Feb. 3, 2010
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Iowa Head Coach Todd Lickliter
Opening statement…
“I told the team, I felt like today we had a chance to win and that is better than on Saturday, because we didn’t give ourselves a chance to win at Michigan. We did enough things right today to give us a chance but, in these games that we have a chance and are close, we probably try 10 plays that even the best players can’t make. When I say the best players, I mean NBA guys. We try to make plays that just aren’t there, that are so low percentage, and when you do that seven or eight times against a team like this, your chance of winning is so diminished because we just don’t have that kind of margin for error. We did more good than bad and hopefully we can fight and compete and eventually make some winning plays when it comes that time. I feel like this is two games now where when it was time to win, we just couldn’t come up with the right plays. Hopefully we will keep competing and that will happen.”
On Cully Payne’s drives to the hoop…
“I think Cully’s drives to the hoop are ones he needs to make. I mean he is at the rim; he is going to shoot it. If you are at the rim, you’ve got to shoot them and you’ve got to make them. I think at times he drew more than one defender and gave us a chance to offensive rebound. In fairness to him, we couldn’t make outside shots so he probably felt like he had to get to the rim. He’s made them before, and he needs to.”
On timeout play with 58 seconds left…
“We were trying to clear a side and look for a quick basket. First we were looking for Cully coming off a back screen and then clear it for Matt to come off of an on ball and see if he had something. I’m not sure where it went from there, but those were our first two options.”
On Illinois student section…
“I didn’t really have any thoughts. I mean they obviously traveled well. Those seats are normally empty and they filled them. When I was coming out, I was thinking how Illinois struggled a couple of years ago and now they travel like this and play well also. Bruce has done a good job. It was a good environment over there (Champaign), a really good one.”
Illinois Head Coach Bruce Weber
Opening statement…
“We knew it would be a grind out game. They’re style, they’re going to make you guard and they pack it in on defense and they make you earn stuff. We were hoping, you know we had a couple great spurts, a great spurt at the end of the half which was important. A spurt early in the second half and you get it to 10 and to 11 and then just like Northwestern a couple weeks ago, we just get stagnant. They did a great job defending. They switched some things and didn’t give Demetri (McCamey) some easy looks, and now you start thinking instead of just playing. We made enough stops that, obviously the defense holding them under 30% (field goal percentage), that’s pretty impressive. Mike Davis a big shot, and Tyler Griffey coming off the bench and got his fourth foul and he knocked his knee a little bit. Tyler hit a big shot, then you get (Mike) Tisdale back in there to hit enough free throws to make a difference. So, it’s a win. I wish it was a little prettier, but it is what it is. We got a win and were 7-3. We set the goal of being 8-2, but we are a little bit short now we have a big game with Michigan State coming in Saturday night.”
On Iowa’s change defensively…
“I think they just switched all the ball screens at the end of shot clocks and stuff. I guess we rely on it so much, and we’ve got to find other ways to score besides those. We got it to Tisdale and he’s got to deal with the physical play. Certain officials just won’t call it. When we got it to him and he doesn’t take care of it. He loses it a couple times and maybe turns it over, or misses some short shots. Just somewhere we’ve got to find other ways to score than just the ball screens and Demetri. I think it was good Mike Davis made a shot, maybe this will be a confidence boost as we continue into the last half of the Big Ten.”