Dec. 15, 2014
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GEORGIA TECH COACH Brian Gregory
Opening Statement
“That’s a well-coached team that we played tonight. They do a really good job. Coach Fox is going to do really great things there. I like that team we just played. And on the other end, I thought that we played well. We did some good things. We didn’t get off to a great start, went to our bench, and those guys really responded well. Robert Sampson, in particular, has been playing well for us and did a really good job tonight. We got good minutes out of Corey Heyward and Ben Lammers as well. Those guys really gave us a big lift. And Chris Bolden has been playing better. That’s a good luxury to have and it was very important today. I liked our energy on defense. We have got to keep getting better there. We did a good job on the glass again with 13 offensive rebounds. Marcus, the last 12 minutes of the second half, was tremendous. Even though he got into foul trouble in the second half with three offensive fouls. I thought we did some really good things. We need to continue to improve so this was a good step for us.”
On team’s ability to attack on offense
“Everybody knows that old adage that the first game after finals at Tech is always sluggish. It kind of started out that way, but that’s where those other guys gave us a boost and gave us energy. When the starters went back in, it just kind of continued to flow. We were moving the ball well. We took care of the ball. We ended up with 14 assists and 11 turnovers. I think three of those 11 turnovers probably came in the last two or three minutes of the game. So we were probably at a two-to-one assist-to-turnover clip before that, which is good. We did some good things. I thought we moved the ball well and shared the ball. We attacked any time they pressured. And our pace was better. We can still get a lot better and we’re going to have to.”
On team’s shooting from beyond the arc
“We’ve got to keep shooting those. I think Marcus had a couple of wide open ones. Tadric had six good looks. You just have to keep putting in the time, getting our shots up. When we break though, maybe we will go 14 of 15 instead of 2 of 15. The thing is though, even if you miss those, it’s an open shot. To get an open shot means you’ve broken down the defense. Broken down defenses don’t rebound. So we have to be aggressive and keep taking those shots. If we can start knocking down a couple of shots, we can get so much better offensively.”
“His percentages aren’t great right now- I’m OK with that. At times he takes some tough shots- I’m OK with that because he’s good offensively. What we need to do is just work on the daily habits of being disciplined offensively and he’s going to continue to blossom. We need to keep working on the defensive end with him. And he’s going to be a heck of a player. I think he’s got some growth he can do right now, and if he does it’s only going to make us better.”
On Marcus Georges Hunt’s leadership on the court
“That was big that he kind of took over that game in that eight-minute stretch. That was big because we needed that. And I have been challenging him a lot lately in practice. He’s not in that position anymore to just sit back and be one of the guys. He’s an unbelievable kid, so that kind of aggressiveness and leadership is out of his comfort zone a little bit. But we need that. I think he’s starting to get it. But it doesn’t start overnight; it’s kind of a process. He’s an intelligent kid, and I think that he’s earned the respect of everybody. So that leadership role is going to continue to increase.”
APPALACHIAN STATE COACH JIM FOX
Opening Statement
“Obviously a lot of credit to Georgia Tech. I think they had a game plan. Really after the first four minutes I thought they switched defenses and really slowed us down. I thought that that put us on our heels a little bit and from that point on we struggled to get into a flow. I think that was a credit to them and the adjustments they made early. And obviously we just fouled too much. We put them at the foul line and gave them free points. We’re learning. It’s a process for our guys. We have to learn how to play defense without fouling. I’m proud of the way our guys fought. We didn’t surrender. We had a couple guys battling their butts off so I was proud of that. We’re going to get better from this.”
Difference in win over Virginia Tech
“We had 19 offensive rebounds back at Virginia Tech. We had three tonight – all by one guy. I think Georgia Tech did a good job keeping us off the glass. We have to find ways to score. I don’t think we did much in transition. Also I think they made some adjustments defensively that really slowed our flow down. We’re still in the process of learning our offensive system and when things don’t go well we tend to revert back. That’s what I just told the guys. We’re in that limbo land right now and we have to do a better job of trusting the system, staying in the system and being able to take what we did in practice and bring that over to a game.”
Georgia Tech’s defensive adjustments
“I thought they went with a patient pressure. By going with that patient pressure I thought it really slowed us down.”
Did the zone press take you out of rhythm?
“Yeah I think it did. I thought it did. It’s something we work against a lot. And for some reason we are struggling right now to take things from the practice floor over to when we play with the lights on. That’s something we will get better at as the year goes on. This was a great experience for us. We’ll take lessons from this game and we’ll make adjustments. We played the schedule we did because we tried to challenge ourselves to get ready for our league schedule come January. We are going to gain experience from this and we’ll get better from this.”
Foul total discrepancy
“We fouled more than they did. We have to learn to defend. I thought we attacked in the first couple of minutes and then I thought we were on our heels for the rest of the game. And when you’re on your heels you’re not attacking. I didn’t think Georgia Tech stopped attacking. They kept going right at us and causing us to foul.”
