Boeheim Reflects On 2014-15 Campaign
3/4/2015 3:48:00 PM | Men's Basketball
Syracuse head coach Jim Boeheim held a press conference on Wednesday afternoon to provide his thoughts on the team's final game on Saturday at North Carolina State and the soon-to-be-completed season.
While reflecting on the season, he noted the impact of freshman forward Chris McCullough's injury on the team's success, as well as the loss of center DaJuan Coleman for the entire season. Those two injuries, along with the departure of C.J. Fair, Jerami Grant and Tyler Ennis from last year's team, made the year especially challenging.
Here are some of Coach Boeheim's comments:
Opening Statement
"I was maybe not as clear the other night in assessing the end of the year that this team has really, in my mind, accomplished a tremendous year. To get to 18 wins, I'm as proud of this team as I am of last year's team when we won 29 games. I think this team has had to dig through a lot of difficult moments. They've been in a lot of very, very difficult games against very good basketball teams.
"I think now, even from the start of the year, Iowa was going to be an NCAA tournament team. Nobody ever mentions that we beat a ranked team early in the year, which we did. Iowa will be an NCAA team. I think Louisiana Tech will be an NCAA team when all is said and done. In their kind of league playoffs you never know, but they certainly deserve to be an NCAA team. Obviously the wins we had at Notre Dame and the win we had here against Louisville were tremendous wins. When you beat teams late in the year who have so much to play for and we have nothing to play for except pride, those are great wins.
"You look at the teams we lost to and I think obviously we know we could have won some of those games. But St. John's should be an NCAA tournament team. I think that if California hadn't had a major injury to their best player, they would be too. Obviously, Villanova is going to be a tournament team, probably a number one seed, and we're 10 seconds away from winning that game, which we were very disappointed to lose.
"The teams in the conference -- Â when you beat a bottom team you don't get a lot of credit, and that's probably true. But Boston College beat NC State, who's going to be in the tournament, up there by 16 points. Those games, when you win them everybody says, 'Well you're supposed to win them,' but they're not that easy. Boston College in fact beat us last year. Those wins were good wins and I don't think we'd ever say that we're going to be satisfied with having 18 wins, nine wins in the conference with one game to play. I don't think that's something in normal circumstances that we would be happy with.
"When we lost Chris McCullough we lost such a key factor, I think, for a guy that would have really had an effect on both ends of the court, not just offensively but defensively as well. I believe he would have progressed, he would've gotten to be a much better player and he would've made a difference for our basketball team. That was a devastating loss, and obviously everybody knows about the guys we lost from last year. Again, I think this group has done everything we've asked them to do.
"Michael Gbinije had to play three positions and that's difficult in college basketball to play more than one. Most guys don't. Very few people play more than one position and almost nobody plays a frontcourt position and a backcourt position. Guys that play two positions are usually a center and a forward or a point guard and a two guard, normally. There's very few, and I'm not going to even think back to who we've had, who we've asked to play the point and play a frontcourt position. That's very difficult to do. He's persevered through all of that.
"Rakeem (Christmas) has had to go from being a role player to being the best player on our team and to being one of the best players in the conference, which I believe he is. I think you have to also look at numbers. People say, 'Well he had just 10 points in his final game.' He was double teamed on every possession by the best defensive team in the country. To get 10 points is really stretching it in that situation. They didn't play him straight up and he had 10 points. To show you how effective he is, when Pittsburgh played him straight up he had 25 and they doubled him here all the time and he had whatever it was, eight or 10. If you double team somebody every play, which he's been getting double teamed for the vast majority of time in the conference, but to put up those numbers is incredible.
"One of the reasons we won 18 games is that other guys get great opportunities in that scenario.
"Unfortunately, in some cases we didn't take full advantage of that in the other positions as we just didn't make enough shots. I think if you're a college basketball team, and Virginia is a tremendous defensive basketball team, but if you get 19 or 20 threes that are open threes, a couple might have been a little tough but not really, you need to be able to make six or seven of those. We were not able to do that in that game and certainly in the Duke game. That's just something that we have to get better at in the future. We have to shoot better.
