Louisville vs. Nicholls Postgame Quotes

Louisville Head Coach Chris Mack

(Opening Statement) "Well, we've got a long way to go, that's for sure. I'll give (head coach) Austin (Claunch) and Nicholls State a lot of credit for their kids coming in here and playing fearless and playing aggressive. They got it to 14, or whatever the deficit was for them, and their kids kept battling. As I've said before, we have to get a lot better in a hurry and hopefully, tonight was a little dose of reality for some of our guys."

(On pregame expectations of team's performance) "I thought early on we had nerves. We had seven turnovers probably in the first four or five minutes and then ended up with six for the rest of the game. Those turnovers, by and large in the beginning, weren't because of the pressure, at least full court pressure, but just our ability to catch the ball and pass the ball to one another in those first five or six minutes, probably nerves. I thought we did a much better job taking care of the ball from there on out. Who knows what to expect? That's part of taking over a new program and new personalities. There were some occasions on the floor tonight when I didn't like what I saw with our attention to detail, our toughness on the defensive end, on the glass, but it's game one we have to learn from it and get better because of it."

(On getting touches inside for post players) "I thought in the first half the few times we tried to get it in, our guys couldn't hold onto the ball. That doesn't necessarily give you a ton of confidence when you're a post-feeder if that guy's not securing the basketball. I also thought a few times we had guys open in the post and we're getting the ball deflected as if there's no defender in front of us. And so, if you're a post player, you can only hold your seal for so long, and so we have to do a better job of being able to slip that thing in there when he's open. I thought we did a better job in the second half. We wore them down between (sophomore forward) Malik (Williams) and (junior center) Steven (Enoch), who played a lot better in the second half than he did in the first. We have to be a team we can throw into them guys."

(On playing a half-court game and getting sped up) "I don't necessarily control the other team's coach, so if they want to press, then we have to attack to score. We got to the free throw line a few times because we had an attacking mentality against the press. One time, there was a charge call, could have went either way, but we don't want to give a team a free press. We're not going to be the team who brings it over half court, takes a big sigh of relief and now hands off to our point guard and our offense. When you do that, you just entice the defense to press harder, so we took what the defense gave us and unfortunately, on the defensive end for us, we weren't near where we need to be."

(On winning his first game at Louisville) "Not very good. I'll be honest with you. Doesn't feel very good. I don't think we played very well. I don't think we were very tough. And we have tougher games coming. So, I'm happy that we won. I'm certainly not happy with the way we won. And we've got to figure that out."

(On not calling timeouts during Nicholls run) "You're right. You're right. I didn't call a timeout. Armchair quarterbacks can call a timeout, and you go back out on the floor, and they get another three. So, I want our guys to figure it out. I want to learn about our team. And I felt like it wasn't needed at the time."

(On performance at the foul line) "Yeah, I thought in the second half, we were much stronger with the ball against their pressure. I thought, specifically Darius, in the last couple of minutes. In a few of the traps, he didn't turn the ball over against double teams. I'm sure there's some inadvertent fouling going on, and he didn't use that as a crutch. He was able to wiggle out of there and find the open man and take the foul. I believe we have a good free throw shooting team, I don't know how many teams in the country will have a center that can go to the line and go 11-for-11. And that was despite not really playing well in the first half. So, it was good to see. I do believe that we're a good foul shooting team, so hopefully that train continues."

(On defending three-point shooting of Nicholls guard Jeremiah Jefferson) "Yeah, I mean the kid had zero points at half. He's coming off a 28-point game. I said to the guys in the locker room at halftime, 'You don't think he's going to come out with an itchy trigger finger,' and he did. If a guy hits one, I think you have to adjust as a defender. If your hands are down and you close out and you challenge the shot—for a good shooter, you're not really being challenged, it's not really a contested shot. It might look like it and you can have that false hand up after he follows through. But, when a good shooter has a clean look when he catches the ball and he's going to feel good about the shot. (junior guard) Ryan's (McMahon) hands both times were down and he's not the quickest guy in the world, but that can't be an excuse. He has to have his hands up, especially when a guy is pulling the trigger time after time after time."

Nicholls Head Coach Austin Claunch
(On competing despite having foul trouble)
"We tried, I'm proud of our guys. We battled. We knew there was going to be some adversity, obviously. This is a tough place to play. This place is awesome. It was packed tonight and the environment was great. We knew there were going to be some ups and downs. We've been through some funky lineups, but we battled through it and gave ourselves a chance to make it interesting and potentially pull it out. Certainly proud of our guys. We've got an eight-day road trip we're continuing. There are some good things that happened but there are somethings we need to build on and get better at as well. Definitely a learning process."

(On shooting a lot from outside, was the game plan or if they were forced)
"Little bit of both, we shoot a lot of threes. Now at the same time, it's hard to penetrate, especially playing an ACC team, their length and athleticism. Even when you get down there, you think you might have a layup and you don't. They showed that a couple of times a couple of times in the first half and they got a couple of blocks and runouts and layups on the other end. We shoot threes, we have good shooters. I don't really care how many we take, as long as they're good ones and I thought early on we rushed a little bit. We were hunting shots more so instead of letting it come to us. In the second half, it opened up a little for us and guys got comfortable and we saw what could happen."

(On using the press to speed up Louisville's tempo)
"Our press is good for us. To be honest, it's less about the other team. I think it more gives us a little energy, gives us a little pop. I think it bothered them a little bit. They did a good job when they did break it, converting and hurting us on the other end. That was the biggest thing. I was pleased with it overall. We didn't take enough charges on the backend. We sort of got caught in the circle, we fouled and that shows by them shooting 55 free throws. That's the biggest thing we have to figure out. When we do press, our big guys have to protect the basket without fouling. It's good for us, but we certainly need to get better at it."

University of Louisville Athletics

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