Louisville vs. Grand Canyon Postgame Quotes

Louisville Head Coach David Padgett

(Opening statement) "Great response by us in the second half. We seem to have gotten the message a little bit about the rebounding, which was good to see. We were down two at half time and ended up outrebounding them by six for the game. Plus, the second half was very good to see. We got off to a little bit of a slow start, couldn't make any shots, but that's going to happen and we were resilient and responded and bounced back. So, very proud of our guys. We slipped up once at home in the non-conference slate against Seton Hall obviously, but other than that we took care of business. Some of them were probably a lot more stressful than I had hoped, but nonetheless, a pretty good start overall. Our guys are going to go home for a couple of days, enjoy a great holiday, and we'll come back Tuesday and get back to work.

(It seems like you've had a lot of games where you've played better in the second half. Do you have any theory on that?)
"I've been asked that question a lot and I've thought about it a lot. I don't have an answer for it. All I'm glad about is that it's not the other way around. I'm glad we don't get off to a great start and all of a sudden we're horrible in the second half and we've got to sweat it out. We missed too many… Deng's first two 3s to start the game were pretty darn good looks. Ryan (McMahon) missed a couple, I think Q (Quentin Snider) maybe missed one. We just, we find a way to respond. If Ray Spalding plays like that we have a chance to have a very special year."

(It seems like you guys, especially at the end of the first half, really started trying to push in and transition to get early offense. Is that something you tried to focus on?) "The reason we were able to do that is because we were rebounding the ball. We couldn't do that the other night, because we weren't getting the ball. We can't, unless you're the North Carolina of the world, you can't get the ball, take it out of the net take it out of bounds, throw it in and go. We had to play a good defense to get the rebound most importantly. The best way to start your break is to get a rebound.

(You talked about with Ray, when you guys play like that, on offense he seems like, is it confidence or comfortable when he has the ball?) "He just was being aggressive. Quentin (Snider) and those guys did a good job of getting it to him. Anas (Mahmoud) made a couple great passes to him. But he just, when he catches it and gathers and finishes strong like he can, he's a force. But, the most impressive thing to me is the 10 defensive rebounds. He basically took it upon himself to cure our woes at least for this game. So that's obviously very good to see, but that's what I expect out of him and I told him that.

(What went in to that 21-3 surge?) "We just did a good job pushing the pace. Q (Quentin Snider) got it going there for a minute, got to the rim a couple of times. We weren't shooting the ball well and we did a good job of not really settling for threes, we kind of just tried to space and drive and get to the rim. Because of that we shot 27 free throws. We tried to just keep going at it. I called that time out at the start of the second half because I wasn't happy with the way we came out of halftime. They seemed to respond pretty well from there."

(On Ryan McMahon's performance) It's just the experience factor. It's the same thing Q (Quentin Snider) went through at the beginning of the year. It's only going to take one game where he makes four, five or six in a game, and he's off to the races. He gambled a couple times on defense today, I wasn't very happy about it. He understands how to play, he knows what we're doing…man, zone, whatever it is. (He) just kind of gives you that sense calm when he's on the floor because you know he's going to make the right play."

(On giving days off and the holiday schedule) "Well, we did it last year with the way the games were laid out. We've had games before on the 23^rd, and then again on the 27^th, and we weren't able to do it. So, with the way the calendar fell, we were able to give them a couple days. So, we'll come back, we'll still have Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday to get ready for Friday. Holidays…these guys, they've earned it. Not that if we lost the game, I wasn't going to let them go home, but it's good to get away for a couple days. It'll be good for me. I was sweating this game horribly, as much as I've sweat one this year. It'll be good for them to go home, spend a couple days with their family, and then come back to get ready for Friday and then most importantly, ACC play."

(On late-game lineups) "Dwayne (Sutton) is so important, because he can rebound. He came in and got five rebounds, made 3-for-4 from the free throw line. I wouldn't say it's because of size or anything, I would just say it's experience. When the game gets tight like that, you just, maybe it's me being a first-year head coach or whatnot, but I just have to go with the experienced guys—just got to trust they'll make the right play. Each game is going to be different. I thought Darius (Perry) actually came in, did some good things defensively, got us going a little bit. It's going to be different from game-to-game, but the good news, like I said, is we have different guys we can put in."

(On the Kentucky game) "To be honest, we haven't spoken one word about Kentucky, and I'm not just saying that. We really haven't. We were 110 percent focused on this game. I told the guys yesterday after practice, I said, 'I don't even want you guys thinking about going home. We need to win this game tomorrow and get momentum going into next week.' No, obviously, I'll start taking a look at them. At the same time, I've got two little boys that are really going to enjoy Christmas, so I'm going to enjoy it with them."

(What's your early impression of Kentucky?) "The only film of Kentucky I've seen is our game from last year. I saw them play earlier in the year, a couple of minutes on TV… We don't look ahead, especially this year, we don't look ahead at all. We've taken it day-by-day so we haven't spoken one word about Kentucky."

(You've experienced playing Kentucky on the road –are you going to tell the players what they can expect?) "Four of them have been there. Anas (Mahmoud) and Quentin (Snider) and Ray (Spalding) and Deng (Adel). It's obviously one of the toughest environments in the country to play in, especially given the rivalry. At the end of the day, it just comes down to doing what we've got to do defensively, offensively, X and O-wise and try to execute. The good news is that our young guys have had a pretty tough test on the road this year at Purdue. Now I'm not saying Purdue is harder to play in, but that was a very tough environment so at least we have that under our belt."

