Murray State University Athletics
Cronin addresses press conference
1/17/2006 6:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
ON EASTERN ILLINOIS LOSS: We shot 31 threes. You're not going to win when you shoot 31 threes and you don't have guys on your team named (Samford's J. Robert and Joe Ross) Merritt. At least, not us. The last time I checked, we didn't have anyone named Joe Ross or J. Robert on this team. But, we just continue to fire them away when guys are wide open under the rim. It's kind of discouraging. I thought we had graduated from that after the Southern Illinois loss.
ON WHAT CAUSES THE TEAM'S THREE-POINT ATTEMPTS: Over-confidence. Lack of attention to detail. All things that come from a five-game winning streak. Young kids, immaturity. Getting happy, forgetting why you started to getting back on a winning streak in the first place. Lack of an understanding of what got you your previous five wins. It all goes back to just taking the easy way out. The easy way out is just to shoot it. The easy way out is to try to run under screens and let (Eastern Illinois guard) Bobby Catchings shoot wide-open threes. The hard way is to guard him, and not let him get open and chase him. If you take the easy way out on both ends of the floor, you're going to get beat.
As a coach, you have to tell your guys to come ready to play every night, and that's all you try to preach. You try to point out other scores in college basketball, and sometimes it falls on deaf ears. The tape doesn't lie. If you're open (for a three-pointer), and a guy is open two feet from the rim, you have to pass it to the guy two feet under the rim. When you don't execute on offense -- you stand around, and you miss a screen, and you miss another screen, and miss another screen -- you don't get the ball in the high post. You just keep circling the wagons and then you have to get a shot off.
Did we miss some open shots? Yeah, but the film doesn't lie. We stood around, didn't execute what we practiced, and ended up with tough 20-footers. You're going to lose when you do that. And then when you have opportunities to pass the ball inside, you pass them up. The bottom line is, we don't see people because we're not looking for them. Everybody wants to be a hero and make a big shot instead of being a hero and making the extra pass and understanding that you need to get the ball inside and get the big guys touches against a zone. It's fool's gold. It's why people play zone, and hope you take the bait, and we took it. That's why people pack it in, whether it's zone or man.
ON IMPROVING ON CONSISTENCY: I haven't seen (Tennessee-Martin) play all year, not even against anybody on film. Our opponent is ourselves right now. We're not improving. We've been out-rebounded over the last six games. Our field-goal percentage defense is higher over the last six games than it has been all season. You're supposed to get better at execution, not worse.
Tennessee-Martin is big. I'll be honest, I know earlier in the year they were playing a big lineup, and (Tennessee-Martin head coach) Bret (Campbell)'s a friend of mine, but I don't even know what kind of lineup he's been starting lately. That will be a challenge for us, the way we're rebounding the basketball. I know they play zone; they've been known to play some zone, so that could be a factor as well. I haven't seen (Jeremy) Kelly play in two years, and (Jared) Newson's a great athlete; they're big and athletic. I've been hearing about how they have a lot of fouls called in their games, so I guess with a bigger lineup, they are more physical in their games.
They have a big game Thursday (at Austin Peay), so maybe that will be an advantage for us. We have to develop some consistency; that's our issue. Numerous individuals on our team have inconsistent practice habits, therefore they have inconsistent games, inconsistent effort and inconsistent attention to detail. We have one guy that's pretty much been a consistent player all year, and that's Shawn Witherspoon. It's usually he and two others. You guys watch the games. It's a wonder: one guy plays well for a week, and then you can't find him. It's tough from a coaching standpoint because you don't know who you can count on in certain situations.
