FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. – The Nova Southeastern University men's basketball team (6-8) will end its three game road trip Wednesday when they travel to West Palm Beach, Fla. to take on the Palm Beach Atlantic Sailfish (5-9) at 7:30 p.m. on Radio X 88.5 FM. NSUSharks.com spoke to Gary Tuell prior to the matchup.
 
Q: The Sharks fell to No. 7 Barry Saturday, but were in the game throughout. After a couple days of reflection, what are your thoughts on the game?
 
A: My opinion of Barry hasn't changed. I still believe they are the most complete team in our league and have a wonderful chance to win the NCAA DII National Championship. They were sensational Saturday, knocking down shots and scoring in the paint and in transition. As I said before, they are a team without any apparent weakness. They make you guard the 3-point line, the paint, the drive and the transition game and they make you block out and battle on the glass. I thought they were exceptional Saturday. We played hard, but not as hard as you have to play to beat a team like Barry. We were within striking distance all day, but we never could string together the three or four stops in a row that we needed to put more pressure on them. But that's to their credit. You can try to take three things away from them but they have four ways to beat you. I was happy that we competed and happy that we were in the game inside the final 10 minutes. When we had it down to four with nine to play, and even when it was an eight-point game with three to play, I thought we had a chance against a superlative team playing well on their floor. But we just couldn't get over the hump. We have to do a much better job defending them next time or the outcome won't be different.
 
Q: Brian Cahill (Sr., Arlington, Va.) was cleared the morning of the game, and had a season-high 16 points. How important is his return moving forward?
 
A: Brian definitely gave us a lift and put a charge in the team. We learned that morning that he was cleared to play. He hadn't practiced for 10 or 12 days and I wasn't expecting him to do much. But Brian stays in good shape and he loves the game. To be honest, the time off was probably good for him because it gave him a chance to rest his back. I'm not sure how much he will practice the rest of the season. We need to do whatever it takes to keep him as healthy as possible. Someone once said the greatest ability is "availability" and we certainly need to do whatever we can to make sure he's available to play.
 
Q: We're deep into what has been a grueling road trip (four out of last five games), is that weighing on the team at all right now?
 
A: I'm not insensitive to our player's needs, especially when it comes to rest. I know when I'm tired they must be, too. But I'm not tired. I'm amped. I'm excited. We don't have time to be tired. We have too much work to do if we're going to be as good as we can be down the stretch. When I was a young boy the first real book I read was a biography on John Paul Jones, our nation's first Navy hero who led us to victories in the days of the Revolutionary War. I fell in love with John Paul Jones and embraced his mentality. So many of his most memorable quotes apply to our team, our situation and the mentality we need to embrace as a team in the next six to eight weeks. "I have not yet begun to fight!" "If fear is cultivated it will become stronger; if faith is cultivated it will achieve mastery." "I wish to have no connection with any ship that does not sail fast; for I intend to go into harm's way!" "It seems to be a law of nature, inflexible and inexorable, that those who will not risk cannot win." "If this war should continue, I wish to have the most active part in it."
 
When we go into games, I want to coach the team that has that kind of fighting spirit, the team that plays aggressively and has the most active part in the battle. I came away from the loss at Barry feeling like we – as a team – have not yet begun to fight. But we're going to. Mental and physical fatigue are not options. I don't think we played as hard against Barry as we could have or needed to. Maybe we were working as hard as we could and just weren't able to overcome their superior talent and size. Either we gave up too many easy baskets to Barry because our effort wasn't as good as it had been in earlier games, or Barry's talent and depth just overwhelmed us. Either way, we have to get better, play harder, develop more toughness. I'm very happy with this team and with their work ethic, but we can do better. We can't afford to ever be satisfied. We're a small row boat sailing the high seas against some very tall ships, and we have to fight for our lives every night. Every guy has to pull his weight on the oar. We can't accept anything less than that. That mentality has to define us down the stretch.
 
Q: Palm Beach Atlantic is 5-9 and have lost nine straight games. However, they seem to be in every game, and a few of those losses have come by one possession (against Lynn, Florida Tech and Paine). What is your take on this PBA squad?
 
A: First of all, I pay no attention to won-loss records. Not theirs. Not ours. I measure a team by how hard it competes and how well it executes. I had no idea what PBA's record was or how many games they lost in a row. But since you brought it up: They beat a very good Benedict team on the road and beat a good Morehouse team and a good Flagler team. You can't win those games without a good team, so I know they're a good team. Secondly, you mention their nine straight losses. That streak began with a loss at Florida Southern, who was number one or two in the country at the time. Most everybody loses that game. They played poorly in a loss at Rollins, in part because Rollins was exceptional that day and also in part because PBA was without some key pieces to their team and definitely out of sorts. A clunker game for PBA and those happen to everyone over the course of a season. But when you analyze that losing streak you have to come away impressed with PBA and you certainly have to know how dangerous this game is for us.
 
