Louisville vs. Robert Morris Postgame Quotes

Louisville Head Coach Chris Mack
(Opening statement) "I'm going to be very careful with how I say this because I thought Andy's guys played extremely hard, and I told him after the game, a lot harder on tape, well a lot harder tonight, than on film. It's a credit to when they've lost a few in a row. To me, this game was about our inability to be ready to play. We were playing uphill the entire game and it was because of having the wrong mindset. That hasn't been an issue with our team, but hopefully a dose of reality that if you're not mentally ready to go, you're not willing to, again, be ready to go when the ball is jumped then you find yourself in the situation we were in. It's disappointing. Obviously, it's a different game for us offensively with CC (Christen Cunningham) being out. Everyone sort of moves up a notch on the food chain in terms of ball-handling responsibilities. We managed that really well. Not the merriest lead into Christmas, but it is what it is."

(On what he said to the team at halftime) "I said, 'I'm not going to tell you I told you so, but I told you so.' Because our coaching staff sensed it was a little too loose. We tried to address it. I have to do a better job. Anyone can tell you, 'You're not ready to play,' or, 'You're too loose,' but so what. Identify and fix the problem and we had a problem to start the game. I told them at halftime, if we play the second half the like we did the last five minutes of the half, we do a much better job of handling the ball, which is what I think we did, and maybe the outcome will be different from the first half."

(On when he noticed a lack of focus) "I sensed when we got to the arena. It was more our staff sensing it. With guys getting shots, really loosey-goosey in warm-ups, layup lines, and certainly you can sense it, feel it on the floor in the first four or five minutes of the game. Felt like it was a mortuary on the defensive end. There was no talk and we got served tonight."

(On what happened with Christen Cunningham and his timetable) "He missed a little layup in traffic yesterday in practice and it was a little bunny, so he quickly second jumped and tried to tip it at the same time and the guy was sort of blocking him slash undercutting him, so he landed on his back/butt, his head hit the ground, pretty nasty. He got up, said he was fine. Fortunately, Fred (Hina) held him out, he did not feel as well the next day. We made the smart decision to sit him out with the symptoms. We are very hopeful that the break for all of players, but obviously Christen, will serve him well and he can come back, be ready to go in the next game. I think eight-nine days between when he did it and when we play."

(On defense and starting early) "With the way Robert Morris was defending us, and us turning the ball over, it had to start on the defensive end. we had to have an answer for how fast they were running their offense, how quick they were slipping their big to the rim . we did a poor job on pick and layups which led to more fouls and downhill drives. For us, it always starts on the defensive end, because shooting is going to come and go, your opportunities on offense will sometimes be executed very well but you might miss the shot and you have to get consecutive stops. I thought outside of the first 12-14 minutes, we really did that because within the first 12 minutes they had a lot of points. And they ended with under 60."

(Defense on Williams) "it was tough, it was a lot of different guys. Khwan (Fore) has been a good defender all year and he is a guy who we trust to take a player like Josh Williams and chase him all over the floor and defend him without fouling. Some of our other guys stepped up and took shots that quite honestly we haven't really seen. I thought the difference with Robert Morris tonight was that they played a lot harder, especially offensively and we were just a tick slow.

(On Steven Enoch and his future) "He worked his tail off in the post. He may have set his teammates up and guys get in the habit of not being able to find Steve because he is invisible and then tonight, he did a great job sealing his man up the lane, he's asking for the ball on high-lows, he's sealing his man on skip passes and we quite honestly missed him a few times. So, we must get better in that regard, but it was great to see. It was his effort in terms of sealing his man close to the basket, he's so wide and so athletic. The more we can get it to him right there, as you know if he gets fouled, he is an awfully good free throw shooter."

(On how well Robert Morris defended early in the game) "Again, on tape, I didn't think they played as hard as they did tonight in the (KFC) YUM! Center. Was told by Matt Painter years ago and I'll never forget it. If the guy on you blocks your shot from the perimeter, you just made a really boneheaded play. When you think about it, when you play basketball, if the guy blocks your shot while he's on you then obviously you can't play. You got to have that feeling. Of course a couple of them, well one of them, there was two seconds on the shot clock, so there weren't a lot of options. I thought Andy's kids played really hard on it."

