John Pelphrey pre-game media event for Tennessee
FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. – Arkansas plays host to Tennessee on Wednesday at 7:05 p.m. in a game being televised by Raycom Sports. Raycom games are carried by KHOG/KHBS in Northwest Arkansas, KATV in Little Rock and KAIT in Jonesboro. The Razorbacks are 13-6 overall and 1-5 in the Southeastern Conference while Tennessee is 13-7 and 4-2. Head coach John Pelphrey met with the media on Monday to preview the game. Following is a partial transcript of his press conference.
“This is a big week around the league and we have a great opponent coming in. Tennessee has great coaching and has had outstanding success the last few years. They have a great frontcourt with (Wayne) Chism and (Tyler) Smith. They have an extremely athletic backcourt. Theirs don’t look like ours. They are long, athletic and talented. That’s not new for us. Scotty Hopson is a tremendous talent. He’s going to be a superstar in our league. It will be important to defend and rebound. They’re coming off a great win over Florida. I’m sure their confidence level is very high.”
Expectations for Tennessee:
“They were outstanding last year, but they lost a lot to graduation. They recruited well, they played people who are challenging and I think they will be there at the end. Their schedule has certainly not hurt them in terms of getting experience in tough environments.”
LSU game (79-69 loss in Baton Rouge on Saturday after trailing 41-21 at the half):
“If we had not played better in the second half, I probably would not have been as angry. There’s an attitude there than can be fixed. We didn’t grow any taller or get any faster when we decided to compete. It needs to be that way all the time.”
Courtney Fortson (18 assists and seven turnovers in the last two games):
“He has 19 games of experience and he’s using it. I thought he was outstanding against Alabama and LSU. Outstanding means knowing what we want from the bench and having it go through him. We had good ball movement. Michael Washington got 21 shots and Rotnei (Clarke) got 10. That needs to continue. We’ve seen signs of Courtney and Stefan (Welsh) taking what we’ve learned and getting it into the games. Courtney is maturing and becoming a better point guard.”
Fortson’s three-point shooting:
“What he takes are pretty good shots. I have no problem with him getting one or two off every half.”
Pace:
“We’re not going to look to slow it down and I’m sure they aren’t.”
Marcus Monk availability for Wednesday:
“We always have hope. Guys are working hard (on the situation).”
Ten games left (in the regular season):
“In the big picture, that’s a lot of time. I never attempt to predict the future. I believe with all my heart, if we have a great attitude and play hard in our style, we’ll have a chance to overachieve.”
Jason Henry playing power forward:
“Sometimes you have to do things you don’t want to do, and we may have to do that.”
