On the identity of the team

We haven't had our full group together, except for just a few days. So it's still hard to envision. Obviously, we plan and we believe it's going to look one way. But also our job as coaches is to figure out the best way. So not much has changed with what we foresee. We're excited to have a full group back together in the fall and really start working more. We're still in an experimental phase, evaluation phase, and learning each other. And so now, once we get back for school, things ramp up as far as intensity and things like that.

On L.J. Cason

He's been a real pleasant surprise. Obviously, we thought he was a really good player. We signed him at FAU and we had really good players there. So we thought he'd fit in. He shot the ball really, really well. He's been extremely competitive. He's been very, very coachable. And he looks like someone that physically is going to be ready to contribute. We need really everyone on our roster to be ready to go. But he's been a little further along than we anticipated. He had a great high school coach. He comes from a really strong travel team, AAU program. But yeah, he's been really good, as has Pippen and Brooks. Those guys, you know, Brooks missed the early part of the summer with a knee injury. And immediately upon return, you could feel his presence in practice with his defensive acumen. And then just to Pippen, he's missed a good portion of the summer, too, with a minor injury. But he's a poised, steady player for a freshman. So those guys are all going to have opportunities to fight their way into the rotation. But obviously, the success of our season will lean heavily on the veterans.

On why the whole roster hasn't been together

Minor injuries, academics, guys finishing school on different schedules. Just a little bit of this, a little bit of that. It's very common. Other schools, your players might be on the national teams. They might be here. It's really difficult to get a group together in the summer. It's been that way every year for us. Last year, we had a couple guys try in the NBA draft. We had guys for a number of reasons. So it's good, though, because it allows some of the other players to have a bigger role, more reps, more touches, things like that. So it's not all bad. But from a coaching perspective, it would be nice to be tweaking with lineups and combinations a little more. But we have plenty of time.

On whether the released roster is the set roster

You're telling me we are or you're asking me? (Laughs). Yeah, we still have feelers out, but it would have to be something, I guess, out of the ordinary to bring someone in this late. You never rule anything out. But, yeah, we feel pretty good about this group with the mix of young guys and old guys. They've been fun to coach, though. I'll say that with certainty.

On the potential of early-season struggles

Well, hopefully, with so much turnover everywhere that everyone's struggling a little bit early and the teams aren't a finished product, you're going to struggle at some point during the season. You know, there's been national champions in the last couple of years that had real rough patches in January. And usually, the teams that can battle through that in the face of adversity get better and improve. So we're not really going into it worried about not jelling right away. It's just let's be a little bit better. Let's try to anticipate what our issues, our problems are going to be and plug those gaps before they happen if we can. But also we'll be in evaluation mode for a while, you know, with combinations, with how we play, with sets and styles and whatnot. So I don't think we'll be past the evaluation stage until November, December.

On Danny Wolf on his lateral quickness and defense

You know, we made a lot of – there's been a lot of, I guess, information out about recruiting the portal. And you have to make quick, decisive decisions. And we went back and watched him after he had signed just from a different lens, you know, before you're trying to decide, does he fit here? And then after that, then you're trying to decide, you know, what do you really, really have? And you're watching the high-major games. You're watching the biggest games, the conference tournament championship, things like that, whatever. And we thought – we always thought he had really good lateral quickness. We thought he was more physical than people gave him credit for. And so in the recruiting process, people were, I guess, killing us that how are you going to play him at the four? And we were very confident that he could guard fours in the Big Ten because of his ability to move and obviously being seven foot helps. But, yeah, he's done a good job of guarding the basketball.

On how he landed on Matt Aldred

He was an assistant when I was an assistant in Florida. And so I watched him work. I knew the program that Preston Green had developed. And when you say Furman wasn't – you know, if a team is in a lower level league, but they happen to beat the teams at a higher level league, I wouldn't really say that they're not that. They just – they're not at a historical land-grant university that is a part of the Power Five conferences. But if you look at their players, the way they move their bodies, their injury prevention, I would say Matt's been a high-major strength coach before this summer.

