Postgame Quotes vs. Wisconsin
1/5/2016 10:28:00 PM | Men's Basketball
Indiana vs. Wisconsin
Jan. 5, 2016
Postgame Quotes
Indiana Head Coach Tom Crean
Opening Statement…
TOM CREAN: I'm proud of my team's effort. I really am. The crowd was great. There's always a little bit extra any time a championship-level team is in the building, and when you've got that team, it's quadrupled because of what they did. To say that all of us don't feel that a little bit would be an understatement because you don't want to disappoint on a night that's so important to so many people and on a night that brings that memory, but you've got to -- I didn't realize they were all -- I had to catch my breath a couple times early when I walked out there.
But to me our guys really did a great job of persevering throughout the game. Our defense got better, even when we weren't scoring, and in the past, immaturity could have kicked in in a hurry and you get disappointed and discouraged when you're not making baskets, and all of a sudden the runs turn into -- we never let that happen, and I'm really proud of the way that they did that.
I think we gave up two baskets in the first 12 minutes of the second half, and we had a bunch of different lines because of their match-ups and because of our foul situations.
Proud of the guys; once they got the lead, I don't think we trailed the last 14 minutes, somewhere in there.
But we didn't get a lot of free throws, obviously. We didn't shoot a free throw until there was seven minutes left in the game, but fortunately made every one of them, and that's crucial. It's not about how pretty it is, it's about how you persevere and find a way to win, and that's exactly what we did, and we knew we were playing a really good team. We were playing guys that were main stage on a national championship runner-up. We're playing an excellent program. Greg is an excellent coach. He's been as well-schooled on what it takes to succeed as anybody could be walking into the situation that he's in, and they've got good players, really good players, and fortunately our guys continued to improve during the game, too.
We got away -- when we stayed to what we really wanted in the first half, we may not have made the basket, but we got really good looks. When we got careless, which we did, and when we tried to -- we tried to go in spots where they had too much help, that's where we've got to continue to grow up and continue to learn from that, and when we trusted the movement and when we cut and moved without the ball, sometimes we even over-passed as you saw on the baseline a couple of times. But I'd rather have a group of guys that are playing unselfishly than trying to make something happen themselves all the time. But proud of the way they continued to play against a really good team.
Q. Is this as much growth in a team defensively as you've seen?
TOM CREAN: In 17 years? Oh, I don't know about that. Yeah, I don't know about that. I'd have to -- I don't know. Reflection is for the end of the year. I'm just obsessed with us getting better, and that's exactly the way that they have to be. We'll reflect down the road, but right now there's a lot of room for improvement, and I hope we keep improving for a long time.
Q. This is the third straight game we're asking about OG (Anunoby) coming off the bench. What steps has he taken and maybe gotten the confidence from the last few games?
TOM CREAN: Well, he's an excellent defender, and that was for sure. His confidence is growing, you can see that with the way he's shooting the ball. As I said other times before, one of the reasons we recruited him is because of the way he could shoot. He's getting more comfortable with it, but he's very smart, he's very athletic, he's very strong for his age, and he's pretty fearless when it comes to defense.
And as he gets better even understanding angles and even understanding the personnel -- right now we don't want to inundate him with too much, these five things about this guy and those four things about that guy. We want him just to really play. But he's got to keep rebounding the ball for us, but our guys have got a lot of belief in him, and he knows that, and he's just going to continue to get better, I think.
Q. Losing James (Blackmon, Jr.), what's the mentality moving forward now?
TOM CREAN: Well, I think yesterday when we found out last night and he had already told a couple of them before I told the team later last night, they feel for him. I mean, everybody knows how good he is on our team. I mean, he's -- he makes a world of difference. It's not just his numbers, and I think that hit me about five, six minutes into the Rutgers game, that he wasn't -- the defense is different when he's not out there. That's not a negative towards our other guys, but you have to pay a lot of attention to James, and so it's not just about the baskets that he makes, it's the spaces that he creates for other people, and he's had some very good rebounding games. He's getting better at handling the ball. He can play in the pick-and-roll. He's not a great defender yet but he's working at it. His work ethic is outstanding. They all like him because he's in the gym all the time and he's one of them.
I think they're down about that to a degree, but I mean, they're also resilient. But we miss him. We truly miss him. But at the same time you've got to keep preaching that there's unbelievable opportunity for other people, and it's not going to all -- 16 points are not going to come from one person, and they're probably not going to come from two people. They've got to come mixed up, and the best thing we can do is continue to do is make hustle points.
We're not getting a lot of -- we don't have a lot of great individual offensive numbers from some of our main guys in these first three games, and to say that we're 3-0 inside of that, I could say in spite of it, but they're doing some pretty good things. But inside of the fact that we're not getting some great numbers from other people says a lot about the way they're getting better defensively and persevering.