During the losing streak that began with Florida Southern and includes a loss at Rollins, they dropped an eight point game on the road to a very good Bowie State team; lost a two-point game on the road to an ultra-talented Florida Tech team; lost at Barry, who I think is best in the country, by about the same margin we lost to them; and lost an eight-point game at Tampa, who is playing about as well as anyone in our league right now. At home they lost a three-point game to Lynn, who is undefeated in our league and probably a top 10 or 15 team; lost a two-point game to a very talented Paine College team; and lost a three-point game to Saint Leo, one of our league's best teams. PBA isn't a team getting beat by 30 every night. They are a team that is in just about every game and has beaten some good teams.
 
They have four starters back from a team that beat us by 19 at their place last year. And the second time we played them we won by nine but they pushed us to the brink. They start four seniors and a junior who is a DI transfer. They have a 6-10 center, a 6-7 center and a couple of 6-6 and 6-5 forwards so they're bigger than we are. They have a wonderful defensive team and when they knock down threes – in two games last year they were 24 of 45 against us – they are a nightmare to play. Clayton Williams scored 30 and 25 in two games against us last season. Ronnell Ross, who I think is one of the best players we face all year, had 18 points and nine rebounds at our place after getting seven points and 12 rebounds in their win against us. Evin Graham had nine points and 12 assists in their win over us and 16 points and 10 assists in the loss to us. This is a very, very talented team and we will need to play our best to beat them. They earned our respect last year. I can't imagine our guys going into this game thinking it's going to be easy because PBA lost nine in a row. Heck, anybody could lose nine in a row playing that schedule.
 
Q: Last year, PBA scored 88 points on NSU twice (the Sharks split the season series, 1-1). What can NSU to prevent that kind of shootout this season?
 
A: Until PBA is fully admitted to the Sunshine State Conference, games against them are always going to be "trap" games. Games against them count in your overall record, but they don't count in the league standings. Because of that, players have a tendency not to value the game as much as they normally might. And I know we're going to work on some things that we want to do against Florida Tech in our game against them. We will use Tuesday's practice and Wednesday's game to try and do some things we want to do against Florida Tech. We won't do much game-planning for PBA. That probably won't help us against PBA, but hopefully it helps us Saturday against Tech. Our emphasis for PBA will be to play hard, try to do a better job in transition and pressuring their shooters. But if they shoot it like they did last year, we will be in for a long evening.
 
Q: Can it be a challenge to keep teams focused on nonconference opponents in late January?
 
A: Sometimes you overlook nonconference opponents and don't invest the same effort into playing the game that you might against a conference opponent. But by the same token, there is less pressure on your guys to win, and sometimes that helps them to relax and play better. As a coach, you never know what you're going to get in these games. PBA will be on a mission to beat us, partly because they did it last year and know that they can and partly because some of their guys had career nights against us. They have a losing streak they want to end, they're playing at home, and they're confident that if they play well they can beat us. We're not an over-whelming team physically so we aren't going to scare them or intimidate them with our presence. I'm confident that Dave Balza (PBA's head coach) uses games against the SSC teams to really jazz his team up and sell them on playing their best, earning respect from teams in our league. It's a much bigger deal for them than it is for us.
 
I doubt that either team scores as easily as we did against each other last year. Their defense is very stingy and Dave does a great job in game preparation. We may be investing our time in preparing for Florida Tech Saturday and not PBA Wednesday, but our defense is better than it was a year ago and I think – if we play hard – that we won't give up some of the easy baskets and open looks that PBA got last year. If both teams play hard it will be a close game, probably go down to the wire, and whoever makes big shots or gets to the foul line most will probably win. But we better play hard and play with tremendous effort or PBA's guys will have a party against us like they did a year ago.
 
Q: What are you hoping to see most from your team Wednesday?
 
A: I want to see if our older guys are mature enough to bring the kind of fight and effort you have to have to win a tough game on the road, even though it's not a game that counts in our league standings. I want to see what kind of pride we have when it comes to defending and rebounding against a bigger, talented team. I want to see if we can make adjustments to take away some of the threes that they made against us last year. I want to see us improve in the areas of ball movement and recognition and execution. I want to see us fight for 40 minutes, not 15 or 20 minutes, because that's what it will take for us to compete in every game from here on in. We've done a good job of competing going back to the Missouri-Saint Louis win before our Holiday break. We can't afford to take a night off or go backwards. As well as we played at times Saturday at Barry, it was not close to our best effort and that's unacceptable. We need to give our best effort.