Jan. 29, 2000

Notre Dame head coach Matt Doherty

On the game:
“St. John’s missed some shots, but we were there to rebound them. I took Matt (Carroll) out early in the second half because he wasn’t hanging around to rebound, but he got a couple big boards late in the game. We knocked down our foul shots. I was afraid we got a little tentative with about 5 or 6 minutes to go. We still needed to score. We had to put the ball in the basket and then we got aggressive again.”

“I thought we did a good job of moving the basketball. In the second half, we cut down on the turnovers, and that was a big key.”

“It was a big win. We needed another shot in the arm.”

On the crowd support:
“I thought the students and the fans were great. They gave us an extra boost when we needed one.”

“We have to know how to win big games at home. I waved the students on because I wanted to educate them. I wanted them to storm the court when we beat St. John’s because they were a large part of this win.”

“They are a big, big part of this program and we could not have won this game without them.”

On the play of Jimmy Dillon:
“Jimmy (Dillon) went a little showtime on us with the dunk.”

“That was a big steal. We were sitting back in a zone at their mercy a little bit. Jimmy’s a gutsy kid. That’s why he played the whole second half. He looked at me after that dunk because I told him if he dunked it, it better go through the hoop. I don’t want any to come back through.”

On Troy Murphy:
“We can’t take him for granted. He got 30 points and 18 rebounds in a big game. He was awesome tonight.

Notre Dame Player Quotes

Guard Jimmy Dillon

On his steal and three point play at the end of the game
“I tried to anticipate and I got my hand on (the ball) and what happened happened”

“It opened things up and ended up being a key part of the game.”

On the NCAA Tournament
“I don’t think it is out of reach. We’ve had many key wins and a couple of losses to some good teams. Right now each game is important and we are focused on winning the BIG EAST. “

On preparation for today’s game
“Coach talked about getting our mindframe together. We had a couple of tough losses. We had to get our mindset together and that is hard to do.”

Forward Troy Murphy

On Dillon’s play at the end of the game
“Jimmy is a great guy with a tremendous heart. He’s got some nerve though. He’s had many breakaways and has always laid it up. He surprised me with a dunk. It was a big play and really got the crowd into it.”

On getting a big win at home
“It is great to get a win at home, especially after the Miami game. The fans really helped us out with this game. The students were there for us and we rallied around them.”

Guard Matt Carroll

On playing to win
“We knew that we could win this game and we played that way. The bottom line was that we were not going to lose this game.”

On the mood in the timeout with 3:30 left in the game
“Coach was telling us to start picking it up and to calm down. Then I came out and got the ball and was open and took the shot and made it.”

St. John’s Head Coach Mike Jarvis Quotes

On losing to Notre Dame:
We lost to a team that has beaten some pretty good people so we’re in some pretty good company as far as victims. Maybe we’ll get to play them again before this is all done.

On the game:
Unfortunately for us, Notre Dame took advantage of the opportunities when they were presented, whereas we didn’t. They deserved it. As much as we would have liked to win the game, I certainly would never take anything away from the opposition because all these kids played hard. Notre Dame made some big plays when they had to and they won another big game.

On taking 29 three-point goal attempts:
(It was) totally out of character. I’ve always felt that the three-point shot is fool’s gold and tonight we went after the fool’s gold. Our game is attacking the basket, regardless of what type of defense the opponent is playing. The only time we want to shoot threes is off of good penetration or good ball movement. Other than that, at least in our program, the three is not a shot that we’re going to live by because most of the time, just like tonight, we die by it.

On going into Monday’s game with Syracuse after losing three out of four games:
I think it’s fantastic. I just told the guys, “I have a pretty good idea how Moses felt when he was in the wilderness for 40 years and we’ve only been in the wilderness for a couple of days so a couple more days isn’t going to hurt us.” I really feel the guys will go out and play as hard as they can, no matter if we win or not.

On Troy Murphy:
Murphy is a great player. He’s a hell of a basketball player and he can do so many different things in so many different ways to beat you, whether it be scoring or passing. He’s an exceptional basketball player and an unbelievable competitor and he’s having an All-American year.

St. John’s Lavor Postell Quotes
“We’re playing at Notre Dame, they have a good team, they have a great player (Murphy) so it’s going to be a close game. We give up a couple inches on them but we got back in the game, but then one play turned the whole game around, that one play.”

On the three pointer: “That’s not our game right there. When we win the most we might take is ten, at the most. And we just got out of our game today. Our game plan is to get it inside, attack gaps, kick it out, but we didn’t do that tonight. The result is that we took twenty-nine threes.”

On St. John’s giving up late runs near the end of recent games: “We’re losing some tough games, and like last year when we lost tough games early. But you learn from games like this. You hate losing but the main thing is we learn from our mistakes and hopefully get into our game plan on Monday.”

On the impending trip to Syracuse: “We lost, we’re upset right now but by tomorrow we’ll just get it out of our system. We just had a team meeting and we feel bad today, we should have won the game, we gave it away but we played hard and still could have won. So be upset tonight, and tomorrow morning we get it out of our system. We’ve got another game to play on Monday. At the meeting it was give and take, but like I said be upset right now, we know we should have won the game but its over.”

“They (Notre Dame) played a good game out there, I’m going to give them credit but we just didn’t get into our game plan today. We just didn’t play St. John’s basketball out there today.”

“Hopefully we’ll get the team together tonight, only players to discuss some things and get back on track to winning. You go through you rough stages in life, right now this is our rough stage. We’ll just have to get back on track on Monday. We had the same thing last year when we lost some tough ones, but then we turned around and went to the Elit e Eight when people doubted we would make the tournament. We shocked a lot of people and hopefully we can do the same thing this year. We just have to get back on the right track, stay focused.”

“Murphy’s a great player, I just wish I was 6’8″ or 6’10” so I could really body up on him. But I can’t make excuses he’s a great player, one of the best in the nation and I have to give him credit.”