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University of Louisville Men's Basketball Post-Game Quotes
March 02, 2008 | Men's Basketball
March 2, 2008
Recap | Box Score | Notes | AP Action Photos 
Louisville Head Coach Rick Pitino
"It was a special night for three young men. Three young men that certainly want to go out with a victory. These guys have been such a treat and a privilege to coach all three of these guys. I am real honored to be their coach; it has been a distinct privilege. I can't say enough about them as people. They are totally selfless and care about the team. Everything about these guys is team. You just don't see it anymore. I am a really lucky guy to have three guys that have a team ego; I know the whole team thinks that way. We are all very fortunate to have been around these guys for a long period of time. Today you don't see too many guys get in and go through their senior class."
"Tonight it was not like a Pittsburgh or the last game we played. They are going to front the post and they are going to take things away. You have to win this game by doing little things and we did. We kept them off the offensive glass, which they are very good at with the exception of the last few passes of the game. We did a very good job. They are going to It was going to take a very smart effort to beat Villanova."
"Even with all the injuries if you said to me we would be 14-3 and 24-6, I would probably say not. Even healthy from the beginning I wouldn't have believed that. I believed the winner of this conference this year was going to have four or five losses. So I am absolutely delighted as to where we are right now. We withstood not only the injuries but a lot of circumstance like suspensions. David wasn't a good leader when he was hurt because he felt like he wasn't helping. I told him whether you play again or not you have to be a coach on the floor. I am delighted where we are right now. I think we can play any style, which if very important. We can play slow we can play fast, we can play man, we can play zone, we can attack zone, we can attack man. I think our nonconference schedule and the BIG EAST being a corporation that it is. You see so many teams and you see so many styles. It is a meat grinder. And the tournament at Madison Square Gardens is a meat grinder. We wanted a bye in the worst way. So we didn't have to go through that totally."
"We knew it was going to be a forty minute game. They were playing the worst basketball game down 20 to LSU and then came back and won. They are very quick, they are like Marquette; a team of runs. We did a very good job of them from second shots. We did a very good job of defending them in transition and keeping them off the offensive glass."
"Andre is playing terrific basketball. That is the nice thing about this team. You have a bunch of people that are selfless. I have Earl Clark coming to me and saying play Tello don't worry about me. And Andre McGee has that attitude. It is a nice team as far as caring about each other. We are real excited right because of the type of competition we played against. Some of the places we have had to go into, UNLV is as tough as any BIG EAST environment that we have been in all year. That set the precedent early in the season for us. It started out well for us with scheduling tough teams."
(On preparing for Georgetown) "I don't think it is significant either way. They have six days to prepare we have five days to prepare. It works out for both of us real well. I don't like a long time off. We are not going to take off tomorrow; we are going to take off Wednesday to try to break the week up. It doesn't matter. It is not significant either way, I am sure they feel the same way."
"The best thing about the BIG EAST is the tournament because it is held in the most famous arena; Madison Square Garden. It is held in the greatest city in the world, New York City. It has great pageantry. It is the best college tournament in the business. It is a lot of fun and if you can ever get there and get to that final game, it would be awesome. And play for the championship there as well. We try to make it a mini NCAA. The more pressure, the better teams perform. This is a great pressure game for us. Especially on the road."
Villanova Head Coach Jay Wright
"We played an outstanding team tonight: very focused, very unselfish and I was just very impressed with the balance of this team offensively. They shared the ball defensively. They are outstanding with their quick hands. They have great size. We offensively rebound pretty well and at halftime we had zero offensive rebounds. I just felt they did a great job of keeping us in front of them and then rebounding the ball. We just got beat by a better team today."
(On the Cards' defense of Scottie Reynolds) "Their guards do a great job in guarding of pressuring the ball in the back court and not getting beat. Usually when you open the floor up, to guard, you are going to get beat sometimes. They really keep people in front of them. McGee, Smith and Sosa are outstanding on the ball as defenders they are outstanding Scottie couldn't get by them. And we had times in the backcourt when our guards started backing up because they couldn't get by them."
(On why Scottie Reynolds didn't start) "Scottie and Corey are roommates and they overslept and they came five minutes late for the bus. We have a young team and we have to get them mature. We do everything together at all times. Not a big deal, they aren't in any trouble but it is something we have to maintain within our program."
(On Malcolm Grant) "Malcolm did a good job starting. I think I said it is tough to play all three of them so Malcolm started and he was doing a good job. We run them all in and out. We just went with Malcolm today."
(On how U of L is playing) "They are as good as anybody. We haven't played some of the better teams in a while, but we did just play Marquette and UConn. They are as good as anyone. They were playing great. I was very impressed."
(On the effectiveness of the Louisville zone) "I think their length, we all know about Padgett and Clark and their length and Williams and whatever you list him at, he is long. Those little guards 60-1, 5-11, they gotta have wingspans of 7 feet. It is incredible. They get their arms out and they have quick hands. If you have length like that, you don't have to go out and chase people because you can keep them in front of you like they do. They have great rebounding if you think about it. We have been very good offensive rebounding team and we had zero. I think it is credit to them, keeping us in front of them."
(On what happened after the good start) "We did and then we got Dante Cunningham and Dwayne Anderson in foul trouble right away and we just don't have the depth yet to handle that against a very good team and they do. When DC comes in there he is a force. When Sosa comes in from the off bench, he made some plays in there in transition early. I just felt when they went to their second line it kinda makes a difference in the first half."
