courtesy of Jack Alden

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"We're ecstatic with the way we played. There was a stretch the last five minutes of the first half that we didn't play as well. Other than that, we played maybe out best basketball of the year on the offensive end. We were very unselfish and rebounded the heck out of it and got the ball inside where we wanted to get it. "At the same time, everybody knows that Syracuse can shoot the ball better than they did today. We caught them where they didn't shoot it as well and didn't play as well, and we played very well, and that's the reason you got the margin that you had out there. They made a great run right before the half and got it to a five-point game. I challenged our guys at halftime to play the best 20 minutes that we've played all year, and I think they did that. "I couldn't be happier for these kids. We've had a little adversity this year with guys going in and out of the lineup and guys getting hurt and things not happening as well as we'd want them to happen. But we're still playin', and we're ecstatic about that. "At the same time, I think college basketball has got to be a little fun. You guys (media) have been talking about that monkey on my back for the last three years, so we talked to the kids last night, I sent my wife to the store and we bought this (stuffed) monkey (pulls out of a paper bag), my wife brought it to me last night, and I took it into our team meeting and put it up on my back and allowed everybody on our team to come over and jerk the monkey off my back. We took it in the locker room today and it sat and waited for us until we got back, because I told the guys I was tired of answering your dadgum questions about second round losses. So it's me and the monkey, and some great, great young men had a great time today."

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