March 13, 2000
Every one of us to a man felt we were ready to go tonight at tip off against BYU. We all felt the best we've felt physically in probably two or three weeks.
I've never seen anything like the way we played coming out of the locker room to start off the game. We just came out so ready to play and with such unbelievable energy and emotion. It's just amazing. I just can't really express enough how, not surprised but just almost like vindication for how much hard work and effort we put into playing such an important game. That is definetely the best we've played all year. It's not even close.
I think we did certain things differently this time around against BYU. Our defense was tremendous. Everybody picked up their game and made it difficult for them to get shots off. I feel like that was definetely a big key. As was the effect that everybody was helping each other out a little bit more than in previous games against them this season. I felt like a spectator at times, everyone was so unbelievable.
Trevor Diggs had an unbelievable tournament. I think he definetely should have made the all-tournament team. It's the best three games he has had all year. You don't ever think you're going to beat anyone as badly as we did BYU tonight.
We didn't win tonight's game this week or last week or two week's ago, we won it last summer and in the preseason when we worked out so hard. I think the effort we put in then really showed tonight how good of shape we are in as a team.
Winning the MVP award is an amazing feeling. I used not being named first team all-conference as a motivating factor in this tournament.
Tonight's win should definetely put us into the NCAA Tournament. I don't see how they can keep us out. We won our conference as well as our conference tournament and that's all that we can do. We had a couple of bad losses along the way, but they've got to take into consideration our last several games. We've won seven in a row now. With everyone knocking everybody else out around the country this weekend I think it's going to be tough to keep us out.
It's been an unbelievable four years here at UNLV. To go out a champion in my last home game as a Rebel is an unbelievable feeling. I grew up so much not only as a person but also as a player. It's been an amazing ride. Hopefully my college career is not over yet and we will get in the tournament and I can play a couple more games as a Rebel. Four or five hopefully. The people of Las Vegas have been great to me. I'd almost consider this my home now. It's been great.
