Capel on the win, the freshmen, energy and more

Jeff Capel talked about his first win at Pitt, the performance of his freshmen, his team’s energy and more after the Panthers beat Youngstown State Tuesday night. Here’s a full rundown of what he said.

Capel: I was really proud of the guys for the defensive effort that we had for 40 minutes. To have four new guys for the first time wearing a Pitt jersey in a real game, to come out and perform like that on the defensive end, I thought was big-time. We knew that Youngstown State was going to shoot a lot of three’s, so our preparation for this game was three-point defense and long rebounds. With them shooting a lot of three’s, we knew that we could turn those misses - if we contested them - into offense, and I thought that we did that. When we broke the game open in the second half, I thought that we were able to get out in transition, we were finally able to rebound.

For those three freshmen to perform like they did in their first collegiate game, you know, is really, really good. And for Malik to have his imprint on the game in different ways. But I thought the guy that really changed the game as Kene. We decided to start him in the second half because he rebounded. He rebounded in the first half and he gave an energy. And that’s who Kene has been since I’ve been here and he earned the right to start in the second half and I thought his energy on both ends of the court really helped us break the game open.

So again, I’m really proud of the effort on the defensive end. To hold them under 30% from the field, about 20% from the three-point line, was really good. We have a lot to work on, but we have some things that we can build on as we move forward.

Are we going to see Kene starting from now on?
Capel: Maybe. We’ll see. Practice will determine that.

bIs there some part of you that’s maybe sort of relieved for this first game to be done with, to shift more from there being a new coach and a new era to it being more about this team?
Capel: For me, it’s always been about the team, so I never - I don’t pay attention to that. For me, it’s always been about us. We talk to our guys that we all need to use plural pronouns: us, we, our. It doesn’t need to be “I” or “me.” We don’t need to speak that way. So it’s never been about that.

Now, is it good to have the first one over? Yeah, especially that we won and now we can continue to build. You know, for the returning guys, this is their first win in 2018. And so it was good to see guys excited in the locker room after the game. For our new guys, it’s their first win. And again, with the way we did it on the defensive end, it’s something we should be proud of. Not satisfied with, but proud of, and move forward and build on it, learn from it and get better from it.

Knowing that they’re freshmen, I’m sure there was some lee-way you wanted to give them, but how hard was it as a coach to allow those freshmen to make the mistakes that they made, especially in the first five minutes with turnovers and missed dunks and missed shots - the lapses that most coaches would have yanked a guy, you let them play through it.
Capel: I think if you’re going to allow guys to have freedom, then you have to allow them to make mistakes, as long as they’re mistakes going hard. There’s not a perfect player and our game is not perfect. But what should be perfect is our effort and how hard we play. We certainly made some mistakes and those guys did but it was everyone, it was all of us, it was me included. But those guys were playing hard. You allow them to grow. You allow them to fix it. You allow them to learn from it.

Again, that’s been my thing: as long as guys are playing hard and competing and getting after it, you have an opportunity to play. And the guys that did that that played today are the guys that earned it.

They had all the energy but like you said, it was the first game and they were excited. Do you think that’s who they are, to have that kind of energy? Or are you curious to see how it sustains over the course of the season?
Capel: I hope we do. That’s something that I hope. Hopefully we don’t have to teach energy. All of those guys have been, since they’ve been here, high-energy guys. Those three freshmen are always in the gym. Always. You know, at night, they’re in here late, they’re always in the gym and they want to be really good. We have a lot of our guys that are in the gym a lot, so I like guys that have energy. And understanding with that, sometimes you have to rev them down. That’s good. I’d rather rev them down than try to rev a guy up. It’s really hard to rev a guy up. So to calm them down a little bit, that’s good. That’s good. I want them to be excited and hopefully that’s something we have all year.

