Jan. 29, 2011
COACH Herb Sendek
On the comeback in the second half: “I think our offense in the second half was much, much better. We got out of transition more, we cut harder, our passing was better, and most significantly we made some shots. We were struggling in the first half, when we were 6-30 in the field. To our men’s credit, they really regrouped and they came out fighting, and offensively they did a great job executing in the first half. Trent played great all night, and Jamelle gave us a great lift.”
On Ty Abbott’s fouling out: "Obviously it really hamstrings us when he has that kind of immediate and then continued foul trouble. I don’t know that he ever got into the flow of the game. He picked up two quick ones, and I wasn’t just going to sit him the rest of the day. He’s a senior, and I hoped he could play without picking up his third in the first half. He’s so important to us that we rolled the dice and played with four.
On the UCLA team: They have some real offensive talent. They’re not easy to guard. Honeycutt can play; that guy is good. Reeves Nelson and Joshua Smith, Jones, give them a lot of credit. We could break it down from our standpoint, but that is a talented group of guys.
On the low number of turnovers: We played with only 9 turnovers so that’s a step in the positive direction. We’ve had a number of games where we’ve had low, even single-digit turnovers, and we’ve played a number of halves where we’ve shot over 50% on the half.
On the game in general: They say these kinds of games break even over time, but ultimately you have to make the plays to win the game on both ends of the floor. We made some really good plays, but we didn’t make enough of them to win tonight. The film will tell the truth; at first glance I don’t think we were as good today. But there are two sides to every story. They are really a hard team to check.
On what allowed the team to get back into the game: We made plays, we knocked down some shots. In the first half we didn’t shoot the ball well at all. I think we had one assist at halftime so we weren’t making each other better. You know guys got in the rhythm; we had some early foul trouble that kind of through us off a little bit, and guys stopped being aggressive. So we were able to turn around and get into our offense in the second half and we knocked down some shots.
On ¾ court pressure in second half: We wanted to slow them down a little bit, just to get some time off the shot clock and you know we don’t have to defend them in the half court for thirty five seconds. They move the ball very well, and they got some big guys down there that can really play the game so we tried to eliminate their offensive flow and you know it worked for us for a while and we got some opportunities that we didn’t have in the first half.
On what to take from game: It’s obviously encouraging that we have a team that can fight back and get back into a game and give ourselves a chance obviously. But at this point the wins and the losses, I mean it’s the same story and it has been the same story for about a month now. We have to find a way to make the plays late. We gave ourselves a chance obviously and went into the overtime period, spotted them three threes right off the bat and it’s tough to overcome that. So you know if we’re able to play, to put two halves together the way we put the second half together then hopefully we will be on the other end of the stick. So it’s a deal where its tough, but I think moving forward we are pretty comfortable with those two guys.
On getting tip in off of rebound: I just tried to time it for Jordan’s (Bachynski) release and it just kind of came in a perfect spot and I just put it back in.
UCLA COACH BEN HOWLAND
On Overall Game Performance: It was really, really frustrating how we were making mistakes down the stretch, fouling when we had the lead, stopping the clock letting them shoot foul shots. We gave up two offensive rebounds not getting a good enough block out. It cost us twice in the last two minutes of the game. You have to give them a lot of credit. They fought back. Herb [Sendek] does a great job. Their guys never quit; they kept fighting back. I think we were up thirteen at the half and they came back against us. [Tyler] Honeycutt was sick before the game and he played sick and under the weather. Reeves [Nelson] had a great offensive night with a double-double, Honeycutt had a double-double, Malcolm Lee’s defense on [Ty] Abbott was huge, I thought Tyler Lamb gave us big minutes off the bench with his defense after a subpar performance at Arizona.
Calling this a Great Win: Absolutely this is a great win, every win is a great win especially in the Pac-10. Trust me.