(On Ryan McMahon's expanding his game) "He didn't play very well the first half, so you must be complimenting his second half. I was really disappointed in Ryan in the first half. We need him to be stronger with the ball when he gets in traffic. Because he can get in traffic. His defender in going to be in the air a lot because all he has to do is look up at the banners and guys are going to jump. It's the ability to make decisions and be tough with the ball that we really need out of Ryan. Defensively, he needs to have a louder presence and a louder voice on the floor because he's such a smart player, but if you don't dispense that knowledge, it really doesn't matter. Those are the two areas for growth. You might think Ryan is becoming a better player, I feel like he's really falling short of his potential right now because he can be a lot better and a lot tougher right now. We need him to be to be a really good team."

(On what defensive adjustments he made) "None. Didn't make any. That's how good of a coach I am. I'm serious. Sometimes, you say in the huddle or at halftime, 'We have to make these adjustments.' I told our team at halftime, 'I hate being this coach because I'm not giving you answers, but we're not playing hard enough.' That's it. We're not playing hard enough. When you play to the level that you can and you play really hard defensively and then there are some things that are broken and need to be fixed, then we'll address it. We can't evaluate as a coaching staff what our scheme is doing if we're not playing very hard. I think a lot of coaches sometimes scream and say, 'Play harder,' and don't give their guys answers. And I try to be that coach, but tonight it was called for. We weren't playing hard enough. That's the adjustment that we made. It was to tell them to play harder or we're going to lose the game."

(On coaching on his first Louisville-Kentucky game) "It's a big game. Excited about it. We'll worry about Kentucky after Christmas. We got a really good team."

Robert Morris Head Coach Andrew Toole
(You took away their drives to the basket and really set the tempo early. Was that a point of emphasis, to take away their drive?) "Yeah, I mean them not having [Christen] Cunningham first and foremost affects their ability to kind of have some playmakers out there getting to the basket. And so, we wanted to make sure that we were really doing a good job of closing out to [Jordan] Nwora, closing out to [Ryan] McMahon when he was in the game, closing out to [Darius] Perry, but also then not allowing someone to beat us on dribble drive. Not allowing the interior play. We really wanted to defend the paint as best we could, and I thought that we did a really nice job of that early in the game."

(You were up seven or eight and they went on that 20-2 run, what happened there?) "It's a combination... I think we did have some good looks that we didn't make. I think obvious Louisville kind of raised their intensity level and really started to attack the basket, really get to the free throw line, which hurt. You need all those things to go in your favor if you're going to win a game like this on the road. We had some costly mistakes that led to buckets for them that obviously allowed them to gain momentum. If you can continue maybe to make shots, you can hold them at bay a little bit. We weren't able to do that. And then they were able to capitalize and score, and so all of a sudden, that momentum started to change. And some of the looks, I liked. A couple of the plays, I didn't. But, I thought those guys competed the best they could for 40 minutes."

(Your team didn't look like a team that's lost eight games....) "I appreciate that. This is, I think, what we have been looking for as coaches. Now the trick is, can we sustain it for a majority of the remainder of our season. I think that we've shown flashes of this during our non-conference so far, but we haven't been able to do it for long enough, to be able to win games. We've been trying to constantly discuss that, constantly talk about it, constantly pound that into the guys' brains about competing on every possession. I think that if we can play like this moving forward, we have a chance at becoming a pretty decent team, within our league. But obviously, we still have to prove that we have to do it on a regular basis."

(This is your last game against a power five school. What have you guys taken away from playing all these schools at the beginning of the season?) "One it's a great experience for our guys, first and foremost. I think one of our jobs, as coaches, is to provide these guys with great memories. I think that guys will remember coming to the Yum Center, playing against Louisville, being able to compete at a reasonable level for the majority of the game. Those things are important. And the obviously just the pace is faster, the speed of the game, the athleticism, the physicality of what's out there. I think if you can execute and perform in this kind of environment, then hopefully that will pay dividends for you as you go down the road and you're not playing in front of 22,000 people and having a 6-10, 260 guys hanging around the basket. Those are hopefully the things you learn, but you obviously offer guys the opportunity to compete and play against the best and see where you guys can stack up."

University of Louisville Athletics

Players Mentioned

Christen Cunningham

Steven Enoch

Ryan McMahon

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