(The team gave up 12 offensive rebounds, but that only led to seven second chance points. As you get deeper into the schedule, what are you going to do to get that number even smaller?) "We've just got to keep working at it. It's a fine line, they missed 33 shots so that's the good news, now they're going to get some back, that's just the way basketball works. We missed 33 shots and we got 15 back. We've just got to keep working at it. Like I said, there's no magical formula or drill or words of wisdom to say all of a sudden overnight we're going to be a great defensive rebounding team. We've just got to continue to harp on it. V.J. (King) has done a better job, Deng (Adel), his mindset has been better with it, Dwayne (Sutton) obviously helps us. So whoever the five guys on the floor are have to have that mindset of we're going to get the rebound first."

(Do you think one of the issues is that when you guys block shots, the guys kind of relax for a second?) "One thing that's got to give when you're a shot blocking team is you're taking your biggest and tallest guys out of the rebounding play because they're trying to block a shot. Now, I'm not saying good shot blocking teams can't be good rebounding teams, but it also has an impact. If Anas (Mahmoud) and Ray (Spalding) are trying to go block the shot, now you're relying on smaller to try to rebound. Something's got to give somewhere and if we did block however many shots we block in a game and not give the other team any offensive rebounds, we'd be really scary, but that's just not realistic. It's just got to be all five guys. I know that sounds simple, but that's just the truth. That's what I've seen watching the film."

(On defending Joshua Braun, the WAC Preseason Player of the Year) "In the second half – he only had two points at halftime – we knew he was going to try to make big shots for them. He hit a couple, he had a step-back over Anas, I think he hit that three, but you've got to just keep challenging the shots. That was a big point coming into this game was 'get off your feet and challenge the shots.' Because it makes a difference. It might not the first or second time, but over time it makes a difference. A kid like that who is a good player like that who we've been playing against for three years now, he's going to make big plays. He made a couple, but we did a good job pretty much."

Grand Canyon Head Coach Dan Majerle

(Opening Statement)"I think it's a disappointing game. Obviously, that's a very good team playing at home. With our travel it's tough but that's not an excuse. We've had a hard time scoring all year long and their match-up zone really bothered us. I thought we had two main careless turnovers early. We hung in there and tried to battle. But, just didn't have it tonight. I'm a little disappointed in our effort but, like I said, that's a really good that's got a lot of talent. I thought (Ray) Spalding really took the game over with 21 and 16 and did a really good job for them. So, a little disappointed in us, but as I said, that's a really good team."

(On the difficulty of stretching the lead early in the game) "Well, you know, that's a good defense. It's predicated on not letting guys get to the basket. They're the number one shot blocking team in the country. We just haven't shot the ball well. We hit some early threes. Casey (Benson) hit two straight threes and kind of got us off to that lead, but just didn't shoot the ball well and didn't finish. And again, the careless turnovers. Not so much of what Louisville did, but us just being casual with the basketball. One of the worst things you can do is have live ball turnovers against a team like that. And we had a lot of those, so, disappointed but we kept on fighting there in the second half and made a little bit of a run but it just wasn't enough."

(On Ray Spalding and what he did to be successful) "Just his size and athleticism. I mean, just crashing the boards. Anytime you get six offensive rebounds and 16 rebounds total, it's tough. We were trying to mix up our defenses a little bit. Switching and sometimes he had a little smaller guy on him and just used his size and athleticism to get rebounds. We have to do a better job of being down there fighting and taking care of the basketball. But, he's just a good player and we had to do something to try and speed up the game a little bit and get some steals or get some stops where we could get out and run."

(On being ahead early in the game) "Our inside-out, we were getting the ball to our big freshman (Alessandro Lever)—he had a really good game. I'm excited about him, he continues to get better and better. He's going to be a good player, stretch-fours, stretch-fives, he can really shoot it, we got the ball into the post. Just staggered things for Casey (Benson) coming off and he hit two big threes there to start us off in the game and they kind of adjusted to that as all coaches and teams do. We just found it hard to score. They had the match-up zone and if we weren't shooting it well—Josh (Braun) hasn't been shooting it well and he has to shoot well and he has to shoot well for us to play well."

(On Louisville effecting Joshua Braun's shooting) "Josh (Braun) did something to slow Josh down. Josh hasn't shot the ball well, he gets a lot of good looks. He was 3-10 and 1-3 from three —he's been a great player for us. He's the WAC player of the year, this year preseason. He's an Academic All-American, first team all-WAC. Just for whatever reason he's just struggled with his shot and his confidence. So, we have to find a way to fix that before the conference season. He just hasn't had a good year. He's one of those kids that's tough and will find a way to get it done. He's one of our main guys and for us to be successful he has to shoot the ball."

(On how he wanted his team to adapt to the full court press) "We have to do a better job of guys getting to the basketball. We had two guys on Casey and for whatever reason we couldn't handle the press well. We knew Louisville was going to press. The last couple of years we have done a good job against them. We just had guys that weren't getting to the ball. They weren't flashing and getting to the ball and turning. Did a little better job in the second half where we got some layups but we've got to become more aggressive in attacking the press and trying to score instead of just being satisfied with breaking it. But, they double-teamed Casey, and you got guys kind of hiding. They didn't want to get the ball for whatever reason."

University of Louisville Athletics

Players Mentioned

Ryan McMahon

Quentin Snider

Ray Spalding

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