Lunchtime Chat With Coach Painter on Thursday!

Southern Illinois basketball coach Matt Painter joined us in the chat room on Thursday. Here is a transcript of the session.

Moderator: We are pleased to begin today's chat room session with Saluki head coach Matt Painter. Thanks for taking time from your busy schedule to be with us today. Let's get right to the questions.

Tom (St. Louis): Congratulations on the season and good luck the rest of the way. Know that you can not mention names - but any chance of a 6'10" or so center headed to SIU next year? Best of luck in the NCAA tourny Tom

Matt Painter: We are working very hard to try to sign one more post guy. There is no question that we need somebody that is more of a center, but we also want to take a quality player. We don't just want to sign someone because they're 6-10. And also, we're not excluding signing guys at other positions if we feel they are immediate impact players.

Todd Mundinger: Hainesville, IL: Coach congratulations on a great season. I think you did an exceptional job of keeping the team motivated and focused. During the last four games, it seemed as though the team lost some intensity and focus. Do you feel that the team "peaked" to soon or are they just worn out after a long season? Is there anything that is being done to regain that focus and intensity going into the NCAA Tournament?

Matt Painter: I simply feel that we got beat by two very good basketball teams. There is always talk about when you're going to peak, and this team is not one of those teams that you have to worry about in those regards. They've laid it on the line in every game this year, except the Northern Iowa game. This is a special group that plays hard, and we're just looking forward to competing in the NCAA Tournament.

Chad - Valley Village, CA: Coach Painter, there's always talk of how difficult it is to schedule when you're not one of the major conferences. Now that you're the head coach, what's your philosophy on scheduling for next year and the years to come?

Matt Painter: I think you have to schedule according to the team you have returning. Some of that is speculation in regards to your new players, because you don't know how they'll react to college basketball. We try to schedule the best possible teams that we can play, but we also have to be realistic with our talent level.

Carbondale, IL: Coach Painter, congrats on a great season thus far. What do you say to a bet with the fans. If you guys make the final four, you shave your head.

Matt Painter: I don't think that would be fair to the fans to have to look at my bald head in the Final Four in San Antonio. Our fans have been too good to us to have to go through that torture.

Mike (LaGrange, IL): Coach- Congrats on a great season! You have done an amazing job! Whats the one thing your team must do in order to have success in the NCAA Tournament? GOOD LUCK!!!! GO SALUKIS!!

Matt Painter: We have to do a better job of guarding the basketball in the halfcourt. It is something that we have put a lot of time into in practice, and it got away from us in the second half of the SMS game. Also, we cannot have scoring droughts for long periods of time if we expect to win against an NCAA-caliber team.

Jim - Belleville: How are the redshirt freshmen progressing? Do you think either or both will start next year? Is Brad Korn OK after the "pick"?

Matt Painter: Randal Falker and Jamaal Foster have made great strides in their improvement. They are both guys we look to to play minutes next year. How many minutes and will they start depends on their continued improvement. Brad Korn is fine and will be ready to play.

Eric Ward (Arlington Heights, IL): Coach, Congratulations on a great 1st year as head coach and a 3rd straight MVC Chapionship. It is obvious that this team really excels on defense, but what has happened to our shooting free throws? How do you remedy this, give 300 per practice or what? Thanks, Eric Ward - Class of '01

Matt Painter: We spend a lot of time in practice shooting free throws when they're tired. We will go a 20-30 minute segment of practice going up and down the court and shoot 30-50 free throws and do that three or four times per practice.

MartyP Tinley Park: Do you think it might help all the Mo.Valley Schools to postpone its tournament 1 week later, (like the Big10) in order to rest the players for tourney play???

Matt Painter: I don't think our league is in position to do that in regards to television. The exposure we get from Fox and ESPN is something we might not get if we postponed a week.

Jimmy / Carbondale: With the amount of production you have been getting out of Lamar Owen, will he see any more minutes during the tourney?

Matt Painter: LaMar has played great all season, and the duo of Brad Korn and LaMar at the four gives opponents a lot of matchup problems. A lot depends on our opponent and our ability to guard their big guys.

Robert Ybarra (Sterling, IL): Coach Painter, What areas of emphasis are you concentrating in practice, right now?

Matt Painter: We gave our team four days off and we'll start practice today at 3 p.m., but we will really just get back to the fundamentals, especially on defense, and do a lot of full-court things to try to get their wind back. The main thing for us was to get away from the game of basketball for four days so we will be fresh mentally going into the NCAA Tournament.

