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EA SPORTS MAUI INVITATIONALNovember 26, 2013Andre HollinsAustin HollinsRichard PitinoLAHAINA, HAWAII Arkansas – 87 COACH PITINO: Tale of two halves, certainly, when it comes to the defense. Did a good job the first half, did not do a good job in the second half, but you've got to give Arkansas all the credit. They just beat us, especially in the second half in every facet. They did a great job. We give them all the credit. Q. Do you guys feel like with the defense, especially in the second half, was it more an issue of aggressiveness on your part, or was there something that you guys were seeing in particular from Arkansas that was just really tough to stop? STUDENT‑ATHLETE: Plain and simple, they just out‑toughed us today. We fought well in the first half and we came out in the second half and they punched us first, and we tried to beat them to it, but we didn't play as hard as we should have. Q. Austin, can you just talk about at what point did you feel like it got away from you? Obviously you guys fought it until the very end, but there was a point there where Arkansas made that run. AUSTIN HOLLINS: I mean, like he said, we started the second half, Andre said they punched us first. They went on a run in the second half. We dug ourselves in a hole and we were trying to dig out of that the second half. Q. Just talk about their defensive pressure, and since you guys are both guards, talk about what it was like facing the pressure, especially in the second half when they had the momentum going. AUSTIN HOLLINS: You know, we just had a lot of careless turnovers. It's not something that we're not used to. It's something we do every day because we're a pressing team, as well. The pressure didn't really bother us as much. We had a lot of careless turnovers. Q. For Coach, obviously the team's interior defense looked pretty good yesterday, and now an extra body in there, but what did you see differently from that crew? COACH PITINO: I thought yesterday I think people gained a little respect for us yesterday with how hard we played. We were physical, we were tough, we were scrappy, and I think we kind of set the tone for the way that we wanted to play, and they basically‑‑ Arkansas beat us at our own game. They were tougher. They were scrappier. They started the second half, and we talked about it because we didn't start the second half for Syracuse very well, and we talked in the locker room about not letting them get off to a good start. I believe they started on a 10‑0 run. We were up five and then we were down five right away. I didn't like the beginning and the middle of the second half, just our intensity. I thought we just backed down from them. We didn't fight like we did last night. And you're going to get beat, and I think that's the way it goes. Q. With Mo, how long do you think that's going to take for him to shake that rustiness off? COACH PITINO: Yeah, we talked about Mo. You can't think you're going to come in and be fresh. This time of year you're preparing so much, so he's not really in on the preparation part of it. You know, so hopefully he gets some more minutes tomorrow, and then by the time we get back we can really rely on him. Q. For both of you, with one more game left before you hit the rest of the non‑conference season, what do you hope to‑‑ obviously a win, but what do you hope to gain to have some momentum going into the Big Ten? AUSTIN HOLLINS: I mean, like you said, we want to win, so we've got to come out and play better than we did today. We're trying to get better every game, and we didn't play to our full potential today. Tomorrow we want to come out with a lot more effort, a lot more heart. ANDRE HOLLINS: Yeah, like Austin said, got to come out, got to learn from these two losses. We definitely don't want to go 0‑2 or 0‑3, so we have to come out and play intense. We have to come out and play our brand of basketball. Q. For Andre, the team shot really well as a whole in the first half and in the second half that dropped quite a bit. Do you guys feel that's kind of a product of defense really driving the team, and when your defense suffers you see your offense suffer, as well? ANDRE HOLLINS: Yeah, it was just we gave up too many easy baskets. They had a lot of dunks, and they were just more aggressive than we were. That led to them getting the momentum and getting their juices flowing on defense. It kind of bothered us. We've just got our work to do. Q. Coach, did any Arkansas player jump off the page in your mind? COACH PITINO: Yeah, a lot of them jumped off the page to be honest. They've got perfect players for the way that they want to play. They play hard, they're athletic, they're fast. So I thought top to bottom, they came in with some guys off the bench, Kingsley with seven points and four rebounds in just 10 minutes, brought great value. They do a really good job of recruiting to their system, and I think they have a really good team. They'll be a tough team in the SEC. Q. Loose balls and deflections‑‑ COACH PITINO: I didn't get it, sorry. Q. And Maverick, is he available and healthy? COACH PITINO: Yeah. Q. For either of you, talk about playing with Malik. Seems like he's been playing pretty well. At the same time to try to get the consistency from the guards in general, how would you do that moving forward? ANDRE HOLLINS: Malik brings great energy, that senior leadership, off the bench. He played great this tournament. He's great to come in if I was having a bad night, Austin is having a bad night, we always have that extra weapon. He's doing a great job. Q. Seems like you guys really had turnovers under control at the beginning of the season, and then the last couple games you've had quite a few again. Is that just a matter of‑‑ I don't know, what are your thoughts on that? AUSTIN HOLLINS: Well, I mean, a lot of them are unforced. I think it's just being careless with the ball and not a matter of‑‑ there were a few turnovers that we had due to the press, but I think a lot of it was just not being smart with the ball. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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