he cleared back in? Yeah, Sam's Sam's cleared.
03:17 How's he enjoyed that dynamic between him and John, just being able to kind of platoon those
03:21 guys? And it feels like there's really no like drop off. Yeah, they both super high productive,
03:25 productivity. They've been both have been very productive. You know, they give us different
03:30 things. And so I couldn't be happier with those 40 minutes. I mean, I wish you had more minutes
03:35 for between the two five spots the way they're playing. So but it's good to get Sam back. He
03:39 gives us a dynamic on the offensive glass. He's so athletic, he covers a lot of ground.
03:46 John, you know, he's been offensively, he's been a force down there. So love, love the versatility.
03:53 And we do have Sam back. You think that experience helped Luke at all having to step in?
03:57 Super confident with Luke, I think the thing is, is for him to feel that same way. And that he's
04:07 needs to stay ready. You know, I really, it's like, it's like some of these guys that don't
04:13 play right now. It's not a reflection on them. You want Caden that he's not getting tons of minutes.
04:18 It's more of a reflection on we're old off the bench, you know, and just the way it is in college
04:22 basketball. We're old off the bench, but has nothing to do with my confidence level in a
04:27 couple of those guys that aren't getting the minutes. It's about development, getting them
04:30 better, getting them, you know, learning the offense, defense, getting them confidence.
04:34 And that's what the definite case is with him. How tough is that adjustment for those guys?
04:37 Because before coming to Oklahoma, they've been the guy on every team they've been on.
04:41 It's not just at Oklahoma, it's all around the country. It's an adjustment for everybody.
04:44 Especially with this, we got one more year, the cycle where you're playing fifth year guys. A lot
04:50 of teams have fifth year guys, 24 year olds, 23 year olds. If you're an 18 year old, never played
04:54 college basketball. It's an adjustment, not just at Oklahoma. So you got to constantly be in the
04:59 development process of letting them know mentally too. And we got confidence here. Let's keep
05:03 working. Let's keep getting better. Let's, let's learn the offense better. Know where you need to
05:08 be on defense. And, and that's that race to maturity, you know, of, of learning, but to say
05:14 it's easy, it's not, it's not. Everybody wants to play, you know, it doesn't mean they, you know,
05:20 I'm just asking you to, you know, ask and be patient with it and everything.
05:24 Coach, how important is it just to take advantage of the opportunity to build that
05:27 resume before you get to conference play? I think every game's an opportunity. I mean,
05:31 it really is. You're seeing teams lose to teams they feel they shouldn't have lost to.
05:36 We approach every game like, man, it's an opportunity to put one in the bank,
05:39 accumulate wins, accumulate good wins. Obviously Providence we feel is going to be an NCAA
05:43 tournament team. So that's, we know, we know what kind of win that could be. So our guys,
05:50 you know, the way our preparation process is, is you really dive into their strengths,
05:54 the personnel, what they're doing, no matter what the opponent is. But our guys know how good
05:59 Providence is. They absolutely know it. I know you're going to say it's not the goal. The net
06:04 rankings came out 19. What does that say about the respect they're giving you from what you've
06:09 accomplished? It's, it's, it's, it's, that's more analytical. It's not about respect. It's,
06:13 yeah, the net's more analytical. It's like, it's a number. So, like I said, those things are going
06:19 to fluctuate like, like the stock market. I don't know. I mean, they're just going to be up and
06:23 down. It's going to be, you just don't, it's literally the net. I mean, all this racketology,
06:29 this early, it's, it's all about your team. Are you getting them better? Are you, you growing
06:34 the game in front of you, the game in front of you? So I really haven't put much thought to,
06:39 to the net coming out today. What are you kind of touched on it earlier, but the rebounding
06:42 the last few games, it's like, it's been a real strength for you guys. How happy have you been
06:46 with the effort on that end? One thing is we said it intentionally, we want to be better offensively,
06:50 like analytically, the numbers are like off the charts compared to last year's. And I don't think
06:56 we're giving up our transition defense. That's the thing you worry about. Are you going to give up
06:59 your transition defense? We've got to be on our transition defense against Providence. They are
07:04 going to try to push it and score in the first seven seconds. Pierre and Carter, just elite
07:09 cards and push the tempo. But, you know, I think, I think that, that I lost my, what was the question?
07:18 Rebounding. Rebounding, back to rebounding. I started thinking about Carter and Pierre,
07:23 and I just started thinking about our transition defense. No, I think our offensive rebound has
07:28 been good. And, you know, defense is about blocking out. We've been up and down in that.
07:32 We've had games where, I mean, the numbers are great, but like I look on like, I guess I'm just
07:36 really hard on it, but I look at games where we've given up more offensive rebounds than we should
07:40 have. Every game we have a goal. We're trying to get them less than 30% of their misses. And,
07:45 you know, we got to continue to go out to in. So style of play is pretty similar between the two
07:51 teams. I think so. I think we're both physical defensively. I think we're both trying to run.
07:55 They got a block score. You don't see a lot of teams have true guys that can score. Oduro can
08:01 really score on the block. So John can really score on the block. They got, they got some
08:06 dynamic guards. You know, I feel like we got some dynamic guards, so they're trying to push the
08:10 tempo. They got a block score. They got a very, very physical defense. No, I do think it's a,
08:16 it's similar. Porter, you guys are up there in dunks. Obviously that helps for easy, but you
08:22 guys give me more stats than I know. What does that do when you've got so many guys that can
08:27 score to keep everyone engaged and keep everyone seeing the ball go through and they can get easy
08:30 buckets like that? I mean, any more easy bus bucket you can get, it's just so much. That's
08:37 why we call it DCO. You know, we're, we're trying to get, we're trying to run on misses,
08:40 trying to run on steals, deflections. If you can get easy buckets, you know, and I think our guys
08:46 are feeding into that. I think the key was setting the tone that it's going to start with your
08:51 defense. And that's been our biggest mantra is we wanted to play faster without, without the expense
08:57 of sacrificing our defense. And I think we're doing that. I think we're guarding and playing
09:01 up tempo. And I think that's the key to keep getting better at that system.