"You take Mike's (Gbinije) run of three or four games in the conference, we were at the bottom of the three-point shooting teams in the league anyway, but if you take Mike's run out we were the worst three-point shooting team in the league, and we were, I believe, the worst free-throw shooting team in the league. We had issues on offense. Our defense tried to make up for it, and did in some circumstances, but not enough. We probably have offensive statistics for a team that is 4-14 (in the conference) at the end of the year.
"We've been able to get to nine wins and again, I'm pointing this out because I didn't want to leave anybody with the impression that I didn't feel this team accomplished what they could or more than they could accomplish. I think you have to wait until the end of the season to see what a team is. You have to predict things in the beginning, but I think with the circumstances this team has faced, especially losing Chris McCullough and the loss of DaJuan Coleman, who we thought had a pretty realistic chance since October that he would be able to play this year, this team has certainly accomplished a lot.
"I believe Rakeem has accomplished as much as any player -- in terms of his improvements and what he did for his team -- as much as any player that we've ever had here at Syracuse. You can argue about, pick any name you want, and his impact on his team, not just the points, the rebounds, the blocks shots, which are very substantial, but the double teams he drew which got guys really good looks at the basket. There's not a statistical category, really, for that, but there's no question that that's what occurred. Again, I'm very proud of this team and especially of Rakeem Christmas."
How do you see Rakeem's game translating to the next level?
"I believe they need big guys. My experience working with NBA players, when they're looking for fives and fours, there's not a lot of fives and fours. I think he has the ability to play both positions in the NBA. I think he can guard both positions. I think he can rebound well enough to play at an NBA level. I think his offense is continuing to improve.
"From my experience and from talking to NBA people, they would like scoring, but they feel like they have enough scorers with the way the NBA game has changed, with guards, more perimeter guys, point guards scoring 25-30 points per game, it's a different world today in the NBA. Chris Paul, Kyrie Irving, James Harden, brings the ball up, play the point, these guys are 25-30 point per game scorers, and I just mentioned a couple. Kyle Lowry is like that. You could go up and down the list. I think they're looking for big guys who can play defense, rebound, and run the court. Rakeem can do that as well as anybody."
Was the way Rakeem played this year something that you saw when you were recruiting him?
"We loved him as an athlete. I felt that he had to work on his offensive game, and he has. It's fairly normal, when you look at big guys. Arinze Onuaku really struggled his first two years here, got better his junior year and had a great senior year. Etan Thomas struggled his first couple of years here and got better. It's not unusual for big guys.
"You can look at Zach Auguste at Notre Dame. The first two years he was not a factor and now he's a pretty good player this year. I think next year he will be real good, and he's not really a center. He's more of a forward. I think with centers, generally speaking, it takes a little time to get to where you need to get to, and Rakeem is there."
What challenges do NC State present on Saturday?
"The hardest part of this game is that its their last home game, which is always tough, and the fact that they're trying to get into the tournament. That's a factor, there's no question about that. The other factor is that when they've needed to win, which they now know. They went to Clemson and won by 15 or 16 points. We got beat by 15 or 16 points at Clemson. It's obvious that they're ready.
"When they're ready, they beat North Carolina on the road, which not many people do, and they beat Louisville and they beat Duke. When they're ready to play they're as good as anybody in the leauge. They'll be ready to play. The tenth game of the year you might go in there and they might not be, but they're going to be ready to play.
I think their team is better this year. They beat us in the tournament last year but I think their team is better this year because of Lacey and Turner. They're two great shooters. Barber was a sub last year, he's now one of the best point guards in the league. Anya has jumped up, way up, and their other big guys too.
I think they're a team that can make a run not only in the ACC tournament but in the NCAA tournament. They're a tournament-type team because they can really score. All three of their guards have got 25 points in a game this year. Not many teams have three guards that have done that.
If you're going to play you're last game, you might as well have it be a great challenge. This is a great challenge and we're getting ready for it."