Q. Can you explain the nature of James' injury?
TOM CREAN: No, I'm not going to do that because I think the most important thing is that under the HIPAA law that's just passed that we just continue to let him recover and he'll be back. He got hurt in practice, and it seems to work for other people, and so we'll stick to it ourselves and let him rehabilitate.
Q. Talk about how hard it is to win every game and what kind of a feat it is to go 32-0.
TOM CREAN: Oh, goodness. You probably don't think about it enough, but I don't -- it's hard to even imagine. Even last year with what Kentucky did and maybe some of the others have been close, Wichita State, obviously, I can imagine the pressure those people are under, the mental toughness they had to get from things like that has just got to be so incredible for them in their lives.
But the odds of that ever happening again for anybody are really, really slim when you look at the 40-year window that's passed that no one has done it in.
Q. What did you see there as far as OG Anunoby and Juwan Morgan?
TOM CREAN: Well, they match up body-wise. It's so important. He's a unique player because they're playing him at 3. He's got the body of a 4 or 5, and he can pass. He's really a good passer, and that's where he's improved so much.
And then they've got other guys. Vitto Brown can step out. He shoots a lot of long twos. And (Ethan) Happ is a good player, so there's going to be match-up issues throughout the game, but he's the biggest one, and you've got to have somebody that can match up as close to size as possible, and we thought Collin (Hartman) was a good match-up. We knew we were going to have to have numerous guys guard him tonight, and I'm proud of the effort that they gave on him.
Q. Are you surprised that those two are ready for that kind of task defensively?
TOM CREAN: All I know is they're improving. All I know is they work really hard, they're improving. Juwan is getting healthier, which certainly he was behind when you look at when he got hurt in Maui and how much time he missed, and then he came back and got hurt again. They're smart, learning. They're winners. They've won. Those kids have won, so that's really, really important. We just want to make sure they keep improving. We've got a long way to go, and we've got a lot of games left.
Q. What was the defensive key to start the second half?
TOM CREAN: I think just that. They probably missed some shots. We'll look at the film, they'll look at some shots they could have made, we'll look at some shots we could have made, but the bottom line is we persevered. Our block-outs got better. Our block-outs weren't very good in the first half, and we didn't gamble. The one time we gambled and Troy went for it, I mean, he was flying to get a steal, but then they back -- they kind of made a play. They're good. They really know how to play without the basketball, obviously.
I think when you do that in a game like that -- we challenged their shots, so I think that's important, but we stayed pretty compact. We didn't gamble, and we've got to continue like I don't know where everybody else is at, but understanding how to defend the ball screen right now is hard because you're not always sure what's going to be called and what's not, and it's just -- that's just the way that it is, and I feel for the referees, too.
But we've got to continue to work on that and make sure that we're leaving very little chance for error because offensive players, it's just going to get more and more. They're just going to drive right into the defender and there's going to be a call 90 percent of the time. There's going to be a lot more foul shots shot in games, so we've got to work at that, too, to keep figuring that part out what's going to be best. There's a lot of strategies you've got to come up with now as the officiating continues to kind of get to somewhat of a level. I'm not sure it's all the way there, but this is the third game now we've had calls on the ball screen that we've got to get used to, and we're really trying to do a better job of showing our hands, but yet when the offensive player drives into your body it's a foul on the defense.
Indiana Players - Kevin Yogi Ferrell, OG Anunoby, Thomas Bryant
Q. Talk about the comeback out there tonight.
YOGI FERRELL: Well, I think the main thing was us getting stops. We came together, had a collective mindset that we wanted to get stops. We weren't really converting on offense, we weren't scoring, they weren't scoring, and we were just able to come out at the end of the game.
Q. Talk about building on this game.
FERRELL: I think that's very important for us to build on, and I think this game the fans definitely helped us out a lot, so we thank them for being here, giving the building a lot of energy and helping us get this win at home.
Q. Talk about OG's performance tonight.
FERRELL: I saw OG's potential in the summer. He was just a shy, quiet guy in the summer - he knows it - back then, but we've been on him about bringing that out; we're going to need that to win. And these three big-time games that we've played, I feel like OG has been a great factor for us in these wins.
Q. Talk about your defensive performance tonight.
FERRELL: Like I said before, each game is going to give you something different. Every team has their stars, and the next step is we can't play hard defense in just the second half because that's not going to get us a win down the road playing somewhere like Michigan State. You've got to play defense for 40 minutes and just find a way.
Q. OG, talk about your shooting tonight.
OG ANUNOBY: I used to shoot a lot with Yogi and Rob (Johnson) and Nick (Zeisloft), and they just stay on me about it.
Q. So are you ready to challenge Nick and Yogi?
ANUNOBY: No comment. (Laughter.)
