Alec Burks, Tad Boyle Press Conference Quotes
Colorado Head Coach Tad Boyle
Opening
Statement
"I'd like to start off saying that this has
been a great year for Colorado basketball on many different levels.
The team achieved a lot of success on the court, and as a result to
that, a lot of our individual players had some nice awards at the
end of the season. I've known Alec [Burks] now officially a year
and two days. I was hired here on April 19 of last year. A year ago
today I was on my way home to Boulder, Colorado from Grandview,
Missouri, after meeting with his mom, and I was in full blown
recruiting mode. This year is a little different. A lot of people
have asked, 'What have you done to try and get Alec to stay?' The
role of myself and our staff and our players over these last few
weeks has not been a recruiting idea. It has been supporting him
and his decision that he's faced with. He's had an unbelievable two
years here at Colorado. Our job has been to support him and be
there for him and help him with whatever he may need. I will say
this, he's been through a lot this year. There's been an
unbelievable amount of distractions and people that have come up to
Alec from a lot of different angles during the year and certainly
since the season has been over. I'm not sure I could have expected
anymore out of this young man. How he's handled it, how he's stayed
focused, how he has put his blinders on and kept his nose to the
grind stone, and he's handled it as well as any young man could
have handled what he's gone through this year. I am very, very
proud of him for that. With that said, I am going to turn it over
to Alec. You didn't come here to talk to me. I'll let him make a
brief statement and then open it up for questions."
Alec Burks, So., G
Opening
Statement
"Alright, I want to thank everybody for
coming out. I want to thank my teammates, my coaches and everybody
in the media, everybody that's back there. Everybody is wondering
what I'm going to do this year, after my sophomore year. I just
want to let everybody know that I will be entering into the 2011
draft with plans to sign with an agent."
On the key factors
going into making the decision
"I feel like with the
people that are coming back, I thought I was going to be a top
pick, a top 10 or lottery. It's just something I couldn't pass
up."
On when he made the
official decision
"Actually today. I was going back
and forth. I had some great meetings yesterday. Before yesterday, I
was coming back, but after the meetings yesterday and talking to my
mom and my coach, the best decision for my future is to go to the
NBA."
On who else Burks
spoke to when making his decision
"I talked to
(former CU great and current New York Knick) Chauncey [Billups] and
he told me just to do what was best for me. That's the main person
I've talked to. Coach Boyle, my mom, my AAU coach all told me to do
the best thing for me."
On when he thinks
he will be picked during the draft
"I feel like after
this season I was already a lottery pick, and I feel like a lot of
the top players that might have been in front of me or behind me
decided to go back to school, so I feel like it's the perfect time
for me to come out."
On the NBA labor
situation being a factor
"I feel like it didn't
really matter to me. The NBA is a dream of mine. Rather it be
November or January I feel like I need to take advantage of where
I'm at right now. I'm going to get paid regardless. One day I'm
going to get paid for playing basketball. The labor and the
collective bargaining did not play a factor into my decision
today."
On whether or not he has selected an
agent
"I'm still determining. I met with some
yesterday. I might meet with some more, I might not. I
have yet to determine who my agent is going to be. I might sign
one, I might wait until May 9th to sign one. I
might come back, I might not, but right now I'm going to the
NBA."
On what he needs to
improve on going into the NBA
"I'm going to work on
every aspect of my game. I just need to get stronger.
It's a grown man's league. I need to work on my jumping, but
I'm going to work on everything to get my game ready for the
NBA."
On telling his
teammates
"It's tough. I was really coming
back. I was really deciding that I was coming back whether
nobody believes me or not before yesterday. I like kicking it
with everybody. I have fun with everybody. I wasn't
ready to give up the college friendships. I had to make the
best decision for myself and I feel like I did."
On his two years at
CU
"I'm really amazed. I probably didn't expect
this for myself. A lot of people thought I was going to come
out here and go back home and work. I proved a lot of people
wrong."
On his dream of
playing in the NBA
"I realized it last summer.
What I did my freshman year, a lot of people didn't expect
it. I basically had a great year in one of the best leagues
in the country. Now that I did that, I felt like I could get
to the next level."
