University of Memphis Athletics
Postgame Quotes
Feb 22, 2011 | Men's Basketball
Memphis (21-7, 9-4) 69, Houston (12-14, 4-9) 58
February 22, 2011
FedExForum (Memphis, Tenn.)
Memphis Postgame Quotes
Memphis Head Coach Josh Pastner
What is the status of Antonio Barton?
Antonio, from what I have heard, had to be taken to the hospital. We don't know all the details. It could have just been simply dehydration, but he just kind of fell out at the last time out. He blacked out and just fell. Obviously anytime you are dealing with a blackout situation, you want to be precautionary, and that's why we took him right to the hospital just to make sure he is ok.
The other thing is Antonio played a lot of minutes. He played 33 minutes, a lot of minutes, and he played hard. He hit a huge three, a big-time three. Him and Charles (Carmouche)(hit) back-to-back threes. He'll (Antonio) be ok though.
Houston seemed to never go away tonight. What did you see about Houston that kept them in the game?
You know part of it is that Houston is a good team. They are well-coach by Coach (James) Dickey. They have good players and are a good team, and they are better than their record. We were fortunate to get a W tonight. I thought our guys played well.
Defensively, we did some good things, and we held them to 36 percent from the field. Again, that's good. We held them to 29 percent from three. They would have had less field goal percentage if it wasn't for them having 10 offensive rebounds. We turned them over 16 times. In the first half, we turned them over 11 times, and we had seven, but they beat us on points off of turnovers.
When you look at the stats, 16 assists on 22 made field goals, that is a big thing right there. That means we were unselfish and shared the ball very well. Tarik Black came through for us and played big. Charles Carmouche had some big second chance rebounds, offensive rebounds, in the second half. (Charles) is just a tough, hard-noised player, plus he had five assists.
I thought everybody contributed. Joe Jackson hit a big shot and some free throws. He hit that three pointer when we were in a rut. Joe hit a big time three. You know what, Joe had a tremendous attitude. It was the first game he didn't start all year long, and he didn't sulk or complain about it. He came in and battled and helped us win the basketball game. I was very, very proud of Joe Jackson. Wesley (Witherspoon) came in and played well for us as well.
Houston Head Coach James Dickey
Opening Remarks
Tonight we have the fourth leading free throw shooter in the nation at the line, and Zamal (Nixon) missed the front end of a one-and-one. Those shots could have put tremendous pressure on them (Memphis).
That is not to blame for our loss, but we have a chance right there where we have got to make a play. We have our best free throw shooter at the line and we just don't make it.
One of the best things we did in the first half of the game was rebound the ball. We didn't give up easy baskets. We played a little more zone than we thought we would, but that zone was really good to us. But you have got to rebound out of it (the zone defense), and we didn't capitalize on that in the second half.
I also thought that we had some transition situations where we would get two-on-one, or three-on-two, and we settled for jump shots or just simply a bad possession. You have got to execute with confidence down the stretch like you do at the beginning of the game.
This is a large crowd and a great atmosphere here, and I thought our guys handled it well. But at the end there, we just didn't make the plays that we needed. I know that sounds redundant, and I am sure our fans are asking, "When are we going to start making them?" and I feel the same way.
About shifting to the zone defense
We went to the two-three zone, and I thought that we played it well. We played it hard, and we thought it was the right time for us to get out there and shift to the zone.
But there again, the thing that gave them other opportunities was our lack of offensive rebounds in the second half. We didn't do that in the first half, but in the second half we gave up a lot.
Rebounding, to me, is about effort and just going out there and getting it done. About Memphis defending Alandise Harris in the second half
I thought they were just more aggressive. He just didn't have as good of looks. He wasn't as active on the glass. I thought he and Mo (Maurice McNeil) were much more active in the first half than the second half.
We were trying to keep the guys fresh, but you have got to just keep going and attacking. We have just got to make those plays at the end.
