University of Southern Mississippi Athletics
Green Says 2002-03 Team Can Be His Best Ever
10/28/2002 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Green Says 2002-03 Team Can Be His Best Ever
With the exhibition season starting in just a week and the regular season three weeks away, Southern Miss Head Coach James Green, his staff and players met with the media Monday and the Golden Eagles? seventh-year coach had the following assessment of his team?s approaching season:
We?ve worked hard in the offseason and in the preseason conditioning program and we?ve added new recruits. We feel like we?re in very good shape, and that we?ll go out and have the opportunity to win a lot of games.
Defensively, we?ll be more athletic that we have even been before, and offensively, we?ll be as good or better than any year that I?ve been here. We have a lot of guys who can make a lot of plays on both ends of the floor, that?s both our old players and our new players. We?re having a hard time, as coaches, deciding who will play the most minutes, and we like that. It makes for competitive practices.
Our players have been up every single morning, early, practicing, and, yes, we?ve had some times when we didn?t compete quite as hard as we wanted to throughout the practice. But, that?s true throughout the country, everyone?s going through the same thing, but I can guarantee you that nobody has worked any harder than this group of players that we have in this program right now.
Our schedule will be demanding, we have a new group, and, as always, you need some experience and you need to win early. I feel like that, if we continue to work the way we?re working now, that we?ll have a chance to win some games early and gain some confidence, to go on the road and play in some tough places. If we can get off to a great start in our nonconference schedule and go into the league schedule, with some victories and some confidence, then we?ll be in every single game we play.
We also want to be able to win on the road. Teams are separated by the ones that are able to go out and win on the road. You do that by playing good defense and playing smart on the offensive end. I think that this year we?ll be able to pick up the press a little bit and get some easy baskets, giving us a better chance of winning on the road.
We have to be able to get to the foul line and score from there. We have guys down in the post who we are able to throw the ball to and score. That includes Ben Lambert, one of our most improved players; and Jasper Johnson, who was out last season with a shoulder injury, who can score down low, but who also can step away from the basket and score. Charles Gaines, who sat out last season, is a tenacious rebounder. We can give it to him around the basket and he can score. He?ll draw a lot of fouls there as well.
We also have Geoff Brown in the post, who gives us a 6-11 player that we haven?t had. I think the combination of those post players gives us something different this season over what we had last season.
Good teams are teams that can score inside and score on the perimeter. These guys, along with such players as Greg Johnson, Mario Myles and Clement Carter, who all can score around the basket, but who are perimeter players who can score there as well. We have a lot of guys who we can get the ball to around the basket and that will open up some things on the perimeter where I think we are better than we have been in previous years, because we have better three-point shooting, better ball-handling, and better passing than what we?ve had in the past.
We also have two point guards, including James Pattman, who is another of our most improved players. Along with Dante Stiggers, who played a lot of minutes for us last season, those two will make us very solid at the point guard spot. That?s a lot like a quarterback in football, they?re the guys who will run our team offensively. But, unlike a quarterback, they?re also guys who will start us on the defensive end, give us a chance to get out in the passing lanes where guys such as David Haywood, Jason Forte, and Mario (Myles) who can get out in the open court and score some easy baskets that
way.
The conference will be better than it has been in recent years. A lot of teams have made a lot of improvements by adding new players. People have their systems in place, but so do we; so, we feel like, when it comes league time, if we?ve had a great nonconference schedule and been able to win some games and gain some confidence, we?ll we a team that will contend in every game we play, and have a chance to win any game we play.
Question and Answers:
How do you think your team will match up with other teams?
Green: I really think the other teams should be thinking about how they will match up
with us. We have a group of guys who can defend, bigger players, athletic enough to defend players who are smaller. Offensively, as I mentioned, we have players, such as Jasper Johnson and Clement Carter, who can step out on the perimeter and shoot the three as well as anybody on the team. We have that inside-outside threat, and I think defensively we have the ability to match up with anybody. Sure, there will be some problems here and there, but we?ll make the necessary adjustments. I?m confident in these players, I believe in these players, and I believe that, no matter what the matchups are, we?ll go out and compete very hard.
You?ve been practicing two weeks now. Do you have a feel for where everyone is going to fit?
Green: We have some ideas on how that will work. We still have a long way to go as far as putting combinations in there together to see who really works well together. You look at Jasper Johnson and there are a lot of combinations that can go around him.
You look at our players on the perimeter, and they can play with nay of the post players. We will have to work it out when we have big guys in there, who?s in with who.
We have a lot of guys on the perimeter who can score, but who also can go back and get it and score, in necessary. That gives us a lot of flexibility in that area.
Is your non-conference schedule, in your opinion, more a chance to get ready for the conference schedule, or more an opportunity to see how all the pieces fit together?
Green: I think we have to do both those things. But first, it?s an opportunity to win games. We have to win games early. You talk about going to Western Kentucky, to the Iowa State Tournament and to Auburn, all tough places to play, but we also feel that we?ll have the opportunity to win at any of those places. We also want to be one of the toughest home teams in our conference. We want to win all of our home games, and to make Reed Green Coliseum one of the toughest places to play. Just by going out and playing hard every game, having our students and fans involved by coming in and watching our guys dive on the floor for loose balls, watching them play defense and taking pride on the defense that we play. If you?re going to win a championship, you have to be good on defense, no matter what the sport. The thing that?s different this season, is that have a chance to be good offensively, and I think that when we have fans in the stands, you?ll see our players rise to the occasion.
You have some ?personalities? coming in with some of the teams that will play in Green Coliseum this year. Do you think that will help with attendance?
Green: I think that it will. It matters to us that we have fans in the stands, to know that we?ll compete every game, and that they?re coming to see us play, not to see the personalities, but rather because they believe in what we do on and off the court. It will be a great feeling when that happens. I think we?re at a point where we can take this program further than we ever have before. We have only two seniors on this team, so we have several young players who the fans can identify with over the years. Our coaching staff continues to do a great job of recruiting and we?ll continue to add talent and to upgrade talent each year. I really think that the public will want to be a part of that.