On revenue sharing in the sport

Our sport's a meritocracy where if you're self-aware, then you realize when you should be playing and when you shouldn't. And we welcome having a couple more spots. It allows you to take potentially a developmental player, someone that might take a year or two longer than otherwise – than you would sign otherwise. I like it because we love the developmental part. We love working with guys. We enjoy having players in our program. And not everyone's a star player. Not everyone's a quarterback for Sherrone, for Coach Moore. Not everyone is the starting pitcher. And not everyone – yeah, so that's part of being a – we're in team sports. So we welcome having more talented players for long-term development and short-term development as well. So we're excited to add a couple spots. And as far as revenue sharing, I'm all for it. There's a lot of revenue generated by certain sports, and those players deserve to be compensated accordingly, in my opinion.

On whether the shooters he recruiting are living up to the billing

We have a very skilled – a big skilled team, and we've shot the ball pretty well. We've tried to, just in the last few weeks, pick up our tempo and our pace. So we're working through that fatigue. When we're not tired, we shoot it really well. And as we've gotten into playing more up and down, we haven't shot it quite as well, which is – so we're just trying to expedite the process a little bit. But that's one area that I don't think we'll struggle with is making open shots. And so we'll have to improve as far as our cutting, our screening, our off-ball movement so we can generate really good looks. But that's – I would think going forward that's going to be a strength of this team.

On wanting the team to play with high tempo

Our goal is for the defense to never stop and get set, to continue to put pressure as early and often. And I'm perfectly content of giving up control to our players on game night. Now we have to be trained to play like that. We have to be committed to it. It's a responsibility for all five players on the court to play unselfishly, to get the ball out of their hands, to get it moving. And so we have a long way to go, but we have made progress in that area.And it also takes a great deal of conditioning of mental and physical toughness to play the way we want to play. And so that's another area that we have to continue to improve at. And you're never going to be there in August or September, but we need to be in tip-top shape in November to play the pace that we want to play at. And we think it's difficult to go against.

On the schedule reflecting what he wants in year one

We want that block game to be on national television and the biggest games as frequently as we can, and we want to recruit players that want to play in these games. And so when you look at our schedule, I don't think the metrics are out because most schedules aren't released. I would be shocked if we don't have one of the most competitive schedules in the U.S., and that was intentional. We want to play in the biggest games. We do believe that if we play a very challenging pre-conference schedule, then we'll be more prepared once conference play begins because you have to be able to go on the road and win in tough environments. You have to be able to travel and play on a short window, a short week, or a long week, whatever the case. So the pre-conference has to, number one, prepare you for your conference play, and then post-season, but more importantly, we wanted to play in the Jimmy V's. We wanted to play in these big-time games and classics and whatnot because we're recruiting guys that are excited for the challenges.

On educating his players about the Big Ten

Well, the mental toughness part, when you go on the road and you're facing the coaches, the talent, and the environments they're going to face, we can't get distracted because of a call. We can't get distracted because your teammate missed you. There has to be a high, high level of maturity, mental toughness, and the ability to move on to the next thing. And the one thing that's been a very common theme of any time someone's asked for a foul that hasn't been called in practice, we simply remind them that we play in the Big Ten. So that's a regular just about every drill, every segment. We're reminded that we have to play with physicality because the league we're in.

On how he's been received on the recruiting trail

Most of the guys we're recruiting, it's almost all the message and the situation and life after basketball. And then the way we've done it this fall, the bag part, the name, image, and likeness piece hasn't came up very often because the guys we're recruiting are going to get that no matter where they go. Now there will be different amounts. But I would say most of them are going to get a ballpark figure. And if that number is not something that certain schools are comfortable with, then they just go in another direction. But with the guys we're recruiting, it's fit, it's situation, it's style of play, it's life after hoops, it's the relationships, the culture, things like that. So we've been very well received. Now recruiting is not a game you get the silver medal or the bronze medal in. You need to be gold or nothing. So we'll see. But like I've said repeatedly, it's not as if there's enormous pressure on assigned high school players. If you miss on them, it might be a blessing in disguise because now you can go find guys who are established and proven that they've done it. We just prefer the high school route more.

