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NIT SEASON TIP-OFFNovember 28, 2008Matt PainterNEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK COACH MATT PAINTER: First of all, I was real proud of our team's effort today. I thought our guys played very hard. I thought we had some guys due to foul trouble, step up and get some major minutes off our bench, and really contribute. I thought Nemanja Calasan had a great game. I thought Lewis Jackson did some good things, and with the change in the defenses and different times I thought our guys had some struggles but they also stepped up and made some plays. But from an effort standpoint that's the one thing as a coach when you look back, can your guys go out there and lay it on the line and play hard. And I felt our guys did, I thought they did a very good job of being prepared and following our game plan and we just came up a little bit short. Q. The disparity, can you look at that and comment on that? COACH MATT PAINTER: I talked to our guys afterwards how things get called in a game. It's kind of like injuries, and you can't control it, so you gotta keep a positive attitude and stay out there and just battle, and like I said, we got into foul trouble, and I thought we had some guys come off the bench, play very well and do some good things. There's no doubt we're a better basketball team than we were three hours ago, and this stinks. We thought we had the game. We let it slip out of our hands, but Oklahoma made good plays. They're a good team, and they stepped up and won the game. Q. Can you talk about the play when I guess Jackson attempted to dish off the three to grant there. What happened on that? COACH MATT PAINTER: Well, with 16 seconds to go we were looking to attack and get to the basket or get those guys a wide open shot. But we really wanted to put (Lewis) Jackson, let him use his speed, get to the rim and get a layup with 10, 11, 12 seconds. We just said if he gets stuck, you're going to have a trail. We popped the other guy to the other side. If they stop you from getting your layup, look for him, but he kind of just dribbled to be passing the basketball there at the end of the game and it's a good learning lesson to him. He's gotta use his speed, get a layup and call time out and play defense. Obviously that's not what we were looking for at that time, but that's what we were trying to do at that time. It just didn't work out. Q. You gotta question the call that he enabled the timeout to be called where it appeared like the ball was in the air. COACH MATT PAINTER: Correct. You know, to me sometimes things don't go your way, but the explanation to me is still baffling. He said to me it was an inadvertent whistle, and so the ball now went to the possession arrow, and then Oklahoma had the possession arrow, so that's why they had it. And I was puzzled because as a coach, you hear it all, at least you think you hear it all, you know, and so when that came to me and he just said, instead of -- Q. Check the table? COACH MATT PAINTER: Exactly. When you get to the response of saying, hey, I blew it, didn't have possession but I called it and I messed it up, now it's their ball. At least as a coach, so one thing as a coach I think that you'll accept, hey, I missed the call, and when a referee says that, you just say, okay, didn't go our way. But when he came back with the inadvertent whistle, I don't believe it. And it's not fair. The game doesn't need to end that way, regardless of who wins. Q. The way your offense kind of slowed down the last seven and a half in regulation and the overtime. Is it more what they were doing with their defense? COACH MATT PAINTER: I think a little bit of both because they were changing. They went to a zone during the game and it slowed us down a little bit. We didn't get very good movement. Then we started making some 3s and we got them out of that zone. Then when they went back to it we weren't able to get as clean looks and the same type of movement we were getting before and a couple shots just didn't go down and against the zone you gotta be able to step up and make a shot. And when we were good in those stretches we made some. But he did a good job. He changed defense and we missed a couple and it worked to their advantage. Q. Is that something you can take out of this game for the rest of the season, the fact you showed a really good inside/outside balance and especially that streak of three and a half minutes where you nailed five straight 3s. COACH MATT PAINTER: Yes. And that's what we have to have. We have to have some good perimeter shooting but we also have to have good inside play, and I thought (Nemanja) Calasan did a very good job for us tonight. But it's the game of basketball. You gotta expect the unexpected and take the positives out of it and just keep moving on. Q. Things don't get any easier. You guys gotta play Duke on Tuesday. Can you talk about that game and what you bring out of here into that? COACH MATT PAINTER: Obviously the game got assigned in the summer about playing Duke, I thought it was a great opportunity for us, because I think he gets his guys to play very hard after watching them already a couple times. Out of the people I've watched so far, I think they're playing harder than anybody in the country. Probably it's a tie. I haven't seen enough people but out of the games I've watched during the holiday season I think Duke's playing so hard and he's got them going and it's going to be a great opportunity for us to go out there and compete. End of FastScripts |
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