Oklahoma State University Athletics
Oklahoma State Postgame Quotes
December 05, 2002 | Cowboy Basketball
Dec. 5, 2002
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Head Coach Eddie Sutton
On the game
"I think in the first half we played pretty good basketball. In the second half for the first few minutes, we scored seven straight points. Then we just went into a funk. It wasn't very pretty. Defensively, we just fouled way too many times in the second half. Our board play was horrendous. Two areas I thought we were doing well in were rebounding and free throws, but both of those went down the drain tonight."
On players
"I thought Tony Allen played pretty well. I thought Melvin did too. We decided to leave Melvin out in the second half because of his hip. Frans Steyn is going to be a very good player some day. I think the only way he is going to get better is to get him out there and let him Andre played alright, other than missing his free throws. Those three players are ones who played up to what we expect."
On rebounding
"Those kids are quick jumpers, and we didn't box off on the offensive boards. It isn't always a fault of the man covering a person. On any long rebound and your man doesn't go to offensive board, you have to go rebound."
On defense
"I thought defensively we played alright until the second half when we had some break downs. We fouled way too much. Cheyne fouled a three point shooter, a cardinal sin in basketball."
"They scored a lot of points on the free throw line. "
On Tony Allen's fast breaks
"He does it because he runs the floor. Those guys on the wings need to run the floor as hard as they can and a lot of times they'll get easy baskets. We kept telling our guy they needed to run harder."
On opponents
"We have a saying 'respect all opponents and fear none.' While I have been here, we have done a good job of playing up to our potential against mediocre ball clubs. When you don't get to a certain level emotionally, there are too many breakdowns on both ends of the floor. We needed to respect this ball club and go out there and play them."
Senior forward Andre Williams
On teammate Frans Steyn
"13 blocks, what can you say? Frans played a lot tonight, stepped up and blocked a lot of shots the second half. It's always fun to watch your teammates do well."
On Defense
"Everyone on the team can play defense when they want to. Personally I don't think that we played such a good game. We gave up a lot of easy buckets, way too many offensive boards, they had 20 offensive boards, and they out rebounded us. "
On Disrupting opposing team offense
"That's our whole goal, to disrupt teams offense, not let them get into what they want to run and not let them get into a comfort zone. That's one thing Coach Sutton, Coach Dickey, and Coach Cyprien stressed on us - to get out into the passing lanes, challenge shots and do everything we can to disrupt their offense."
On using the trip to Alaska as an excuse
"We can't use that as an excuse. We just came out and played flat tonight."
On what it will take to get other team members playing time
"It's that time of year, but even still with the first five or the eight or nine top guys, we've got to go out and play. We can't just think that it's going to be any easy game and play down to the level of our competition. We have to go out and get the job done, hit shots and carry out assignments. To get other people playing time we have to go out and do the things we know we can do and that is not to give up 20 rebounds and not to do stupid things out there."
Senior guard Victor Williams
On Defense
"I don't think we played particularly well on defense. I think that we can get better in this area."
On playing hard against every team
"This is the time and the kind of game that coach looks at as far as who's going to be playing in big games and who he is going to have confidence in. Our guys have to look at that and know that at this point of time they have to make a statement . We have to go out and play hard, like 'Dre said each and every night no matter who we are playing."
On the game
"We didn't play as well as we wanted to. There are a lot of things we need to work on as far as getting through the zone and working on the press. We have a lot of work to do before the next game."
On preparing for Northwestern State
"We need to work harder. Coach (Sutton) emphasizes working hard all the time, and once we do that, we will be a better team.
Junior Forward Ivan McFarlin
On the game
"Coach always comes out and gives us a scouting report on the other team, and tells us to respect who we are playing against. We jumped on them at the beginning but they kept fighting back. Eventually, we beat them by 13, but when you win you want to come into the lockerroom excited. When you come in and realize there were a number of things you need to work on, that is not good. Obviously, they beat us on the boards and there were times where we didn't know what man we were guarding. These are things that just carry over from practice."
On Hartford
"They came out and surprised me. They rebound extremely well and have all five guys crashing the boards on both sides of the ball. That made it harder for me and Andre (Williams) to rebound. It really effects the whole game when Hartford gets second chance shots."
