Well, that's the way we drew that up. I'm very happy that we won. I thought we did some things from the under-four timeout in the first half. I thought we got some momentum there. We started to really get stops and that allowed us to get out in transition and get some easy baskets and we saw the ball go through. And then I thought the way we started the second half and throughout, I thought we did a good job. We have to get better when we're playing with a lead. Our tendency is to relax and I think we had a 10-point lead and we gave up an offensive rebound basket and then at another point we had a 10-point lead and actually got a stop and a rebound and we had something in transition but we threw the ball away and they hit a three.
Give them credit, Boston College, they were a team that's not been shooting the ball well from three and they stepped up and made six 3's in the first half. I think they made ten for the game and some guys that we didn't initially mind shooting stepped up and made some big-time three's for them. So give them credit for that, but in the end we found a way and I liked the way when they scored to tie it, it was a broken play and we didn't want to call a timeout. We had the wherewithal to get it in and to push it up and got Murph on a pull-up jump-shot. It takes guts to want to be in that moment and to take that shot and we're incredibly grateful for him to have the guts to do that to obviously step up and make it. So again, pleased with the win. First time we've won two in a row in this program in a while. I don't know the exact date or when it was, but I know it hasn't been in a couple years. So I'm pleased about that and we look forward to going on the road.
How do you balance being aggressive and protecting the lead?
Capel: We still need to be aggressive. We need to continue to do things that got us the lead and namely defend at a high level. When you have a lead, you can't lose guys. You can't fall asleep just standing there with the ball. You can't rest, especially on defense. You have to come up with the rebound. We have to work on that more in practice, that's something that I have to spend a little bit more time on - game situations. This time of year you are trying to protect guys, especially because we have some guys that are playing heavy minutes, so you don't want to do a ton of physicality - you don't want to have a lot of physicality in practice, because you're trying to prevent injury and needing guys ready for real live games, but we need to do as a staff we need to do a better job of helping our guys in game situations. We worked on game situations a lot early in the season. We haven't done that in a little bit and that's something obviously showing on tape and watching on tape and doing it which we do every game coming back from film session, it's not working. So we need to get in the gym and do some more of those situations.
Why not call a timeout? They just turned it over, why not....
Capel: I didn't want them to set their defense and I thought they were scattered and they didn't know the matchup. The matchups were off, they were odd and situations like that, I think you get a chance to get a better shot. We did the same thing against Kansas State, it worked. We did a something thing against Wake Forest and it didn't work. In this situation fortunately for us, it worked.
You had a 19-2 run from the end of the first half to the start of the second, why did things start to click at that point?
Capel: We defended, that's what it was. We defended and didn't allow them to just run their stuff and for us defense ends when we get the ball. We defended and rebounded and we were able to get out in transition and we were able to make some shots.
How much does playing with the lead tie into what we've talked about how guys learning to deal with success?
Capel: I think it's all tied together. I've mentioned a lot, but we're trying to build winning habits and it's something collectively as a group that we don't have and I don't know if it's youth or inexperience with success. That's the bottom line, we don't have it. So you get a lead at 10 and human nature tells you, 'OK I can relax now. I can take this possession off' and all of the sudden in our game momentum can change quickly. For me, I thought it was when we had the 10-point lead and the first one we gave up an offensive rebound and all of the sudden if you get a rebound and you get out in transition, which we've done a good job of. We shot 62% in the second half and maybe we get something easy and that goes from 10 to 12, maybe 13. So in that situation we had it. And then when we had the 10-point lead we had something in transition and then we threw the ball away and he got it and walked into a 3 and I knew it was good. Because in that situation, they always make it. That was the one that was really concerning to me. I got really worried because you could see us get a little bit tight in that situation and again that's where we have to get better. I think all of it is tied together of how do you handle success? You have to be able to finish.
You mentioned Murph wanted to take that shot. How do you build that in players?
Capel: I don't think you instill that, some guys have it and some guys don't. Some guys run from the ball and some guys want it in that situation. I think we have a few guys that like to be in those situations that aren't afraid of it. The thing that you do is you give them freedom and hopefully as a coaching staff we give them confidence that we believe in them in those situations. Like I mentioned at Kansas State, it was Xavier he made the shot. Against Wake Forest, we had a lot of guys in position because we had five straight possessions where we were down one. Tonight it just happened to be Murph. They really tried to go after X and Trey in that situation. If you go back and watch, they really tried to deny them and the court was just open because they had so much attention on Xavier and Trey and Justin found Murph and Murph stepped up and made a big shot.
When you were recruiting Ryan. Did he seem to be the kind of guy that wanted the ball?
Capel: Well he's always been confident. I didn't know, I never saw him play, so I can't speak on that. But he's always been really confident in his ability to shoot the basketball.
It was a roller coaster of a game tonight, any big takeaways for this road trip?
Capel: I'm just glad we won. Glad we scored two more points than them.