University of Memphis Athletics
Postgame Quotes
Dec 01, 2010 | Men's Basketball
Dec. 1, 2010
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Postgame Quotes
#14/15 Memphis (6-0) 78, Arkansas State (1-6) 71
Dec. 1, 2010
FedExForum - Memphis, Tenn.
Memphis Head Coach Josh Pastner
Opening Statement
My thoughts are -- this is my second year as a head coach -- I have never been more disappointed in a way a group of guys and the way they played tonight; Absolutely disappointed in them. We got outplayed by Arkansas State, and we were fortunate to get the "W".
I am extremely upset right now. I am so disappointed in our effort because there was no sense of urgency tonight. I have told the guys before our last two or three games that we cannot afford to take any team lightly. We are not good enough to do that. We are not able to just show up and expect to win.
We had a 23-5 lead, and we just let up. We played unsound, shot 25 three-point shot attempts and didn't have any carry over from what we worked on in practice. It became the "disease of me" the way we played offensively. It was dribble, dribble, dribble instead of passing the ball and working it inside.
I was disappointed in our leadership, and that is why we don't have a captain right now. I am very frustrated with our play right now. This can't happen with what we want to do this year. We were fortunate to get the win tonight. When you play a game as poorly as we did, which is a credit to Arkansas State and they deserve all the credit, to still get the "W" and still learn lessons, we were fortunate to get it.
Shot selection
It's not real careful; its 25 three-point attempts out of 58. They played a 2-3 zone, and we fell right into what they wanted to do. It is ridiculous. I am sick to my stomach right now with the way we played. The fans don't deserve that. It is a privilege to be on this floor, and to come out with no sense of urgency and to take it for granted drives me up the wall. I can't stand negativity, and I can't stand when people take things for granted. I can't stand when things are being coddled. That's how our team played today, thinking we could take them for granted. We played like it was a right to be on the floor, and that is wrong.
We have to change some things, and we have to change them in a hurry before we play Saturday. If we play like this Saturday, we will get our butts beat by 15 or 20 points. We need to have a whole change of the landscape of our mentality. Our guys have to wake up and understand that it is a privilege to be on the floor, and they cannot take it for granted. They are blessed to be able to have what they have, and they should play every possession like it is the last possession.
Arkansas State Head Coach John Brady
Opening Remarks
We had a chance to win it. We make a free throw at the end of the game (regulation), and we may have won the game because they struggled with getting a shot off of any quality. Then we come out and score the first four of the overtime.
I knew that we couldn't shut them out obviously, but we made a mistake in the coverage of (Wesley) Witherspoon. He is left handed, and he wants to drive it. Malcolm (Kirkland) didn't cut him off. We wanted Witherspoon to shoot a jump shot, but he got by us to the rim. We came down, got it to Martavius (Adams) in the paint, and we were still up two, but he fumbled it. He just didn't convert it.
But we did a lot of good things during the course of this game. We rebounded even with them. We didn't shoot it well from the three, but we made enough. We made our free throws in the second half, and we got to the foul line. We changed from man (defense) to zone to try and keep them off their rhythm of play a little bit. Martavious had seven turnovers. But other than that the rest of our team didn't turn it over at all against their pressure, which is a good, positive sign.
We grew a little bit tonight. If we would have played like this against Ole Miss down there, we would have won the game, and we certainly would have beaten Pepperdine had we had this kind of effort.
For our team to come out and play like this, in this type of environment, was big. I mean Memphis never loses here at FedEx(Forum). It was a good game for our team. I am a little disappointed that we lost, but I am certainly proud of the things we did. Our job now is to carry this into practice, the game Monday and the game next Sunday. We just have to get our team to play the way they are capable of playing the way they did tonight.
Talk about the impact that your defense had tonight.
We played some zone, and then we went back to man. I think they (Memphis) were a little bit surprised that we were right there with them. We didn't give them transition baskets. They only had 15 baskets off of our turnovers and we had 20 points on theirs. Last year we came in here and we gave up 28 points off of our turnovers, so we improved in that category. But to hold Memphis without a basket for the last five minutes is good for any team. It is just too bad that we couldn't make the play that we needed and they did.
