Full disclosure: we were not up in Brooklyn today and will be there tomorrow, but we get interview transcripts emailed to us, so here are the remarks from today's player press conference. First of two parts since there's a 1,000-character limit on the boards.
Q. Question for Quenton and Jaylen. You guys at the beginning of this season had a lot of opportunities for high profile victories but didn't come up with wins in any of them, and then at the end of December, beginning of January, you started to cash in on those opportunities. What changed the arc of your season in your mind?
JAYLEN BOND: Just our focus. You know, like you said, we lost a couple of close games earlier in the season. So we went back to the drawing board and tried to focus on the team concepts, playing hard to help motivate us toward the end of the season.
QUENTON DECOSEY: I just think playing against those big teams early really helped prepare us for later in the season when we played against some other great teams, and we found a way to get some wins.
Q. Quenton, this is for you. How much do those road wins help you early in the season get to this point now? How much did that help you in the tournament?
QUENTON DECOSEY: It helped us a lot. It helped our team, knowing that we could win on the road against great teams, and I think it really brought us together as a team. Whenever we'd get down in the stretch or it's a close game, we found a way to come together as a team and figure it out.
Q. This is for Devin, Jaylen, and Devontae. To have Fran Dunphy as your coach, growing up, as a Philadelphia legend, I'm just curious what you guys heard, sort of your first impressions of Coach Dunphy and what your impressions were when you finally got to meet him.
DEVONTAE WATSON: I was told that he's a great coach, an honorable coach, and a great human being. From now, as long as I've known him, everything checked out. He's been a great guy, a great mentor, a good person to have by your side. Grateful for having a coach like that.
JAYLEN BOND: Like Devontae said, hearing a lot of stories growing up about him, how great of a guy he was, on and off the court, he's always going to be honest with you. He's going to tell you what you don't want to hear. It helps you to turn boys into men, and that's what he did.
DEVIN COLEMAN: Just to piggy-back off what those guys said, obviously, coming up in Philadelphia, he was a guy that a lot of us were really familiar with. Like these guys said, I heard a lot of the positive things -- he's a straight shooter, keep honest with you, and everything like that. He's a really nice guy. When I went for my recruiting trips and everything like that. But then when you watch a practice, you see he starts to get into guys a little bit, but that's a good thing. That's what you want as a player.
So I think that he's everything that you would ask for in a coach.
Q. This is for Jaylen, Devin, and Quenton. What kind of problems does Iowa present from what you've seen on tape from the Hawkeyes?
JAYLEN BOND: They're a great team all around. They have a couple great shooters for them. They also have a big guy inside. So that's going to be a tough matchup for us, and we're looking forward to it.
DEVIN COLEMAN: I think one of the things we'll have to limit most will be the transition baskets. We have plenty of clips on our film where the other team would score and they'd show the person that scored on the other team's bench, and when they went back to game action, they were already down the court scoring. So I think one of the most important things for us will be getting back in transition and make sure we locate those shooters.
QUENTON DECOSEY: Basically, everything these guys just said, transition, and they got two really good players that we've got to try to limit. They were a top 25 team for most of the season. They're going to be a pretty good team. I think we'll come out ready to play.
Q. Quenton, could you tell me how you guys were so thrilled to get there and everything, how you put that aside and get ready for this game now.
QUENTON DECOSEY: After we found out we were in the tournament, all that is behind you. You've got to prepare for the first opponent that we're going to play, which is Iowa. So the past several days, that's what we've been doing, just preparing for them and trying to get ready for Friday.
Q. Quenton and Devin, anyone you guys have faced that remind you of Iowa's Peter Jok and Jarrod Uthoff that you guys have been able to go up against this year and how would you match up against them?
DEVIN COLEMAN: I can't think of anyone off the top of my head that I think resembles those two guys, but like we've been saying, they're good players, and it's going to be a challenge to stop them. With Jok, we've got to make sure we chase him around all of those screens, make sure we limit the amount of good looks that he gets. And Uthoff, he's a good all-around player. So we've just got to try to limit him in any way possible.
QUENTON DECOSEY: Same. I can't really think of anyone either, but like Devin said, we've just got to try to limit their touches and try to contain those two.
Q. This is for Jaylen. I wanted to ask, technically speaking, what is it about your foul shots that you sort of describe what you need to work on? Besides repetition. Is there technical things that you focus on there?
JAYLEN BOND: I just get in focus mode every time I get to the line. Don't worry about missing, just focus on making them.
Q. Jaylen and Devin, as Philly kids, what do you remember about Temple basketball growing up? When you get there, do you feel like you want to get it to that place that it was when you were a kid?
JAYLEN BOND: What I remember is it was a tough, defensive minded team when I was growing up. That's something that I wanted to bring here when I came to Temple, just be a tough defensive player and make it hard for the offense to score.
DEVIN COLEMAN: I remember Temple being, obviously, an all around good team. A lot of the years when I was coming up, when I was starting to get into college basketball, Temple was typically a top 25 team. So just knowing that, always knowing the history, and obviously being from Philadelphia, I know a little more of the history, like the sixth winningest program in college basketball and everything like that. It's just a great tradition.
So to be a part of it is great, and to be a part of the team that got Temple back to the NCAA Tournament is a wonderful thing.
Q. Just curious, jumping off of that point, even having Villanova here in the bracket and thinking in those terms, does it feel almost like a parochial battle here, like an opportunity for, not just a chance to advance and win some games in the NCAA Tournament, but to sort of strike a blow for Philadelphia basketball as well?
DEVIN COLEMAN: I don't know if anyone is looking at a day. I think we're taking it one step at a time and just trying to focus on what we have in front of us. Right now we have Iowa in front of us on Friday. That's all we're getting prepared for with our film work, our practice plans, and everything like that. It's just all focus for that game because we know, if we don't win that, there is no moving on. So take it one step at a time and focus on what we have right in front of us, and hopefully that plays out well for us.
Q. Devin and Jaylen, you guys have been very successful in games decided by five points or less. What attributes would you say that's contributed to that?
JAYLEN BOND: Just staying together as a team, not getting down on each other. Just taking care of the little details, if it's rebounding, boxing out, just keeping guys out of the lane. Just staying together and staying as a team.
DEVIN COLEMAN: Yeah, I would agree with that. Something that Quenton alluded to earlier. Just when we get down maybe or we get into those tight stretches, we may come out of a time-out or something, we'll gather up together and just make sure that we know we all have to do it together. There's no five-point shot or anything like that. So we have to stay together defensively and offensively in order to get everything that we want to accomplish done.