Q. Thomas, talk about OG; how have you seen him grow into the offense?
THOMAS BRYANT: I've seen him grow a lot. Since the Kentucky Derby, I saw he was a real guy on and off the court, and I saw the potential when we came in for the summer, when he was finishing with the guards instead of the bigs. That caught my eye quick. He just kept improving. I'd see him going to get extra work here and always wanting to get better, and that really shows on the court.
Q. Yogi, what was the defensive key in the second half?
FERRELL: What was key for us was to get stops. We knew this was going to be a grind-out game, and the only way was to basically just buckle down on defense and just try and take away some of the key tendencies like (Bronson) Koenig and (Nigel) Hayes and what they wanted to do.
Q. Can you talk about what it means to get the win in front of the 1976 team?
FERRELL: That definitely means a lot, and in my eyes that's something I'm going to remember, for an undefeated team to come in and see us get a win in front of them, that definitely means a lot to me and definitely my team.
Q. We asked it of OG, but as a guy who's started a lot what do you think about the young guys and how they can sustain their impact over the course of the game?
FERRELL: The main thing is you've just got to stay ready always. You never know when your name is going to be called when you're on the bench, and you've got to have that mindset of, okay, 'how am I going to go in and impact this game for our team to win?' and I feel like guys like OG, Harrison (Niego), Ryan Burton, guys that are going to come in the game for us, tight game, and they can come in and impact the game for our team.
Q. OG, do you see yourself as a guard or forward?
OG ANUNOBY: Just a basketball player.
Q. Can you use more words than OG?
FERRELL: I told you he's shy.
ANUNOBY: It's not true. I'm not shy.
Q. You had 10 points in the first half, pretty effective inside. Did they do anything different to you in the second half that you were able to get some of those looks?
BRYANT: No, getting those points in the first half really freed up my teammates. I believe Nick got a three, he got a clutch three right there coming up when they all came down on me, and Yogi got some real good looks and got fouled, too, with me coming up and demanding the ball, but also it opens up so much for my teammates. It doesn't matter about me scoring points. As long as we get the win, I don't care. My teammates can score as much as they want and I could end with zero points and still get the win, and I'd still be happy.
Q. It's been 40 years since the team went undefeated and won the NCAA National Championship. It's like ancient history to you; you weren't even born, but how spectacular or impressive is that to think about, that nobody else has able to do what that team did out there?
FERRELL: I think about that every day walking into Cook Hall and then seeing the history right here. That's unbelievable when you get to meet those guys, you get to talk to them, there's a certain humbleness you have to yourself and you try and pick up anything that those guys will try and give you. You just want to go out there and play well and get a win for those guys when they're here to watch and just show that you're representing them to the best of your ability.
Q. Thomas, talk about the defensive improvement this year.
BRYANT: Just continuing the steps of our defensive work. We got better and better as the season went on and practices. Coach got on us before. We get on each other now, and we don't want to go into a game where like it's only offense carrying us. We're an offensive and defensive team, too.
Wisconsin Head Coach Greg Gard
Opening Statement…
For our guys to be able to come in here and be able to battle and compete like we did. We will find about 50 things on film this week that we will have to get better at. I liked, in terms of following the game plan and trying to execute it as we had worked on. We were able to touch the post a lot. We have to play through the post, it makes us a better offensive team. We were able to get to the free throw line, which we wanted to do, unfortunately we left a lot of points at the line. We had a couple of key turnovers at the end and that is always going to get magnified. We just have to get better, which this group is doing. They have bought in to what we are doing and are working and battling to get better.
On the second-to-last possession…
We were looking for (Nigel) Hayes, and we had him. I will have to look at the film, but from what I saw the pass was not deflected. He just dropped the pass. We had what we wanted open, it just comes down to us needing to execute.
On taking over for Bo Ryan in the middle of the season…
It has not been as hard of a transition as you might think. We have great players that understand, and bought in from a standpoint of listening and working. They have been able to do it really quickly. Obviously this situation is a lot different than being able to take over in April or May when you have the time to put your fingerprint on the program and really establish it. We have had to accelerate the process a lot, and we have talked about how they have been able to learn on the fly. They have grasped all of that terrifically. Our execution is not as good as I would like it to be. We have only practiced 10 days since I took over. We are taking steps in the right direction. Obviously the loss stings a little bit and it will, which is good for those guys because they are competitive. To bring a young team in here and have a shot to win with 50 seconds, we are going in the right direction.
On Wisconsin's defense…
I though we were pretty good on defense. Early it was a lay-up contest between us, but then I thought we settled in a little bit. We were able to stop dribble penetration a little bit better, much better than the last time we were in here. I though we did not set the alarm clock fast enough on a couple of 3-pointers late, Max Bielfeldt and OG Anunoby hit one each. But overall, I thought our defense was very good tonight.
