UCLA 85, Washington 79
December 21, 2001 | Men's Basketball
UCLA 85, Washington 79
Dec. 20, 2001
Bank of America Arena, Seattle, Wash.
Post-game Quotes
WASHINGTON HEAD COACH BOB BENDER
General Remarks:
"It is a difficult loss because of the determination and effort from the guys. I am very proud but I hate to use that as a lead-in to explain that it was a loss and in some ways you feel like you wasted that emotion and effort in a game that came down to making plays down the stretch. We were inefficient and our inefficiencies down the stretch negated all those things. I've said this all season, but I won't use inexperience as an excuse and the four wins that we have had against this team in Seattle have come down to the last six minutes and we have had answers, tonight we did not. We got ahead of ourselves and got punished for it."
On UCLA's inside-outside threat:
"Two different things are going to be threats. You are going to give up the chance of threes from Kapono or twos from Gadzuric and Jason Kapono is a good player. Good players are going to get the ball where it needs to go and let their offense come to them and they did time and time again. He wasn't ineffective by any stretch of the imagination."
On Doug Wrenn:
"I was very proud of him, he has handled all the things from this week very well, both in practice and in his approach to the game and the other guys responded to it well. I see him maturing and the maturity is something that when you are around him everyday it is easier to see. You always have to be very supportive and teach him to keep his emotions in check. He needs to learn to rely on us instead of other people and those are lessons he will learn."
On Jeffrey Day:
"Tonight was good for him and he will get better from it. I thought he came into the game very active, bobbled a couple balls, but in that position and a game like this I thought he handled it very well."
On the first three minutes of the second half:
"It was the key from the sense of the big, emotional first half of what we were doing well, of what we were doing with the lead and to have it dissipate that quickly. We make a couple buckets but we get no stops. Our defense allowed them to score right away and then we couldn't score right away and the lead was gone."
UCLA HEAD COACH STEVE LAVIN
On the play of the Huskies:
"We knew we'd get their best punch coming out of the gate, because they are so young and athletic. We wanted to try and wear them down. They are a young, gifted, talented team that will definitely beat some people this year, and will be a dangerous foe in the years to come. In fact, it reminds me a lot of the team we had two years ago. We were young and quick, but we didn't know how to play. It cost us a lot in close games, games on the road, and in the tournament."
On Dan Gadzuric:
"When Dan Gadzuric plays like he is capable of at both ends of the floor, it allows us to take our game to the next level."
On keys to the game:
"Our three keys to the game tonight were transition, because they are so quick, dribble penetration, because they are so quick, and second shots off the glass, again because of their quickness. In the first half, we weren't doing what we needed to do in any of these facets of the game. In the second half, we pretty much did what we wanted to do."
On first half/second half dichotomy:
"At halftime, I told our team to settle down - we were making crazy passes, zinging the ball all over the place. We needed to execute our offense, and quit being beaten to the punch on the boards. We wanted to get the ball inside and be patient, make the extra pass to spread the defense out. Then when Jason Kapono starting hitting his threes, it opened things up for inside."
