Fresno State
Oregon
Fresno State vs. Oregon -- Postgame Quotes
12/18/2004 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Dec. 18, 2004
Fresno State Head Coach Ray Lopes
General thoughts on the loss
"Oh, tough loss, tough loss, tough loss at home. You have to give Oregon credit; they are a good basketball team that we lost to tonight. They really stepped up that first 15 minutes or so of the second half. They raised their level of play. I was proud of our kids. We fought and we got right back into it. We didn't quit and showed a lot of heart, which this team has done all year long."
"We started making some big plays but we kind of let it get away from us a little bit there in the start of the second half, the first 10-12 minutes. We couldn't get any defensive stops. We didn't play hard enough on defense and they (Oregon) must have nearly 70 percent during that stretch."
"Again, we get that thing down to where we had a chance to win and we take the lead and it comes down to one possession. We played good defensive possession and we just didn't come up with the big rebound. They did and we didn't. They capitalized on it."
"One rebound and we win that basketball game. But this is a young team and I think for sure we got better tonight. We'll get better from this experience."
Lopes' thoughts on the last play of the game?
"Too bad, gosh darn it, was what I was thinking. I thought we played a good possession of defense there. [Ian] Crosswright almost traveled. He shot a contested shot, a hard shot, and we if get that rebound we win that basketball game."
On the team's rebounding problems
"We've got to shore up our rebounding. We've gotten outrebounded for three games in a row now and I'm not sure why. It's an area of concern. (The final shot) It was a long rebound and they got a good bounce there. They got a good break by getting that rebound. Again, I thought we defended that possession pretty darn well. Bryce Taylor is a heck of an athlete, he got up there and he got it."
On transition defense
"We did a great job with transition defense in the first half. The second half we weren't playing as hard defensively and they started getting some transition baskets. We started getting back better later in the second half. For the most part I thought our transition defense was good. I don't know if we got enough or a lot out of our transition offense but Oregon plays like that everyday in practice so they are going to be good at transition defense because they going against themselves everyday. They didn't give us a lot of opportunities in the open floor."
On what helped Oregon's transition game
"What helped their transition game was that we missed so many shots. We missed so many shots that first 10-12 minutes of the second half. When you are not making shots your energy level drops, you tend not to play as hard and that affected our transition defense and that got their energy going on transition offense."
Lopes' final thoughts
"It was a good Oregon team we played tonight. We had a chance to win it. This is what you want in a game like this. We let one get away, we let one get away."
Oregon Head Coach Ernie Kent
General thoughts on Oregon's win
"I thought it was a well played basketball game by both teams. They are a very good team at home, particularly in this building. [It's a] tough environment to play in. The fact that they were undefeated, I thought they were playing with a lot of confidence. They have some young guys and Ray has done a tremendous job with that group. We didn't anticipate them to shooting the ball that well. I thought it was a great job by them to do that because their shooting percentage has not been that great. Our focus in the game was to shut down the transition. I thought we did a pretty good job of that. We took Mustafa (Al-Sayyad) out and I thought we were excellent at doing that. Take away the one-on-one plays, I didn't think we did that very well because they shot too well, we wanted to take the three's out of their arsenal. All in all, it was a great win for my young basketball team. Another quality win on the road, an opportunity to come into an environment and play well, fight through some adversity and fight through some tough, tough calls out the on the floor but you expect that on the road and we kept our composure."
Kent's thoughts on Fresno State
"They are a very good basketball team, very well coached. They've got a great inside game. I thought Jack (Marlow) played extremely well tonight and if he plays like that the whole year, with him and Mustafa down there, those two guys are going to be a load to handle and they are going to free up a lot of the shooting on the perimeter. They shot the ball tremendous tonight."
Plan at half time
"The plan was to go to the zone coming out at half time because we felt they were scoring better against us in the man and it worked. In the zone we were able to keep them off the boards and it gave us an opportunity to run them. We are a running basketball team and we got them to miss a little bit. I thought we got them fatigued early on in the second half, the first 10 minutes. We subbed in and stayed fresh and that's where we took control of the game with the zone and the transition game in the first 10 minutes of the second half."