On a possible
lockout in the NBA
"I played that as a factor, but
it's risk reward like coach said."
On his feelings
after the announcement
"I'm glad. I'm glad that
everyone is going to get off my back about it now. It was a long
time coming. It's a great day."
On his family's
opinion
"My mom wanted me to go. She was happy. My
brother is happy. It's a great day when you watch someone realize
their dreams."
Colorado Head Coach Tad Boyle
Boyle's reaction to
Burks to the possibility of Burks changing his
decision
"Alec has made his decision. There are
a lot of things that could happen between now and May 9. He's
not planning on changing his decision. What we don't want is
people coming at him trying to sway him back the other way.
Alec has given this a lot of thought. He's taken his
time. He has gone back and forth, but I will reiterate after
visiting with him a short time ago, this is what he wants to do;
this is a dream of his. He's not yet determined whether he
will sign with an agent, but that will take care of itself.
Quite frankly, that's a pretty personal decision that he has to
make on his own with his family. So we'll leave it at
that."
Boyle on
Burks'decision
"Here's what it comes down to.
One of the things we ask of our players and we expect of our
players and Alec is no different than any other player on our
team. We ask them to be unselfish. We ask them to put
the team goals ahead of their own. Certainly as a head coach
at Colorado, this guy makes me a better coach. We're better
with Alec Burks at Colorado than we are with him going to the
NBA. There's no question about that. For me to try to
recruit him and try to sway him back, and to not do what's in his
best interest, I would be acting selfishly. That would make
me a hypocrite. It's not something I'm interested in
being. As hard as it's been, as much as we would love for him
to come back and join us, it's a decision he has to make for
himself and his family. We respect that. We understand
that. Has it been hard? Yes, it's been hard, very
hard. We want what's best for all our players and Alec has,
one, put himself in this position, but if anyone was in this
position we would act the same way."
Boyle on Burks'
readiness to enter into the NBA
"What I think it
comes down to is risk-reward. It takes me back to my
investment days. You have to look at the risk of coming back
and the reward of coming back. You have to look at the risk
of going into the NBA draft. You have to look at the
reward. The reward is pretty obvious. I think if you
took money out of the equation, it would be a pretty simple answer,
but money is money. You're talking about a situation where
Alec put himself on a course to take care of himself and his family
for years to come. It's hard to begrudge anybody to taking
that opportunity, who has worked as hard as he's worked. He's
put himself in this position. I think at the end of the day,
you look at the risks and the rewards, and like Alec said, his
stock is pretty high right now. I'm not going to argue with
that. He's a heck of a player. We had a workout earlier
in the week. He's got a lot of potential and obviously he's
proved that he can produce in one of the best leagues of the
country at the highest level of college basketball. He's got
production and he's got potential. It's hard to say he's
making a bad decision."
Boyle on losing
Burks and five seniors
"It leaves us in the same
position we were. We're just down a man and a pretty darn
good one. In terms of the future of this program, this is as
bright as it's ever been. I got a lot of belief in the young
men that are in this room and the young men that are coming to help
us next year. We are losing a lot of production from this
year's team. Next year's team was going to be a new team,
whether Alec came back for not. Obviously, we are better with
him than we are without him. This doesn't change the course
that Colorado basketball is on. It might be a blow. I'm
not going to ever fully just judge the program based on the number
of wins, but it's based on the number of improvements we
make. When we come back in August and report to school and
where we end up in March, that's going to determine our
successes. In some years, you're going to have more coming
back than less. We lose a lot of production off of next
year's team. We're not as good; we're not as experienced, but
that doesn't mean we can't have a good year and the future is
bright. I'm optimistic and I'm proud of Alec. This is
something we can use as a positive as we move forward in our
recruiting efforts and talking about kids' dreams. Part of
coming to this campus is following your dreams, whether you are a
basketball player or a chemical engineer or whatever the case may
be, a pre-med major, you want to follow your dreams. Alec's
dream has been to play in the NBA. He's realized that at
Colorado. That's something we can sell when we go out into
future homes and talk about future Buffs."