BearTalk

Here are some highlights from separate press conference conducted today by Cal’s Mike Montgomery (on the phone) and Louisville’s Rick Pitino (on campus with a video replay):

Rick Pitino, Louisville:

– Pitino called the eighth-seeded Bears “the toughest first-round opponent I’ve ever faced.” Sounds like hyperbole, but it may be correct. Understand that in 13 previous trips to the NCAA Tournament with Providence, Kentucky and Louisville, Pitino’s squad has been the lower-seeded team just once. Pretty amazing.

His 1987 Providence team, for all its Cinderella lore, was a No. 6 seed. His took six Kentucky teams to the tournament, and four of them were No. 1 seeds, one was a No. 2 and the other a No. 3. His 2009 Louisville team was a No. 1, and only the 2004 squad, which was seeded No. 10 and played No. 7 Xavier, was the lower-placed team.

– More from Pitino on Cal: “They’re a very good basketball team. Under normal conditions, I’d make Cal a 4 or 5 seed. But the Pac-10 was down this year. They’ve been a very high RPI team the entire year and their strength of schedule has been strong.

“They’re a good team. If we beat them, we’ve played a great basketball game.”

– On the 10 p.m. EDT tipoff Friday night in Jacksonville: “Our guys don’t go to bed until 3 or 4, so it doesn’t bother us.”

– Pitino said senior guard Jerry Smith (8.4 ppg, 3.2 rpg), who started all 29 games before injuring his thumb on March 6 against Syracuse, had not practiced since, but likely will play in a limited role against Cal.

– Pitino said poor foul shooting has perhaps cost the Cardinals three victories. Otherwise, the Cardinals could have had a 14-4 Big East season. He added that aside from senior point guard Edgar Sosa, who has had a “brilliant” season, nobody else on the team really had a special year. But the team has overcome those things to be productive. “It’s been an interesting and intriguing season,” he said.

– Pitino said he tried recruiting Cal senior forward Jamal Boykin, who wound up at Duke out of high school before transferring to Berkeley. “He’s improved,” Pitino said. “He uses his left hand as much as his right hand.”

– On Jerome Randle’s shooting range: “He’ll pull up deeper than any player in college basketball. He’ll shoot from a good 5 feet past the pro (3-point) line. And he’ll take three or four of those a game.”

–  On his general impressions of what Montgomery has achieved with this team: “They’re very fundamentally sound. He inherited this senior class and has done a terrific job with them. They don’t beat themselves, they’re an excellent passing team, they move well . . . they play like a senior team.”

– On how early season injuries impacted Cal’s overall record and the Bears’ reputation: “They’re a top-20 basketball team, a dominant team. We’re facing one of the more underrated teams in the country. We’re up against it and we know it. Every waking moment we have, we’re studying Cal.”

Mike Montgomery, Cal:

– On his impressions of Louisville after watching video Sunday night and Monday morning: “They’re very aggressive,  athletic, very well-coached. They run through their stuff hard. They have a variety of presses they will use. They’re primarily a zone team, but have played some man. They may look at us and decide they have different idea.

“Beating Syracuse twice and knowing first-hand how good Syracuse is, and the fact that their league, game-in and game-out is so difficult , certainly they’re battle-tested. Rick traditionally has teams that play very hard, and this team is no exception.”

– On 6-9, 260-pound sopohmore Samardo Samuels: “Samuels is a load inside. He’s a big guy they go to. He posts very hard. Obviously, given our size contraints, he will cause us problems. They go to him, they try to isolate him. He’s a guy who’s produced pretty consistently.”

 – On coaching against Rick Pitino: “If Rick and I were out playing one on one, I would be preparing very hard to work on my crossover and my dunk from the dotted line. Since we’re not, I’m more concerned about my players. I know Rick is a great coach, has a great history and his teams are always well prepared. Other than that, I try not to get caught up in that too much. That’s for others.”

– On assessing the strengths of his team: ”We shoot the ball pretty well. We do have a veteran team. I’ve only been here two years with these guys. It’s not like we built this thing from scratch.We’ve come a long way as far as understanding what our strengths are and how we like to play.

“We lost five big guys since I’ve been here that we would have/don’t have, that would have changed things appreciably. When we do move the ball, we can be pretty tough.”

OK, the five guys? Ryan Anderson (early to the NBA), Taylor Harrison (medical retirement), Jordan Wilkes (graduated last spring with one year of eligibility left), Harper Kamp (injury redshirt this season) and freshman Bak Bak (acadmically ineligible since early January).

– On being sent 2,787 miles to Jacksonville, Fla.: ”Initially, we thought it was an 11 a.m. game. I would have started crabbing then. With daylight savings, that would have been like playing at 7 a.m. But we got the late game, and we’ve got time to get there, time to prepare.

“I’ve always felt the people who support you, the parents of the kids, should be in a position to see their team play. When you move a team 3,000 miles, it makes it more difficult for everybody. I never thought that was right . . . We’re going to deal with it, go and play with the intention of winning.”