While reflecting on the season, he noted the impact of freshman forward Chris McCullough's injury on the team's success, as well as the loss of center DaJuan Coleman for the entire season. Those two injuries, along with the departure of C.J. Fair, Jerami Grant and Tyler Ennis from last year's team, made the year especially challenging.
Here are some of Coach Boeheim's comments:
Opening Statement
"I was maybe not as clear the other night in assessing the end of the year that this team has really, in my mind, accomplished a tremendous year. To get to 18 wins, I'm as proud of this team as I am of last year's team when we won 29 games. I think this team has had to dig through a lot of difficult moments. They've been in a lot of very, very difficult games against very good basketball teams.
"I think now, even from the start of the year, Iowa was going to be an NCAA tournament team. Nobody ever mentions that we beat a ranked team early in the year, which we did. Iowa will be an NCAA team. I think Louisiana Tech will be an NCAA team when all is said and done. In their kind of league playoffs you never know, but they certainly deserve to be an NCAA team. Obviously the wins we had at Notre Dame and the win we had here against Louisville were tremendous wins. When you beat teams late in the year who have so much to play for and we have nothing to play for except pride, those are great wins.
"You look at the teams we lost to and I think obviously we know we could have won some of those games. But St. John's should be an NCAA tournament team. I think that if California hadn't had a major injury to their best player, they would be too. Obviously, Villanova is going to be a tournament team, probably a number one seed, and we're 10 seconds away from winning that game, which we were very disappointed to lose.
"The teams in the conference -- Â when you beat a bottom team you don't get a lot of credit, and that's probably true. But Boston College beat NC State, who's going to be in the tournament, up there by 16 points. Those games, when you win them everybody says, 'Well you're supposed to win them,' but they're not that easy. Boston College in fact beat us last year. Those wins were good wins and I don't think we'd ever say that we're going to be satisfied with having 18 wins, nine wins in the conference with one game to play. I don't think that's something in normal circumstances that we would be happy with.
"When we lost Chris McCullough we lost such a key factor, I think, for a guy that would have really had an effect on both ends of the court, not just offensively but defensively as well. I believe he would have progressed, he would've gotten to be a much better player and he would've made a difference for our basketball team. That was a devastating loss, and obviously everybody knows about the guys we lost from last year. Again, I think this group has done everything we've asked them to do.
"Michael Gbinije had to play three positions and that's difficult in college basketball to play more than one. Most guys don't. Very few people play more than one position and almost nobody plays a frontcourt position and a backcourt position. Guys that play two positions are usually a center and a forward or a point guard and a two guard, normally. There's very few, and I'm not going to even think back to who we've had, who we've asked to play the point and play a frontcourt position. That's very difficult to do. He's persevered through all of that.
"Rakeem (Christmas) has had to go from being a role player to being the best player on our team and to being one of the best players in the conference, which I believe he is. I think you have to also look at numbers. People say, 'Well he had just 10 points in his final game.' He was double teamed on every possession by the best defensive team in the country. To get 10 points is really stretching it in that situation. They didn't play him straight up and he had 10 points. To show you how effective he is, when Pittsburgh played him straight up he had 25 and they doubled him here all the time and he had whatever it was, eight or 10. If you double team somebody every play, which he's been getting double teamed for the vast majority of time in the conference, but to put up those numbers is incredible.
"One of the reasons we won 18 games is that other guys get great opportunities in that scenario.
"Unfortunately, in some cases we didn't take full advantage of that in the other positions as we just didn't make enough shots. I think if you're a college basketball team, and Virginia is a tremendous defensive basketball team, but if you get 19 or 20 threes that are open threes, a couple might have been a little tough but not really, you need to be able to make six or seven of those. We were not able to do that in that game and certainly in the Duke game. That's just something that we have to get better at in the future. We have to shoot better.
"You take Mike's (Gbinije) run of three or four games in the conference, we were at the bottom of the three-point shooting teams in the league anyway, but if you take Mike's run out we were the worst three-point shooting team in the league, and we were, I believe, the worst free-throw shooting team in the league. We had issues on offense. Our defense tried to make up for it, and did in some circumstances, but not enough. We probably have offensive statistics for a team that is 4-14 (in the conference) at the end of the year.
