|
|||
|
|||
|
 |
|
|
EA SPORTS MAUI INVITATIONALNovember 25, 2014Kim AndersonWes ClarkJohnathan Williams, IIILAHAINA, HAWAII Purdue – 82 THE MODERATOR: We welcome Coach Kim Anderson, Johnathan Williams, III, and Wes Clark to the press room this morning. Coach, an opening statement? COACH ANDERSON: Well, it wasn't very good. The first half was embarrassing. We didn't play very well. I thought Purdue did a great job. They had us back on our heels. We didn't execute very well, obviously. We challenged our guys in the second half, and I thought we did come back and play better. We made some shots. Thought we executed better. But overall you've got to give Purdue a lot of credit. They took it at us from the git‑go. They played an inspired brand of basketball. We didn't to start with. We did once we got behind, but we weren't aggressive. We weren't in attack mode. We were back on our heels. Q. Why do you think you guys were so timid early? JOHNATHAN WILLIAMS: I just think we weren't all the way prepared? We're going to have to bring as much effort as we should have, underestimated them. Purdue executed very well and played great defense. Q. Johnathan, the two seven‑footers, how did those guys kind of impact the way you guys wanted to play on both ends? JOHNATHAN WILLIAMS: They were extremely big, but it was kind of hard to guard. They kind of like stayed in the paint and kind of clogged things up a little bit for us. But I think overall Purdue played a great game. Q. You guys struggled with turnovers yesterday, and they were ready to take advantage of some of those today. Why were they so tough to keep out of transition? JOHNATHAN WILLIAMS: They probably just pushed the ball and put it on us. We should have gotten back, but in some plays we didn't, especially on turnovers. When you take bad shots it's kind of hard to get back on defense because everybody's out of position. So we just had to take better shots and stop turning the ball over in order to get that inside out in transition. Q. For both players, how important do you think it will be tomorrow to get a win and leave Hawaii with at least something in the good column? JOHNATHAN WILLIAMS: It's actually very big for us. We are down on ourselves a little bit at this time and a little uncomfortable, so it will be good to get back on track and kind of find ourselves and be a little bit more confident about our team while pushing forward. Q. Wes, I noticed you were in the sleeve on your knee today. How much was that bothering you from yesterday and what you did exactly? WES CLARK: Not a lot. Just a little sore, but we're still in good shape. THE MODERATOR: Questions for Coach. Q. You were pretty encouraged by the way your guys played Arizona yesterday. What was the difference in the first half especially? COACH ANDERSON: I thought Purdue just did a great job. I thought they were much, much more aggressive than we were. I don't think we came out with the same intensity level that we had yesterday, which is disappointing, because Purdue is a great basketball program, and it's a good team. Matt Painter does a great job. I think they came out more inspired than we did, and that shouldn't happen, especially when you're playing in this type of situation and in a tournament situation. I do think we got turned around a little bit in the second half. But come on, guys, let's be honest. They were up 34. So everybody was just hooping, and we did better. We did some things better, but certainly disappointing overall performance. Q. What did you think of the two seven‑footers and how they impacted the game? COACH ANDERSON: I think I was looking, and I was curious how many blocked shots they had, and they had eight. The two of them had five. But I think they changed your shots and we probably hadn't played anybody like that this year. We encouraged our guys to attack the basket, and we did to a certain extent. But I heard you asked the question. I thought they really did a great job in transition, they did. The reason they did a great job is because we were taking so many lousy shots in the first half. I mean, we were just chucking things up from three and that's not our game. We're a good shooting team, but we're not a great shooting team when we don't take good shots. The game was decided at fast breakpoints. They had second chance points. They had turnovers. I mean, there's a 26‑point advantage right there, so got to do a better job. Q. That was a less‑confident performance by Montaque than you've seen. Just how different were things for him today and how eye opening was the way they played? COACH ANDERSON: He's a freshman, you know? The further along you go the harder it's going to get because they're going to guard you. I mean, he just gave me the score sheet, and when you look on the score sheet it says Montaque Gill‑Ceasar is a leading scorer. So they're going to guard you. When you're young, you've got to learn how to overcome that. You have to learn how to move harder, how to come off screens better, how to guard better. It's not just him, it's everybody. I think when you're young it's been easier for you at the level you were at before. Not that it was easy, but it's been a little bit easier. Here, I mean, we're playing Purdue. It's a Big Ten school. They're coming after you. They got beat yesterday too. So we're going to have these growing pains. I mean, it's going to happen. On a positive side, I thought Deuce Bello came in, Namon Wright came in, Keanau Post came in. I thought they gave us some energy along with Keith there in the second half that enabled us to at least shrink the lead, to at least get the game back to where it was a 20‑point game. Our goal was to win the second half. I think we probably did but, again, when you're down as much as we were, you've got to find little victories. Q. You ditched the ESPN mic at halftime. Did you want to keep things private in that locker room? COACH ANDERSON: No, I told the guys at halftime there is nothing that I'm going to say that would be television worthy. Not that it was bad or anything, it's just I think it was a situation where I needed to coach my team and I didn't need to be on ESPN. They were seeing it live. They didn't need to hear any commentary from me because it probably wouldn't have been any better than the play. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
|
||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
About ASAP Sports •
FastScripts Archive •
Recent Interviews •
Captioning •
Upcoming Events •
Contact Us
FastScripts | Events Covered | Our Clients | Other Services | ASAP in the News | Site Map | Job Opportunities | Links |
|
ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297
|