Fresno State Athletics
Fresno State vs. UTEP -- Postgame Quotes
1/15/2005 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Jan. 15, 2005
Fresno State head coach Ray LopesLopes' opening statement
"Well, what a great win. A great win for the Bulldogs. As I envisioned this game tonight I was hoping we'd win it a different way. I certainly wouldn't have expected us to score 66 points and beat a team like UTEP tonight. I thought we'd make more shots and have more offense and just be one of those basketball games that probably would be a little more entertaining than it was tonight. I thought against a team like them that we need to have a lot of offense. I guess tonight we found a different way to win, which is good for this basketball team. We beat a good team, we beat a good team. You have to understand that UTEP is a good defensive team. They've got good players. They pressure you well, they defend you well. That's a good team and a good program. Again, I'm surprised at the score in this basketball game. I felt if we'd score in the 80's we'd win this game."
About the Bulldogs
"They have some resiliency, some toughness about them. When we need to step up and answer the bell, we tend to do that. The other positive thing is that we're finding a way to win close games. For a young group like this, that's a good thing, finding a way to win the close games. On paper, we're in the race. These guys don't know any better. Our focus everyday is we can get better as a basketball team. We're a good basketball team that can get better. We might look up three weeks from now and be surprised where we are at."
On the team's play in the second half
"The second half, we had a good start, got up by four and then went in a funk again and got down by four. But this basketball team never quits. These guys are tough. They're tough, they're hungry, they stay together. We're never out of a basketball game. We've got five guys out on the floor at the end that defended pretty good, rebounded pretty good, started making a few shots. We gutted this one out. We just really gutted this one out and found a way to win a tough basketball game against maybe the best team in the conference."
On Ja'Vance Coleman's game-winning shot
"You know, Ja'Vance (Coleman) makes a great play. He's a heck of a player. He was probably due. He had a bad night (4-18, 2-10 from three). It was just in the cards tonight for him to step up and make that shot. We were lucky, but we'll take it. That's part of athletics. You've got to be good enough, you've got to play hard enough and you've got to be lucky sometimes."
On his emotions before and after Coleman's shot went in
"I had no emotion (before the play). I was just watching the play. We did what we wanted to do. We got the ball in his hands. The emotion was afterwards. The emotion was `wow.' No emotion during the play because at least we knew we had overtime to play. What a great play, what a great shot. It was a great shot."
 | "They have some resiliency, some toughness about them. When we need to step up and answer the bell, we tend to do that. We're finding a way to win close games. For a young group like this, that's a good thing, finding a way to win the close games." - Fresno State head coach Ray Lopes |
On the crowd
"The crowd was good, especially down the stretch. It's good to see all the people in the seats. They hung in there with us. We weren't playing well from about the 10-minute mark to the six-minute mark [of the second half]. We had just a bad stretch there where we just let them get back in the game."
On UTEP's team
I mean, they've got players. (Filiberto) Rivera hits three three's during that stretch. He's a great player and he might be the best player in the conference right now. And Omar Thomas started getting going. We had a bad match up on him when Dreike wasn't in the ballgame and he (Omar) took advantage of that. And that's what really good players do. But I thought they (crowd) helped us down the stretch. Those last two or three minutes, I thought they were excellent, were great."
Lopes' closing thoughts
"What a great win. To be honest with you, it was a needed win. As I looked at this four-game stretch, in which we were playing three of the top four teams in the conference and three of those games were on the road, my hope was to a least go 2-2 in this four-game stretch. This was a huge win tonight, to kick off this four-game stretch. Now, we have to find a way to go [win] on the road (at Rice, Nevada and Tulsa). It's a tough three-game stretch coming up. We did a great job of defending our home court, a great win. We're a solid basketball team, a good basketball team. I think these guys have gained everyone's respect in the conference. We just got to keep plugging away."
UTEP Head Coach Doc Sadler
"Give him (Ja'Vance Coleman) credit. He took a heck of a shot. They (Fresno State) can compete. I mean, they've beaten some good teams, they've got good players, good coaches and they're playing with confidence. When you have all those things going your way, I mean, you're hard to beat."
