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University of Louisville Men's Basketball Post-Game Quotes
December 01, 2007 | Men's Basketball
Dec. 1, 2007
Recap | Box Score | Notes | AP Photo Gallery 
Louisville Head Coach Rick Pitino
"I know that is not the style you all love but it was a great college basketball game. It was a great game, full of drama where every possession of the game is monumental, where every defensive switch, where every sub coming in is monumental. It's not only difficult but its pressure packed and fun. That was a great college basketball game. I know the score sometimes, whether its football or basketball, when you see a low scoring game sometimes you don't think it's great but it was a great, great game. Two teams playing terrific defense. To be honest with you, if we didn't have a week to prepare, we wouldn't have won the game. T-Will did a magnificent job on their best player, who had back-to-back 30 point games. The one time he did score a three, T-Will was not on him. Earl was and Earl ran into the screen. It was a great win for us, because they are a terrific team. I am so glad that we had a week to prepare and they didn't have as much time to prepare for us."
(on Tim Pollitz) "We made a decision to go one on one with him, we thought he'd score but we didn't think he would dominate like he did. We worked very hard on that, but he made good move and they are very smart. And if you come off at all, they will back door you and we had to play it. Then we went to the zone and the zone was very effective. Then we started hurting on the zone and then we started faking zone and playing man on the first pass and that gave us a big lift. We weren't leaving him any space on all the curl cuts. We were a part of his body, we were jamming him. What we tried to do tonight was not give him an attempt, if you watch him on film, he makes difficult shots and we learned. In the BYU game we played very poor defense and today we played very good defense. But we gave the hot shooter the ball. We were not going to give him the ball and suffer the same fate. We played good defense down the stretch, great blocks, smart plays and smart execution."
"There were three goals of ours and we only missed one. We wanted to get them off the offensive glass, we wanted to make sure to stop the three and we couldn't turnover the ball. The unfortunate thing about the turnovers, even though its not a lot in this game, its 13, but 13 when you score 47 points is a lot and they weren't good turnovers. The defenses were not forcing them, so that's where we have to work but our guys did a terrific job tonightand I'm real proud of them."
"The key to playing them is you have to heat up the guards. Their guards are probably, in the clutch, are not going to go one on one. So we played them like a dribble use situation, we were getting in their face and not letting them make a pass. If they were going to beat us, so be it, but we weren't going to let Pollitz and Bramos beat us."
"He understands the scouting report. Besides his athletic prowess, he understands the scouting report. He watches it, he reads it, he studies it. We have to get our sophomores to do the same thing."
Miami University Head Coach Charlie Coles
"I really enjoyed coming here, never coached or played here. This is legendary, it was everything I thought it was. One of the things people forget about coaches, especially mid-major coaches is that one of my goals is always to play against great programs and great coaches and we accomplished both today. It was just great, the Louisville players are phenomenal as people. I didn't hear one trash talk. In fact me and Terrence Williams got to know each other and what a nice guy. Now I don't if he's nice like that when they play Marquette, maybe he felt sorry for us. He's Twill and I got to know each other. He's a nice guy. It was good- I'm not talking about results because when you come that close you think you should win. Just the atmosphere was good, I always tell my team that the best sound in the world is when you make a basket in a full house on the road.-because there is a silence and that's a great sound. I did feel like we fought hard, didn't feel like we made any outside shots."
"I thought we had some nice outsides shots that we couldn't drop and Tim Pollitz had set it up for us early. I told somebody before the game Michael (Bramos) had a great game against Dayton, but Big Red- the stage is set for him. He's our guy that sets the table and so he made some fantastic plays against some great athletes. Derrick Caracter is big and strong. They gave him a little more attention and our game plan began to unfold. We got some shots, we only hit a couple and against Louisville you can't do that. Our goal was to make them play against five guys on defense. As a team, when you play a Rick Pitino team, they love 4 on 2, 3 on 1 and that sort of thing going down the other end. Our goal was don't let them take the ball from us. Two things about his team- number one I `ve never seen a player play for him that didn't have confidence. Somehow he instills confidence. That's a great trait to have as a coach. Number two that take advantage of numbers, I'm sure when he gets his full team back they can really press and we stayed away from that. That was the reason we stayed close we only had ten turnovers, which is good against Louisville."
(On Tim Pollitz) "I watched him play between his junior and senior year and I kept getting recruiting reports that said Division II. I knew that area had good basketball so I saw him in an AAU tournament that summer in Los Angeles. For some reason they had him playing on the wing- Him and his brother. He didn't impress me because I didn't see him play on the inside. The team they were playing was talented, they had a decent team. They stayed close and won. We didn't recruit him, spring came around. I had a 6-8 kid walk into my office and said he just wanted to focus on school. And I told myself - let him do it. We had another kid quit. So I asked a friend of mine and they said, yes, the Pollitz brothers. He sent me a tape. I called and offered them scholarships. He played behind an All- MAC performer the first year, but I kept telling him don't worry I have plans for you. There's players you give shots and then there's players that you just need to get the ball in the area. With him you just need to get the ball in the area and he will do the rest. My plan was just get the ball in the area, he'll do the rest. He's a lot of fun to watch, he's got a lot of heart."
