Our kids really stepped up on the defensive end. It was just a great team effort on both ends of the floor. |
Our shot selection hurt us in the first half, hurt our defense, and that was really disappointing. |
Our shot selection hurt us in the first half. After that I thought we (gave) a valiant effort. |
P.J.'s going to figure it out. |
Paul is very intelligent. He's very skilled, has great hands and can do a turnaround jumper from 6 feet to 18 feet on the block. |
Sean's gotten stronger. He understands it better, so he's not out of position. He's guarded the best player some nights -- he's come a long way. |
The difference in the game was that it 50 to 50, and they hit shots and we didn't during that stretch. Jacobson made some tough, tough shots. |
The first four minutes we got any shot we wanted. Then they turned it up. The thing about SIU... is you might think it's a good look and then all of a sudden there's a guy running at you and closing and playing it and with unbelievable effort. The ground that they cover is just amazing. |
The four-way race has been fun. It says a lot about our league. There are no bad teams. Every game is hard and you can't take anything for granted. It's been a challenging year for everybody. You don't get a day off. You are constantly going from one battle to the next. |
The guys have been pretty shielded from it. I expect practice to go well and our focus to stay where it is. I don't see us changing. That doesn't mean we're going to play great. But I expect us to because we're continuing to practice well. |
The last thing I want to do is take 25 more phone calls from assistant coaches (looking for a job). When I get an assistant coach, I'm going to announce it as soon as I can. |
The reason you can be confident is because our league is so good. |
There's more pressure on us to play well. |
There's no question were gonna get their best shot. Hopefully, we're up to the challenge and we'll match their emotion early in the game and let them know we're for real. |
They got out of the gate hot and that was the difference in the game. |