"We've been able to get to nine wins and again, I'm pointing this out because I didn't want to leave anybody with the impression that I didn't feel this team accomplished what they could or more than they could accomplish. I think you have to wait until the end of the season to see what a team is. You have to predict things in the beginning, but I think with the circumstances this team has faced, especially losing Chris McCullough and the loss of DaJuan Coleman, who we thought had a pretty realistic chance since October that he would be able to play this year, this team has certainly accomplished a lot.
"I believe Rakeem has accomplished as much as any player -- in terms of his improvements and what he did for his team -- as much as any player that we've ever had here at Syracuse. You can argue about, pick any name you want, and his impact on his team, not just the points, the rebounds, the blocks shots, which are very substantial, but the double teams he drew which got guys really good looks at the basket. There's not a statistical category, really, for that, but there's no question that that's what occurred. Again, I'm very proud of this team and especially of Rakeem Christmas."
How do you see Rakeem's game translating to the next level?
"I believe they need big guys. My experience working with NBA players, when they're looking for fives and fours, there's not a lot of fives and fours. I think he has the ability to play both positions in the NBA. I think he can guard both positions. I think he can rebound well enough to play at an NBA level. I think his offense is continuing to improve.
"From my experience and from talking to NBA people, they would like scoring, but they feel like they have enough scorers with the way the NBA game has changed, with guards, more perimeter guys, point guards scoring 25-30 points per game, it's a different world today in the NBA. Chris Paul, Kyrie Irving, James Harden, brings the ball up, play the point, these guys are 25-30 point per game scorers, and I just mentioned a couple. Kyle Lowry is like that. You could go up and down the list. I think they're looking for big guys who can play defense, rebound, and run the court. Rakeem can do that as well as anybody."
Was the way Rakeem played this year something that you saw when you were recruiting him?
"We loved him as an athlete. I felt that he had to work on his offensive game, and he has. It's fairly normal, when you look at big guys. Arinze Onuaku really struggled his first two years here, got better his junior year and had a great senior year. Etan Thomas struggled his first couple of years here and got better. It's not unusual for big guys.
"You can look at Zach Auguste at Notre Dame. The first two years he was not a factor and now he's a pretty good player this year. I think next year he will be real good, and he's not really a center. He's more of a forward. I think with centers, generally speaking, it takes a little time to get to where you need to get to, and Rakeem is there."
What challenges do NC State present on Saturday?
"The hardest part of this game is that its their last home game, which is always tough, and the fact that they're trying to get into the tournament. That's a factor, there's no question about that. The other factor is that when they've needed to win, which they now know. They went to Clemson and won by 15 or 16 points. We got beat by 15 or 16 points at Clemson. It's obvious that they're ready.
"When they're ready, they beat North Carolina on the road, which not many people do, and they beat Louisville and they beat Duke. When they're ready to play they're as good as anybody in the leauge. They'll be ready to play. The tenth game of the year you might go in there and they might not be, but they're going to be ready to play.
I think their team is better this year. They beat us in the tournament last year but I think their team is better this year because of Lacey and Turner. They're two great shooters. Barber was a sub last year, he's now one of the best point guards in the league. Anya has jumped up, way up, and their other big guys too.
I think they're a team that can make a run not only in the ACC tournament but in the NCAA tournament. They're a tournament-type team because they can really score. All three of their guards have got 25 points in a game this year. Not many teams have three guards that have done that.
If you're going to play you're last game, you might as well have it be a great challenge. This is a great challenge and we're getting ready for it."
Players Mentioned
F
/ Men's Basketball
F
/ Men's Basketball
G
/ Men's Basketball
F
/ Men's Basketball
F
/ Men's Basketball
F
/ Men's BasketballThe McNamERA Begins
Tuesday, March 31
Gerry McNamara Interview
Tuesday, March 31
The McNamERA Begins!
Monday, March 30
Bryan Blair | Gerry McNamara Welcome Event
Monday, March 30
