Coach Boeheim Press Conference-3/11/07
Coach Jim Boeheim Press Conference Quotes
March 11, 2007
Manley Fieldhouse - Syracuse, N.Y.
Opening Statement
“Obviously we are disappointed. We finished 10-6 in the league, which is fifth place, and we thought that would be enough, but the committee didn’t agree with us. There is nothing we can do about that. I know in our league, a 10-6 team has never not gotten into the NCAA Tournament. Obviously, the players, coaches, we are all tremendously disappointed. I felt we played well at the end of the year, went 7-3 in our last 10 games. We were the only team to beat Georgetown in the last 16 games they played. We had four road wins in the league. A lot of teams in the tournament only won one road game in their leagues. You look at the numbers and it’s hard to believe, but you look at Drexel, Kansas State, Air Force, Missouri State, they are all feeling the same way. We’ll get ready to practice tomorrow and play in the NIT this week and do the best that we can do to play in that tournament.”
On when during the announcement he thought Syracuse might not get in:
“I’m always worried, I am never sure about anything. I’ve been thinking all week that something might happen and we might not get in. We won the BIG EAST Tournament one year and didn’t get into the NCAA Tournament. It’s happened to us a couple of times. It seems that when we leave it up to the committee, we have not gotten in. There’s been two or three times we were not guaranteed to get in and we did not get in.”
On his feelings towards the players:
“I feel bad for the whole team. They all put the work in to get to where we ended up. I think with our league, and I have said this since we went to 16 teams, we are not going to get more than six or seven teams in. If we had two eight-team leagues, we would have gotten eight teams in, but we are in a 16 team league so there is nothing we can do about that. We are going to beat each other some of the time. I think West Virginia is a tournament team. Arkansas was 7-9 in the weakest part of their conference. If winning games in a major conference doesn’t get you in, then I’m not sure what does get you in.”
On whether the unbalanced BIG EAST schedule affected them:
“Our schedule is one of the top three or four schedules in the league. I think it was fourth, actually. We played Villanova twice, Notre Dame twice and we played all the top six teams. Of the bottom four teams, we only played three of them and we played them all once. Our strength of schedule overall was 46th, which is better than some teams and worse than others. Within the conference, we had one of the stronger schedules.”
On his team going 5-5 against teams in the NCAA Tournament:
“I know we won five games against teams in the field and there are teams in the field that didn’t do that.”
On whether or not he has talked to anyone from the selection committee:
“No. What’s done is done, and there is nothing we can do about it. I have said what I am going to say and I’ll say the same over the next few weeks or months. We were 10-6 in the BIG EAST, we won at Marquette, we won at Providence, we won four conference road games, and we beat the best team in the conference by 12 points late in the year. I thought if you look at our overall season it was better than some in the tournament.”
On what was behind the selection committee’s decision:
“I don’t know. I have no idea what went on in that room. I know we were fifth in the BIG EAST and two teams behind us are in. There’s not much we can do about it. I have no way of understanding why we are not in. I don’t agree with all the experts, but every single expert had us in. Every single one, even out local expert, (Doug) Gottlieb had us in. No one, of all these people who prognosticate these things, had Syracuse out of the tournament. No one even had us on the bubble.”
On what not being selected means:
“I think it means that the committee thinks that Arkansas, Illinois, and Texas Tech are better than us. They picked the 34 best teams and I thin their opinion is that those teams are better than us.”
On if a non-league road game would have helped Syracuse:
I don’t know. We’d still be 10-6 in the league, so if you look at a non-league win, I don’t see how that would make any difference. If 10-6 in the BIG EAST isn’t good enough to get us in, then I don’t think we should be in the BIG EAST. That’s the way I look at it. We are the only team in BIG EAST history who hasn’t gotten into the NCAA Tournament. I imagine we are one of the few, if not the only team, to win 10 games in a BCS conference and not get in.”
On the difficulty of preparing for an NIT game:
“It’ll be tough. The players are disappointed, they are young kids. I expect they are going to be very disappointed. The NIT will be a very good field, we will have a difficult game. You’re playing somebody that could be just as good as somebody in the NCAA Tournament. That’s what we have to be prepared for. It will be a tremendous challenge. Our four seniors have been in the tournament every year, so that will be difficult to adjust to. It’s not like they were in the NCAA one year, then the NIT. The NCAA Tournament is all they know. It will be very difficult for them to get geared up for the NIT.”