More than that energy, they seem to have some confidence and attitude, a little bit above their years.
Capel: Those guys work really hard and I think they do believe that they’re good players. If you think about it, those kids decided to come here - you know, it wasn’t popular. And you have Xavier and Trey committed within, I think, five days of each other. They never asked me, “Well, what about Malik or Shamiel or Khameron?” They didn’t really care who was here. They felt like they can come in and contribute. Same thing with Au’Diese when he committed; Trey and X were already committed so we had a lot of guards - they do have a confidence, they do have a passion, but other guys do, like Malik has that. Kene showed that. Again, what he did in the second half was really good. I thought Shamiel gave us really, really good minutes. And I thought Khameron Davis, defensively, gave us really good minutes. So again, we have a lot of guys that do that and that’s what it’s going to take for us to have a chance to be successful this year.

You were talking about the freshmen’s work habits; is that typically something that freshmen come in with or is it something you have to teach them? And if it’s the former, what does that say about these guys that they came in right away and did that?
Capel: I think it depends on the kid. I think each kid is different. Certainly, not all are like that. Some already possess a great work ethic. Some, it’s something they have to learn. So each kid is different, each kid is unique. Fortunately for us, we have a lot of kids on this team that like being in the gym, they like working, and I think it’s showing up with the condition that we’re in and the changes in guys’ bodies from April until now.

With the offensive rebounds that Youngstown State was able to get, obviously some of that’s from a lot of three’s, but do you feel like there was something your guys could have been doing better throughout?
Capel: Definitely. Definitely. We have to go after it. Five guys have to rebound all the time for us, and that’s going to be something we say all year. We have to gang-rebound. And when you miss as many shots as they missed, there are going to be more opportunities to rebound, especially when you shoot 38 three’s, there are a lot of long rebounds. When we got those, we were able to turn those into offense. I thought we left a lot of points on the board; I can recall 10 in the first half that we left on the board, with just layups and things like that. Defensive rebounding is going to be a key for us and something we’re going to have to be really, really focused on all season long because we’re small.

How much of your personnel decisions - whether it’s playing time or whatever - how much does that send a message that the game will be played a certain way to this team? You mentioned the toughness, the together, the defensive mentality, how much of that is, ‘You’re not going to play unless you play this way?’
Capel: For me, it’s not sending a message; it’s just, this is the way it is, this is how it is, this is how it’s going to be. And it’s not sending a message, just - this is the standard. The standard is the standard, and that is not changing. So you have to raise your standards. That’s been my thing since I’ve been here: everything in our program needs to be elevated. We’ve tried to do that with everything and guys have to understand that. I don’t think we have anyone fighting it, but the standard is the standard. Period.

You’re one game in and one tech; the guys said that kind of fired them up a little bit. Do sense that at all in the moment or anything like that?
Capel: I didn’t. I apologized to them in the huddle. But it happened. I need to be better in that situation.

It seems like your team is a little bit hungrier this year than previous teams.
Capel: Well, I can speak for our team. I can’t speak for previous ones, and we need to be hungry. We need to be hungry every time we step on the court. We need to have the mindset of, it’s an opportunity for us to get better. Each day in practice, we can’t come to practice with an attitude of, ‘I just want to get through it, I hope it’s not hard today.’ That’s a losing mentality, individually and collectively as a group, and we can’t have that. We need to come with the mindset of, it’s an opportunity for us to get better, for me to get better, and things like that. That requires discipline, that requires hunger, that requires focus, attention to detail, and they will know when they’re not doing it. Again, the standard is the standard. That’s what we have to do every day.

Your press release said that whatever happened with Jared happened in the spring; was that something you had been aware of for awhile?
Capel: Yes.

What made Au’Diese the guy that you wanted to replace him?
Capel: We grade practice. We look at different things in practice. And he’s a bigger body, he’s a guy that can defend multiple positions, he’s been one of our best rebounders in practice. Every day. And he’s been one of our best defenders in practice. So we just decided to go with him. He earned the position.

You’re expecting Jared to play?
Capel: Yes.

On Friday?
Capel: Yes.

You’ve been the head coach at two different schools, interim at Duke; how does it feel to get your first win at Pitt?
Capel: It’s exciting. More importantly, for me, I’m excited for our guys. We have a locker room full of guys that hadn’t won a game in college in 2018, so this was their first. With me, I’m never concerned about me. I had my time when I played. I got a lot of attention when I played. I don’t need that now. I don’t want that now. I want these guys to get it. These guys deserve it. So I was just really, really happy for them, really pleased for them and really, really excited for them.