Indiana’s NCAA Tournament gets underway on Friday against 13-seeded Kent State. The Hoosiers are looking to advance past the Round of 64 for the first time since 2016.
The Golden Flashes are 28-6 overall and winners of the MAC. They are looking for their first tournament win since 2002 when they advanced to the Elite Eight before falling to Indiana.
Here are some of the key quotes from Kent State head coach Rob Senderoff and players Sincere Carry, Miryne Thomas and Malique Jacobs ahead of Friday night’s matchups.
SEE ALSO: Everything Indiana basketball said previewing Kent State
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Q. We were talking to Indiana. They kept talking about your defense and how impressed they were with it. What is it about your defense that makes it so good? And just how much do you guys pride yourself on really doing well without the ball? Any of you can answer it.
SINCERE CARRY: I think we just play hard and play through a lot of mistakes. If somebody gets beat on a dribble or we mess up a ball screen, we can pick up for somebody else’s mistake. But just communicate and play hard. Playing hard is the recipe to our great defense.
MIRYNE THOMAS: I would add to that that the tenacity of our defense and covering for each other, that really keeps us together. It keeps us as one.
Q. How much confidence do you guys get from your close losses earlier in the year to Gonzaga and Houston? Do you feel you’re better prepared now having gone through the conference schedule to face a bigger team like Indiana?
MALIQUE JACOBS: I think the close wins that we got and the close losses, the close games, it helped us out to stay composed during the last three minutes of the game. It’s a big part of us being here right now.
Q. You guys feel like you can play a little bit looser being the underdog, like there’s a little less pressure on you?
MALIQUE JACOBS: The way we play is play loose, play Kent State basketball. So we play Kent State basketball, we’ll make a good run.
MIRYNE THOMAS: I think the statistics speak for themselves, but our track record, this history also speaks for itself. So we might be an underdog lower seed coming into these games, but we know face to face we’re just as good as those higher seeds. So we’re excited to get to play.
THE MODERATOR: In a few moments we’ll have Kent State Head Coach Rob Senderoff.
We’re joined by Kent State Head Coach Rob Senderoff. Any questions, we’ll open it up.
Q. Coach, obviously the storyline, facing Indiana again, for you for the first time. Talk about going back into that challenge alone. You’ve been a coach there, so you know the challenges of being on that side and on this side now. Talk about that in itself.
ROB SENDEROFF: I mean, it’s an unbelievable program and an unbelievable team that we’re playing against tomorrow night. I have an incredible amount of respect for all the players on that roster, Trayce Jackson-Davis being one of the best in the country. Jalen Hood-Schifino being one of the unique talents in the country.
And Coach Woodson’s done a tremendous job, him and his staff, of playing in one of the best conferences in the league and having as much success as they’ve had.
So it’s certainly a big challenge for us tomorrow night, but one that we’re really excited about.
Q. One of the questions Indiana fans still have from your time at Indiana is like why did you guys do what you did that got IU put on probation? Can you kind of just take the fans through what happened, what the thinking was at that point in time?
ROB SENDEROFF: Quite honestly, I’m happy to answer that maybe at another time. I really think that the NCAA Tournament, it’s about the three guys that were up here from Kent, those players and their stories. The kids from IU that have tremendous stories as well and have been through whatever they’ve been through throughout their careers.
I feel like that’s what the tournament is about. It’s not about Rob Senderoff or what happened 20 years ago. As much as it’s about Sincere Carry and how did he make it to this point and how has Jalen Hood-Schifino developed as a player this year.
Respectfully, I’d be happy to talk to you about it at another time, but I really feel like the tournament, wasting that time on me is really not where I want to go today.
Q. You guys have been — really sort of made your name on defense. Your ball pressure, your ability to force turnovers. How do you balance not wanting to change what you do and wanting to just stay true to your identity when you face a player like Trayce Jackson-Davis that just kind of has the gravitational pull and the passing range he has out of the paint?
ROB SENDEROFF: It’s a great question and a heck of a challenge. He’s such a good player that, if you just do one thing against him, you’re going to be in trouble because he’s going to figure it out. He’s that good.
So we do have to create some turnovers, as you mentioned. They have tremendous size and physicality, IU does. And we’re going to have to stay true to who we are as a team. We got here because of how well we’ve defended and how many turnovers we’ve created over the course of the season, and we’re going to have to do a great job of that tomorrow night to have any chance against one of the best teams in the country.
Q. Two-part question. It’s kind of both how they relate on the floor. Your defense, why is it so good? What is it that really causes teams fits? Second question is on Sincere and how his game translates, especially on a level like this.
ROB SENDEROFF: How we defend is really there’s two parts to it. Some of it is personnel based. We have some tremendous individual defenders. Sincere was on the All-Defensive Team. As you know, Malique Jacobs was the Defensive Player of the Year. Both of those guys were on the All-Defensive Team last year as well.
So they are unique talents on that side of the ball. Then what we’ve tried to do as a coaching staff is put them in position as best we can to make as many plays as they can on that side of the ball.
You will see some trapping. You’ll see some digging it out of the post. You’ll see some full court man to man. You know, nothing that I’m telling you is something that hasn’t happened all year long. So you’ll see some of that, and hopefully that will allow us to create some turnovers over the course of the game or speed them up and make them take quicker shots than they would like to.
And as for Sin’s development, to me, he’s on the Mt. Rushmore of players that’s played at Kent State over the last 20 years. Obviously there have been some great ones that have come through, but he’s in the conversation among the best. I think winning this conference championship last week, tournament championship, and being here really solidified that for him individually. Then obviously how we play out here could move him even further up the ladder.
Q. Did you schedule Charleston and Houston and Gonzaga in part in anticipation of having your team ready for March?
ROB SENDEROFF: We did. When you return, we returned Sin and Malique, we brought in a transfer from Ball State, Miryne Thomas, who we knew was a really good player. We signed some new guys who we thought could help Chris Payton, in particular, as a transfer from Pittsburgh.
So we knew we were going to have a good team. We didn’t know how good, but we also knew we needed to challenge ourselves in the nonconference. As you know, following basketball and covering it as long as you have, schools from the MAC sometimes struggle to get games.
But we worked really hard. We played, like you said, in the nonconference, College of Charleston in a home and home, Northern Kentucky, who’s also in the tournament, we opened up the season at their place, Houston, Gonzaga. We also played Cleveland State, who was in the championship game of their league, South Dakota State, who didn’t have quite the season that they normally have, but still a very quality mid-major team coming off 30 wins. When we played New Mexico State and UTEP, we expected those to be really difficult games, and they were.
So we did that with a purpose, and I think our players would have confidence regardless because I think that’s just how they’re built, but having played that schedule and played some of these games as closely as we have, I certainly think it gives us confidence.
And at the same time, I think it gives the Indiana coaching staff the ability to tell their players like you guys have got to be on point because look at what they did in this game and that game.
So it does work both ways when you get here, but in terms of preparing for this moment, I think it certainly helped us.
So it’s a huge part of what’s allowed us. We’ve had success for a while now, and it’s a huge part of what’s allowed us to maintain a level of success is that family atmosphere that you brought up. I really appreciate the opportunity to talk again about that on this stage.
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