Stew's Thoughts As the Regular Season Draws to a Close

On the Idaho game...

"As I look back at the Idaho game, we appeared to be worn out and the confidence level looked to be down a great deal. If anyone is to blame it is probably me because I have been hard on this team and I have pushed them a lot. I think they have hit the wall a little bit, at least they did that night against Idaho. I know we don't have anybody that's not trying on this team. Somebody asked one of our players if they were done or if they had quit. If you look at the 16 guys like I do everyday at practice, you wouldn't ask that question. Because that's not the makeup of this group. I think if there is anybody to blame it's certainly not those guys, but it would be me. We just seemed to be out of gas and our confidence level wasn't up. We just looked tired, worn out, beat down. Idaho did a good job. The thing I find ironic, and I've been doing this a long time, is we are two baskets away from first place, two one-point games. And yet the terms like 'rock-bottom' come up. We are 19-8, it's not like we have four wins. We are in third place, there are seven teams below us. We are not going to win the league every year, and the sooner people realize that they will probably be less disappointed. We are doing our best and we're trying to get our energy back this week. That is what our focus is on this week, to have fun playing basketball and to play hard. We can live with the results if we do that."

On Cal State Northridge...

"Northridge comes in like they always do with real good athletes. They'll press us some, they'll run a lot of different stuff. They're real aggressive and they'll give you about six different defensive looks. So you face a lot of different things when you face Northridge."

On Pacific...

"Pacific will be a real contrast because they play us totally different than Northridge. They're going to be very specific on how they play our personnel. We know what is going to happen there. It's a matter of if we are going to step up and make some plays based on how they are playing us. Sometimes they will dare you to have certain guys shoot the ball. That will be a real interesting game along those lines. The good thing is there isn't a guy in our program that is in a panic. I don't think there is anybody who thinks we are done. We know we have to play well to win games, but that's the way it always is. We are trying to bounce back and see what we can get done."

On the team's emotion...

"I'm not really worried about the team emotionally. I'm worried a little bit about the confidence level. I'm not worried about guys not trying. Like I said, we don't have those kind of guys. The best thing they can do right now is play for themselves. That may sound selfish or greedy, but the nature of sports is that way sometimes. We have just got to forget about all the distractions and all the people that might be disappointed or all those that ask what's wrong. We need to go out and play for the guys that are there every single day and be as good as we can be and see what we can do. I think if you focus on that and not worry about all of those distractions, you'll perform better. There has been a lot of pressure on this team, and a lot of it has been my fault, following our past three teams. For them to feel like a failure at 19-8 and 10-6 in league, there is something wrong with that. What has happened in our society? You see it with things like the Super bowl, back in the day if you had a .500 season you were pretty good. But now it's if you don't win it all people say 'What's up, what's wrong?' and that's the nature of the beast. We are better off if we don't dwell on it that much. Not to say that we don't appreciate our fans, because that's not what I am saying. But at times you have to close ranks and worry about the program."

On Northridge's winning streak in the Big West...

"They are playing well. They have two guys who are all-league type players. (Curtis) Slaughter and (Ian) Boylan are very talented. The weirdest thing with these two teams is it's like we did not play them this year. The way the schedule fell is almost like playing them for the first time this season. They have changed a lot since we played them. I think they feel like they are on a roll and that presents a challenge for us. Pacific on the other hand had a bunch of injuries that contributed to them losing a few games in a row. The best thing we can do is worry about ourselves. It's not so much worrying, but playing and having fun playing the game again and not putting so much strain on ourselves. Again, if somebody wants to blame someone, blame me. No one else, but me. Those guys don't control what happens everyday, I do. They are trying their best. We have a chance to win 20-plus games if we take care of business and find a way to win a few more. We didn't win 19 games being soft. We were just soft that one game, but I'm confident we'll bounce back."