University of Pittsburgh Athletics
Post-Game Quotesheet
1/25/2015 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
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POST-GAME QUOTESHEET
No. 10 Louisville at Pitt • Petersen Events Center • Pittsburgh, Pa. • January 25, 2015
No. 10 Louisville 80, Pitt 68
Quoting Pitt Head Coach Jamie Dixon
Opening Statement:
“Congratulations to Louisville. We’re extremely disappointed. I thought our fans, our crowd was unbelievable. I thought they were great. For me, it’s very disheartening to come up short in front of our fans like that. We’ve got to get ready for Virginia Tech. We’ve got a quick turnaround. We’ve got to go find a way to get ready for Tuesday. They played today as well, we’ll both be coming off a loss. We need to go get ready for that. That’s going to be our attitude. As I told our guys coming out, we’re getting ready. I believe that we’re going to get better in these 48 hours in preparation for Virginia Tech. Our fans were terrific. Louisville’s a very good team and they played well tonight. They shot it well. If you told me we were going to outrebound them by six and have less turnovers than them, I’d feel good about it. Sixty-five percent from the field obviously stands out to our 37. We’ve got to do things better. We had some guys play, we battled, cut it down, were in position, but we don’t make the right play at the right time so it gets away from us again. We’re going to get ready for Virginia Tech. That’s what we came out of the locker room saying. We’re going to get better, and we’re going to get better in these 48 hours.”
On the play of Louisville guard Terry Rozier:
“[Rozier scored] a little bit in transition, but it wasn’t so much that. We played zone and he got open looks in the zone. We played man, and he got some tough shots against the man, some fall-aways. Obviously, he had 26 on us – it wasn’t hard to figure out that he’s a scorer, a big factor. He just got going. He’s a very good player, but zone, man, press, we guarded the ball screens different ways, and nothing seemed to be effective in what we did. I thought we would have zoned more, but they scored every single time we went to zone. That kept us away from that. We tried everything. We’ve just got to do it better. What we’re doing, we’ve got to do it better.”
On attacking Louisville’s zone:
“I felt [our offense] was good at times, but 37 percent doesn’t give you the right answer. We got some offensive rebounds, so that was good. I thought it was good early. I thought we were getting good shots. We’ve got to finish around the rim better; we’ve known that. We get the ball inside and we don’t finish as well as we need to, as well as teams in the past. It’s obviously something we need to improve on. We’ve got to continue to get more penetration and we’ve got to make some threes. Teams know what our numbers are, and we’ve got to get better at it. It’s that simple.”
On Louisville’s shooting efficiency:
“They hit some tough pull-up jumpers – shots we wanted them to take – for a stretch there right in front of our bench. They played well. You need a team to play well to shoot 65 percent. They played well, they made shots, and they had guys make some shots that hadn’t made shots. We need to do that. Give them credit, but at the same time we need to go do some things to improve and get better, and that’s what we’re going to do. That’s what I told our guys. I believe it. I believe we’re going to come out and execute better defensively and do the things that we try to do.”
On why Pitt was unable to capitalize early in the second half:
“[We] just rushed some shots and got revved up. I guess that’s part of not being in those situations before. I think we actually had [the deficit] to five. You’ve got to make some free throws; there was a stretch there where we missed free throws. I could coach that better. We’ve got to do those things. You’re down, you get the opportunities, you get stops – which we did – then you’ve got to make the play on the other end. Whether it be making a free throw or making the right decision on a play or not settling for a jumpshot as the crowd gets you going, that’s what we’ve got to play through as well. Good that we came out. Good that we talked about our defense in the second half. We came out and I think that we had four or five stops to start the half. That’s what we wanted to do. At the same time we got to the line and didn’t convert when we needed to. That’s almost a turnover. You run good offense, you get a layup, you get fouled on it, and you don’t get the and-one or points. It’s a turnover. Those are the situations we put ourselves in, being down and letting them score some points. We kept battling and playing hard. The attitude is good. They’re not happy at all with losing. We’ve just got to understand what it takes to beat a good team, and this is a good team.”
On the fans:
“It’s different everywhere you go. We’re very fortunate in that we’ve had great results and great history here which is how you develop these crowds and this history of support. I’m just disappointed for those that came out. Our Zoo was terrific. I saw our fans lined up early. At times we take it for granted. Some people may, but I don’t. I can’t thank them enough for all they did. Every game is different; every place is different, and we’re still seeing some new places in the ACC. We’ll see a different place [at Virginia Tech]. The spirit and passion of our fans and the students is unsurpassed. That’s something. That’s terrific. We’re very proud of it. I’m just disappointed we didn’t play better today for those fans. We will get better, and we’ll play better on Tuesday.”
Quoting Pitt forward Michael Young
On what contributed to Louisville’s 70 percent shot accuracy in the first half:
“They had a few tough shots and they just got [momentum] going early. They made it to the rim and then they just took off from there.”
On what attributed to Louisville’s scoring run at the end of the first half:
“We were making mistakes. We were trying to beat their press and we had three turnovers in a row. That got [Louisville] going and they converted on that.”
On missed opportunities:
“Yes. We had a lot of opportunities to come back, bring the lead within striking distance and try to win this game. I don’t think we capitalized on a lot of opportunities we had in the second half.”
Quoting Pitt guard James Robinson
On Louisville’s zone defense:
“I think we could have attacked it a little bit better. It left a couple driving lanes open that we could have attacked. It always makes your offense a bit slower.”
On what Pitt did “right” at the start of the second half:
“We came out with a lot of intensity. We had a couple stops and we capitalized. But then Louisville made their run back. We didn’t respond as well as we should have. That impacted the game.”
Quoting Louisville Head Coach Rick Pitino
Opening Statement:
“We usually win with defense, but tonight we won with offense. Our offense was special and great shooting percentages are a result of great passing, and we did a terrific job of passing against a very good defensive team. I am really proud of our guys; we needed to get this road win because we are at Boston College, at Miami and Virginia coming up. We needed to play well tonight to get our confidence back after the Duke loss.”
On the changes to their offense:
“We made a lot changes, subtle changes in our offensive schemes. We had a week to work on our offensive, so we ran some different offensive sets which helped us a lot, and we did a lot of good things by getting to the paint with drives, and that was a point of emphasis all week in practice. I felt if we could do that, we could shoot a high percentage, and we did.”
On Chris Jones and Terry Rozier’s performance:
“The most impressive thing to me tonight, despite the fact they both played great, was one guy played 40 minutes, one guy played 35 minutes and with the exception of the first four minutes of the game, they pressed full court and broke pressure. Their stamina was great; I don’t think I can remember coaching two guys with that type of stamina, because I have never played guys that many minutes playing this style. I know how tired they must be, but that was an incredible performance, not only in their statistics but in their stamina and ability to do that tonight.”
On their team’s overall performance tonight:
“We played great basketball, we played great basketball against North Carolina and they learned from that. I told them we need to finish this thing, and tonight they did.”
On playing Pitt and the Oakland Zoo:
“Pitt is a very young team right now, and they will get back to being great. We have a pro arena, we don’t have a zoo, North Carolina has a pro type arena, and Duke doesn’t. So Pitt has great student support, they are on top of you and it is a very tough place to play. Pitt has their culture, they always recruit to their culture and they get better and better. This (Pitt) team is not as good as other Pitt teams, so they are going to lose a few (games) and then next year they are going to become invincible again because that’s the way this program is. This (Pitt) program is as well run as any program in America.”
On their defense tonight:
“We pressed a lot, but I told the guys during practice this week to only press after the first four minutes. I told them after the first time out we will come with our heat.”