On his philosophy on close games

Three years ago we were that, and then the next year we flipped it. And typically you would assume that you're playing like opponents and you're in a one-possession game. You're probably going to win half of them. So you're 1-12, 1-13, whatever it was. I don't know the exact, I didn't look at those situations, but it could be a timely free throw. It could be fouling a three-point shoot. There's so much that goes into winning and losing on that last possession. But I do think guys that come from winning programs, they know how difficult, how important every possession is, how difficult it is to win. And experience usually keeps you from making those mistakes. So for us, it was just simply we had players that had never been in those situations and didn't believe we were going to find a way to win to the following year of after we got that first win, it was more of a mindset of, okay, we're going to win this. We don't know how yet, but we're going to find a way. And I do think that there's that belief from being in the situation before. So we do have guys that have been in some big, big moments, and usually, you're more comfortable with that experience.

On it being self-defeating losing the first close game

It is for some. The glass is half empty or the glass is half full. Or if you have an engineer in mind, why is the glass twice as big as it needs to be? And so if we're really close and we're losing, then we're probably going to be encouraged that we're right there and we don't have a long way to go to get over the hump. If we're winning those games, then our message is going to be we're putting ourselves in a tight situation too frequently and we need to find a way to create a little more separation before that last play that can go any which way.

On whether anyone has stepped up to be a leader

It's hard to say now. And with our team, leadership's open to everyone. But the one thing that is required is the actions behind the words. Those guys that you mentioned, they've all put a lot of actions behind the words. Our locker room, thanks to the administration, we're renovating our locker room, our community space with our team and the women's program and all that. It's all brand new. So we're in transition now. So we're not in the locker room, we're not around those guys, except the practice court and the offices. But we have guys that have worked this summer with great attitudes. They've led by example. So I do think we'll have several guys emerge as leaders, and that's something that we're not going to sign captains. I think those things typically emerge organically over time based on usually actions and behaviors more than words.

On whether he expects any freshmen to contribute this season

It's so hard. Based on their summer performance, they all could impact the game. Injuries, situations, it's very, very difficult. And I think the stat last year, and you guys could research it or just take it. I took it from someone else. But I think out of the Elite Eight, there was maybe one freshman starter. So you have 16 teams, 16 times 5, 80 players. So 79 out of the 80 weren't freshmen for the best teams. So typically now, if you're a freshman and you're playing a lot, you're either with a lot of veterans or you're on a team that's not winning and you're building towards something later. But I would be very, very comfortable if those guys earned the minutes and were in the rotation because they all bring something really unique to the game. But am I going to sit here and say now that any of those freshmen are going to be in the rotation? There's too much time between now and the opening night to make those decisions.

On the differences in defensive styles from this team to his FAU teams

We thought it would be polar opposites as we've evaluated our group. And like I said, we're still trying to figure out the best way for us to play on both sides of the ball. We've, I guess, moved a little closer to how we played in the past with our positioning, with our off-ball rules and whatnot. So I'd say it would be similar, but it won't be identical. Just our makeup's different. But the size allows us to play a little bit differently than our speed did at FAU.

On whether Mike Boynton Jr. is leading the charge

He is. He was hired to run our defense, and he works with Justin Joyner and Kyle Church. Those guys oversee the defense. They work together. That's kind of their position group. And those guys of all three had orchestrated really, really successful defenses at the college level.

On the relationship he has with the staff

Even better than it was then. It's a group that has a very, very low individual ego and a high team ego. They work well together. It's not – I don't take it for granted. It's not always common to have a group that really, really works to support our players and do it together and realize that anything that we all get is going to be because of our cumulative success as a group. And those guys, they model it every single day. They walk the walk, and that's a good starting point for your team when they see a staff doing it every single day.

On whether he's been to the Big House for a game

Not yet. I can't wait.

On whether he's pushing for team bonding activities or is it happening on its own

Both. We've had several dinners and NBA playoffs. We're having the guys together frequently. You know, after practices we have a training table. We sit down and try to eat with them. The Olympics are on. The last couple weeks, though, we haven't done as many organized functions, but the guys have been getting together for each other's birthdays. They've been spending time off the court together. And it's been different groups. It's not like this group is with them and whatnot. It's been a good mix of guys. We haven't done a lot of organized stuff yet just because we didn't feel like we're ready for those things yet as a group. The trust isn't there for us to really get some of the things on the table that we need to to be our best. But, yeah, we'll do some fun activities. But every single day you should be developing and working on your culture, how we are, how we interact with each other in practice in the weight room. Those things contribute to it. And then the dinners and what, that should just be more just enjoying each other's company and spending time. All right, Coach.

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