Jeff (Boston): What has been the hardest part of making the transition from assistant to head coach?

Matt Painter: Probably the hardest part has been the time demands away from the game of basketball. I really enjoyed being an assistant because you deal only with basketball-related activities.

Chris (Carbondale): When is the Spring signing day?

Matt Painter: Every year, the spring signing day is the second Wednesday in April. The early signing day is the second Wednesday of November.

Mike from Carterville: Coach Painter, Thanks for another great season and best of luck in the NCAA!! This is looking ahead to next season but who may replace Willis at center? Are there any plans for a junior college transfer? What about Nick Rogers? Thanks for your time.

Matt Painter: First of all, I cannot comment on any prospective student-athlete until they have signed a National Letter of Intent. We feel very good about our two redshirt freshmen and Matt Shaw to help us in the post next year. Josh Warren and LaMar Owen will give us experience and hopefully they will have the best years of their career, like Sly and Brad have this year.

Lindsey (Carbondale): Hi Coach Painter, first off congratulations on your accomplishments this season with the team and being coach of the year. Also thanks for doing such an awsome job, you and the team have made us saluki fans very proud! If we get the bid into the NCAA tournament (I am sure we will) what teams would you like to play in the first round, and why? Thanks :)

Matt Painter: For us, we would really like to play a team without a true point guard, similar to Missouri last year, minus the big guy in the middle. When opponents have a point guard that can handle pressure and run their team and get them in offense without turning the ball over, it really limits our transition baskets. Also, anytime opponents have a center that is skilled offensively, it has caused us problems. Our guys have done a very good job guarding forwards, but have struggled with somebody of considerable size that is efficient around the basket.

Allen Triebull (Los Angeles): Coach, In this week's polls Kansas, North Carolina, Illinois and Southern Illinois are all ranked in the top 25. It must be gratifying to have your program included in that group and to be personally mentioned with the likes of Roy Williams, Bill Self and Bruce Weber? Paul Kowalczyk is looking like a genius (or the guy who can spot one) after last year's coaching merry-go-round debacle. The buck stopped here! So, I hope Paul's got you locked up for a lot of years. It looks like you a going to have a great team again next year. Good luck in the tournament.

Matt Painter: Thanks for your comments. It simply means we have very good players.

Tara (Harrisburg): Congratulations on your great first season, and hats off to the guys who made it that way. I like how you want to change the way that the students act towards the other teams at home games. I'm a student at SIC, and I can't understand why the students insist on yelling things that are rude, especially when we were on ESPN. Do you think that through your efforts and the team's, we will ever be able to stop the students' habits at the games?

Matt Painter: Like I've said all year, we have the best fans in the Valley. I feel the Dawg Pound is the loudest student section in the whole league. I don't think it's fair to categorize all of our fans because of a couple people yelling offensive remarks.

Dave (Robert): Are you and JD Collins not exchanging holiday greetings?

Matt Painter: I think JD Collins is one of the best officials in our league. He does a very good job representing the Missouri Valley Conference. Sometimes as a coach, you fight for your team during the game and then after you watch the film, you realize that the officials are right about 95 percent of the time.

Kevin from Peoria: Matt, Congratulations on an absolutely outstanding season, with more good times to come! I know you were an assistant for the Dawgs last year, but did you have heavy competition, from across the country, to win your position? The success of both the football, basketball and other athletic programs has been great for the past several years. How much do you attribute this rise in output to Athletic Director, Paul Kowalczyk? Good luck in the tourney and go Dawgs!!!

Matt Painter: How Paul handled the situation eliminated any competition by naming me head coach so quickly after Coach Weber was named at Illinois. I feel that Paul has a lot of respect from across the country by handling it the right way. He's obviously done a very good job as our athletics director and hopefully, he stays for many years.

Robert----Rockford, Il: What a great season, however, there is some concern about losing 2 out of 3 games at season's end. What caused that, can it be corrected and can it be used as positive motivation somehow?

Matt Painter: Anytime you lose, it makes you analyze yourself a little more closely as a player and a coach. We went two months without losing, and when you are involved in a streak like that, it becomes very difficult to play at the top of your game night-in and night-out. I simply feel that the wheels fell off at Northern Iowa, but you have to give credit to them for playing a very good game, and I simply feel that SMS out-played us, especially in the last 10 minutes of the game.

Moderator: Since there are no more questions at this time, thank you Coach Painter for taking time out of your day to join the chat room at www.SIUSalukis.com!

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