Post-Game Quotes
December 08, 2007 | Men's Basketball
Dec. 8, 2007
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Head Coach Lorenzo Romar:
Opening Statement:
"The Pitt team was a very good basketball team. Their guard, Levance Fields, did a good job controlling his team. He made a couple of big shots. In the first half, they out-scrapped us, but in the second half we came back and scrapped a little harder. We don't have a win to show it but we pulled ourselves together. As a team, we made progress. I know winning is what it's all about but also you're making progress to put yourself in a position to win on a consistent basis. That's what we're looking for. It is great to have Ryan Appleby back with us."On the final play: "My thoughts were, as he continued to dribble, if he could possibly get there in time. I knew it would be difficult when he saw a little daylight at half-court as he split the defenders I thought maybe he could get to the lane and make the play. When he eventually shot the ball, I thought it was going to be really close. When they reviewed on the monitor, the ball was in his hand when the red light came on. I thought our guys were hanging in there all the way to the end of this game. If we can continue to put forth an effort like that, we will eventually become a consistently good basketball team."
On the areas where the Huskies made the greatest strides: "I thought there were more possessions in this game and we did a decent job of guarding. We also only turned the ball over eight times. 18 assists on 29 field goals is a pretty good job."
On the lineup change: "We went with those who had shown the biggest commitment to defense. Nothing else. Stats, nothing else mattered. The ones who made the biggest commitment are the ones we went with."
On Artem Wallace: "They were beating us on the boards and when we went small we weren't doing very well. We needed someone who could make a physical presence in this game. It was an alley fight and Artem can get physical. I thought he did a nice job."
On having Ryan Appleby: "I didn't know he'd make every shot almost at the beginning, but that's what you get. He'd been practicing for a week and a half. What you saw today is what he's been doing in practice...We'd probably be disappointed if he didn't do that. That's what you expect from him.
On Quincy Pondexter: "He settled down a bit. He rebounds for us, he made some great plays...Today, Quincy played 25 minutes. He's been averaging 24 minutes. If he'd played 6 minutes, that would've been a message. He played, he just didn't start."
On being back on the floor:
"It felt good to be out there against a great team like Pittsburgh. On our home floor with the great crowd like we have every home game. It was fun. I've waited five weeks to get out there again and get a chance to play. There's no better feeling than that. It would've been great if we'd gotten the win though."On his health: "My thumb's not bad. It's not a hundred percent yet. But I tried to get through a little bit of it, what I have left. I'm trying to get my legs back from sitting out those five weeks. I did a bunch of conditioning and running but it's just not the same as playing up and down the floor and cutting and backpedaling and jumping and all of those things. I got tired for a little while there in the second half but I just kept plugging away.
On getting the first three-pointer out of the way: "I think it was Quincy who set me a great screen to get me open in the corner off the inbounds play. I just set my feet. I've got confidence that I can knock down shots, so I just go out there and try to do it."
On the last shot: "I thought it was good. I was watching JD and the clock at the same time. From where I was sitting, if I was the ref, I would've called it good."
On the wait before the last shot was called off: "It was a bunch of mixed emotions. In my head I was saying, `We won this game, we pulled it out. We didn't play really great but we made some strides and won the game.' But then I said, `Uh oh, what if we didn't win this game? It's going to be a tough loss.' I was going up and down both ways, even though I thought I was sure that the ball had gone in and the ball had left his hand before the clock went off."
On Pittsburgh: "They're a tough team to play against. At their place or [when they are] on the road. They do a really good job of controlling the game. Fields is a heavy point guard who knows how to play. They got a lead on us at the beginning of the second half and they did a good job of taking the air out of the ball and running a lot of isolations for Fields."
On the last shot:
"I saw three seconds on the clock and thought I could get off a shot by running the floor. I just shot it and then the buzzer went off. I was taught in that situation to try to get the shot off. I had already made up my mind to take it.On waiting for the official review: "It was frustrating not knowing. It is really hard because you have it and then they take it away from you and it feels like everything just went bad.
Pittsburgh Head Coach Jamie Dixon:
General Statement:
"You can't get a better game than that and to win it like we did, how we gathered ourselves up for the second half and played efficiently as a team in a lot of ways. We know how hard it is to win here, I know the winning streak is 30-something straight wins. I know how loud it is and I know from talking to the UCLA guys that this is the toughest place to play in the Pac-10. This is a great win for us against a team that played very well. Everybody knows how much respect I have for Coach [Lorenzo] Romar and their program, but they made shots. [Ryan] Appleby comes off just in time for us, I thought that was convenient. It's good to see our guys come together and when things got tough and they kept making tough shots, we made plays too. I thought we grew up a lot today, a young group grew up a lot today."On being in a situation waiting for the officials to decide the game: "I've never been in it and hope to never be in it again to be honest. It was about an hour and a half standing and waiting on the sideline there. The players kept coming over and saying that it wasn't good. Then we saw some people at the table saying it wasn't good. During that time we kind of had an inkling. I guess it was good TV, that's what we're here for."
On being down eight points in the first half: "I thought we were rushing some things, I thought we took some quick shots, some bad shots, and made bad decisions. I got in a timeout in the huddle and just let them know. I thought against their pressure we were dribbling and forcing some shots up. We prepared for it, we talked about it. It's something we haven't done well. We've struggled a little with that in our last game and even the game before that. The second half we were efficient as we could be. We shot 61% from the field and had two turnovers. You can't be more efficient than that in this type of environment and against this kind of team."
On Ryan Appleby's return: "I predicted when he got hurt 6 weeks ago that he would be ready for us. He made shots against us last year too. He's a difference maker for their team and add him to the mix and they become a different team."
On junior Forward Sam Young: "I felt really good at half time being down three points with Sam only playing three minutes and having two fouls. I just felt getting to half time still being in the game would be a good situation at that point. He hit big shots at the end of the half obviously. He really felt good. He hasn't shot it well, but today you could tell he had a good feel. He didn't force anything; he made the plays off of what we were trying to do."
On freshman Forward DeJuan Blair: "He was playing against one of the best players in the country [Jon] Brockman and he made big plays all the way through. He's very coach-able and a great teammate. The physical skills are evident."
