Marshall University Athletics
Marshall Postgame Quotes: South Carolina
12/1/2014 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
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Head Coach Dan D'Antoni:
Opening Statement:
"We started slow again. I've got to find the key to starting the motor a little earlier. I think overall what I will take from the game was that we played hard all the way through, especially the second half. They could've given up, but they didn't. I shrank the lineup and when you play competition like this, you find the people who can raise their game up and the ones who get stuck in the middle. We made a lot of mistakes, but overall the effort was good. We continued to play and ended up scoring around one point more than they [South Carolina] did in the second half. It might help me to decide the six, seven, or eight players that we're going to play and give them a chance to gel and try and get better as we go through this year."
On adjustments in the second half
"We tried to play better. I know you guys like to write about adjustments, but I've been in a lot of different locker rooms. Usually, you find out, the adjustments are made after the game, once you see what happens, you can tell them and adjust it. The adjustments we make are trying to correct what we're trying to do and do it better. We didn't do a great job. We came out the very first play and we were chasing. We told them in walk-through that if you start chasing these guys, they're athletes that will rip and get to the rim. If you start chasing them on defense, you're going to be in a lot of trouble. I thought we didn't get them pinned in to our sideline and keep them down like we wanted to. Once they get you in a little disarray, the wheels start coming off. I thought we did a little better job of doing what we do. Again, if we're going to play up to this level, which I think we can, you have to be very good at your schemes and at what you're doing. Tonight, we were not. We just have to get a little better. I was proud that we didn't quit. It's a growing process. I thought the second half, they made a little step. It's going to be ugly sometimes, until we get this right, but it'll get right. I was happy with some of the things that happened as far as understanding our personnel."
On Ryan Taylor bouncing back
"I think Ryan bounced back in the second half because of who we were playing. It's funny how things work. If all the pieces fit a little better, everyone plays better. I just thought the first half, we came out and the ball wasn't moving in the places we were supposed to move, and the defense wasn't doing what we've asked them to do. Unless you're a great-great player, it's hard to be good in a system that people are coordinated in. In the second half, he started playing a little harder. It's the execution with energy that the majority of our kids seem to struggle with. If that's the case, I have to start whittling down to allow the ones that can produce to play, and the ones who can't will have to sit and watch"
On players buying into the system
"I think that's huge. Just to let you know, we go game to game basically the same. I want to know what they do, because that's part of it. No matter what they're doing, we're doing the same thing. We have to will them to us, and not us start chasing them. If we're going to start chasing them, we're going to have to have the tom athletes in the country. But I do think, we can find that athletes that can get in here, run a certain system, and do it well. It takes time and experience to do that. None of these guys, even if they're seniors, have done this. It will take time for that to be coordinated and will take time for me to really make sure who are personnel is going to be."
On what coach sees in practice versus games
"I do think we have a better overall aura in the team. They are trying to pull together. From what I understand, that hasn't been the case here for the last few years. In our locker room, there are about eight or so that played under that system. Winning is a habit. It's a learned response. Playing good is one thing, but winning is another. Right now, we go through the motions in practice. They have the ability to do it, but they don't react mentally quick enough. When they hit a wall, they crumble instead of run through. The only thing I know, and I know it works, is to keep pressing the attack. There's a tenacity it takes to win. Sometimes as a coach, you look at people and see their talent and expect them all to have that tenacity, and not everyone is gifted with that. I have to be able to sort it out and find who it is."
Player Quotes
On what South Carolina did to force deflections and steals early to disturb the offensive flow...
"They do play hard and they deny, but I think most of it was us making late passes, bad reads and stuff. I think it was more us then them."
Jay Johnson
"It's more us not playing harder off the ball. Making harder cuts to get open. Just doing the hard stuff to make the game easier for us."
