Colorado University Athletics
Big 12 Men's Basketball Media Day
October 28, 2004 | Men's Basketball
HEAD COACH RICARDO PATTON
General: "To my left I have Antoine McGee, a junior, point guard. You have seen him around for a while. To his left we have Jayson Obazuaye, also a junior. It's really a different team this season in that I think we have seven or eight juniors and no seniors, and only one scholarship to give, but a lot of new faces in our program.
"I think this year will be exciting to watch. I think we will probably play a different style of basketball. Last year with David Harrison, the 7-footer who is now with the Indiana Pacers, we sometimes had to wait on him to get down the floor. This year we have added a couple of guys, Lamont Arrington and Julius Ashby, who will probably be able to get up and down the floor a lot faster, a lot quicker. It will be a new year of basketball for us. The first few weeks of practice have gone extremely well.
"I think one of the things that is a big question mark in the mind of the other Big 12 coaches, and even the media for that part, is who do we have in our program, and there is not much known about some of the guys, like Richard Roby, Martane Freeman, who is from here, Kansas City, junior college player.
"I think it could be an exciting year for us. It depends on how quickly we can come together."
On Transition Period: "I think there will be, but I think if you look at our non-conference schedule, I would venture to say we have one of the toughest non-conference schedules in our league. When you think about going to Utah and Richmond, we have Northwestern out of the Big Ten coming to our place, we go to Oregon State, to California. I think it's a very competitive non-conference schedule that hopefully will prepare us for a very grueling Big 12 conference."
On Point Guard Position: "I think it will be shared. Any time you play an up-tempo style, I think you need at least a couple guys at every position, because to play that way guys are going to get winded after playing hard, as you would like them to. The two guys to my left will play that position primarily, and both guys offer a different look. I am excited about that."
On G Marcus Hall: "I have played with him a little bit at the point just for really an emergency, but I like him at the two-guard position because he came out of high school, out of Texas as a scorer. He averaged over 30 points a game as a senior in high school. I think to free him up to look to score a little bit more now as a sophomore would really help him, too."
On Defense: "I think this is probably the most athletic team that we have had at Colorado since I have been there, and this is my ninth full season starting. I think that we should be able to extend our defense, and the fact that we have a couple of guys at each position, it allows a guy to go hard and play all out and get back in there. So far it has been exciting to watch in practice, watching guys getting out in the passing lanes and deny passes and pressure the basketball.
"If you look at our team last year, we were a half-court defensive team. I don't believe that we created a lot of offense with our defense last year. We didn't get many easy buckets. Sometimes that's pretty difficult. You have to go to the point where you create some easy buckets with your defense."
On G Richard Roby: "Richard has had some good days in practice. The thing I like about him, he is not a typical immature freshman, I don't see so far. I think he has a great workout ethic. He wants to be a great player. He can do some different things. He is not just a guy that can shoot the basketball. Those guys that come in and that's primarily all they can do is shoot it, they really struggle early on because defenses are geared to sticking closely to those guys. He is a guy that can put it on the floor, get to the basket. At 6'6" he is very long, athletic and can do some different things. So he will be a guy that I think in time, by the time he is a junior and senior in this league, I think he will be a guy that is highly regarded."
On Center Position: "You know, right now Julius Ashby is a guy that really has a presence on the low block, but also Lamont Arrington at 6'11". We have toyed with different line-ups and trying to play those two together. There will be times when that happens.
"Andy Osborn, who transferred from Loyola Marymount at 6'9" can shoot the 3-ball as well as anyone we have ever had. So we just have different combinations of guys that we can go with depending on our game defense."
On Who Will Lead Team in Scoring: "Someone is always going to lead you in scoring. Even the bad teams have a leading scorer. But I just think we will score in a lot of different ways. Again, we don't have the seven-footer in the middle. Most nights last year we were bigger than most teams at that position.
"As I have said here recently, the good thing about us not having David Harrison is no one else has him either in our league. If you look at what Oklahoma State accomplished last year going to the Final Four, they didn't do it with a seven-footer in the middle. They did it with guys in different spots, Graham, the point guard, Lucas, Tony Allen. They just scored in a lot of different spots. I think we have that luxury this year that we don't have to depend on one or two guys to score for us.
"Last year the scoring was primarily from David and Michel Morandais and Blair Wilson. Lamar Harris is a guy I am more concerned with who is going to rebound for us. Lamar got some pretty big rebounds for us. When you think of us finishing fourth in the Big 12 last year, we were a pretty good rebounding team."
G ANTOINE McGEE
On Change of Style: "I think that the change is good. We have a lot of athletic players on our team. I would like to say Lamont Arrington can run the floor pretty well. The fast-paced game will fit not only our team, but our atmosphere pretty well."
On Richard Roby: "Well, like Coach said originally, I think he is more mature as a freshman. In practice he has done a good job of showing us that he can play offense as well as defense. He came this summer and has gotten a lot stronger. He has a lot of confidence and that will carry him a long way in the Big 12."
On Scoring More: "I think now I will give myself a chance, an opportunity to score, as well as Richard Roby and Freeman and guys like that. I think now that I have been playing, I think my role might begin to increase this year."
G JAYSON OBAZUAYE
On Change of Style: "I also think the new style of play will benefit us. We have a lot, like Antoine said, a lot of athletic players, so we will create our offense and defense this year, probably getting out, pressing a lot more, getting after guys that way."
On Richard Roby: "Richard is a good player. I like his style of play. He gets after it on defense and offense as well. He is a really good player, and he has come out of high school, he was a highly regarded player. He didn't come into our program with a big head like he had been, so that messes up team chemistry."