Jan. 5, 2016
Postgame Quotes
Indiana Head Coach Tom Crean
Opening Statement…
TOM CREAN: I'm proud of my team's effort. I really am. The crowd was great. There's always a little bit extra any time a championship-level team is in the building, and when you've got that team, it's quadrupled because of what they did. To say that all of us don't feel that a little bit would be an understatement because you don't want to disappoint on a night that's so important to so many people and on a night that brings that memory, but you've got to -- I didn't realize they were all -- I had to catch my breath a couple times early when I walked out there.
But to me our guys really did a great job of persevering throughout the game. Our defense got better, even when we weren't scoring, and in the past, immaturity could have kicked in in a hurry and you get disappointed and discouraged when you're not making baskets, and all of a sudden the runs turn into -- we never let that happen, and I'm really proud of the way that they did that.
I think we gave up two baskets in the first 12 minutes of the second half, and we had a bunch of different lines because of their match-ups and because of our foul situations.
Proud of the guys; once they got the lead, I don't think we trailed the last 14 minutes, somewhere in there.
But we didn't get a lot of free throws, obviously. We didn't shoot a free throw until there was seven minutes left in the game, but fortunately made every one of them, and that's crucial. It's not about how pretty it is, it's about how you persevere and find a way to win, and that's exactly what we did, and we knew we were playing a really good team. We were playing guys that were main stage on a national championship runner-up. We're playing an excellent program. Greg is an excellent coach. He's been as well-schooled on what it takes to succeed as anybody could be walking into the situation that he's in, and they've got good players, really good players, and fortunately our guys continued to improve during the game, too.
We got away -- when we stayed to what we really wanted in the first half, we may not have made the basket, but we got really good looks. When we got careless, which we did, and when we tried to -- we tried to go in spots where they had too much help, that's where we've got to continue to grow up and continue to learn from that, and when we trusted the movement and when we cut and moved without the ball, sometimes we even over-passed as you saw on the baseline a couple of times. But I'd rather have a group of guys that are playing unselfishly than trying to make something happen themselves all the time. But proud of the way they continued to play against a really good team.
Q. Is this as much growth in a team defensively as you've seen?
TOM CREAN: In 17 years? Oh, I don't know about that. Yeah, I don't know about that. I'd have to -- I don't know. Reflection is for the end of the year. I'm just obsessed with us getting better, and that's exactly the way that they have to be. We'll reflect down the road, but right now there's a lot of room for improvement, and I hope we keep improving for a long time.
Q. This is the third straight game we're asking about OG (Anunoby) coming off the bench. What steps has he taken and maybe gotten the confidence from the last few games?
TOM CREAN: Well, he's an excellent defender, and that was for sure. His confidence is growing, you can see that with the way he's shooting the ball. As I said other times before, one of the reasons we recruited him is because of the way he could shoot. He's getting more comfortable with it, but he's very smart, he's very athletic, he's very strong for his age, and he's pretty fearless when it comes to defense.
And as he gets better even understanding angles and even understanding the personnel -- right now we don't want to inundate him with too much, these five things about this guy and those four things about that guy. We want him just to really play. But he's got to keep rebounding the ball for us, but our guys have got a lot of belief in him, and he knows that, and he's just going to continue to get better, I think.
Q. Losing James (Blackmon, Jr.), what's the mentality moving forward now?
TOM CREAN: Well, I think yesterday when we found out last night and he had already told a couple of them before I told the team later last night, they feel for him. I mean, everybody knows how good he is on our team. I mean, he's -- he makes a world of difference. It's not just his numbers, and I think that hit me about five, six minutes into the Rutgers game, that he wasn't -- the defense is different when he's not out there. That's not a negative towards our other guys, but you have to pay a lot of attention to James, and so it's not just about the baskets that he makes, it's the spaces that he creates for other people, and he's had some very good rebounding games. He's getting better at handling the ball. He can play in the pick-and-roll. He's not a great defender yet but he's working at it. His work ethic is outstanding. They all like him because he's in the gym all the time and he's one of them.
I think they're down about that to a degree, but I mean, they're also resilient. But we miss him. We truly miss him. But at the same time you've got to keep preaching that there's unbelievable opportunity for other people, and it's not going to all -- 16 points are not going to come from one person, and they're probably not going to come from two people. They've got to come mixed up, and the best thing we can do is continue to do is make hustle points.
We're not getting a lot of -- we don't have a lot of great individual offensive numbers from some of our main guys in these first three games, and to say that we're 3-0 inside of that, I could say in spite of it, but they're doing some pretty good things. But inside of the fact that we're not getting some great numbers from other people says a lot about the way they're getting better defensively and persevering.
Q. Can you explain the nature of James' injury?
TOM CREAN: No, I'm not going to do that because I think the most important thing is that under the HIPAA law that's just passed that we just continue to let him recover and he'll be back. He got hurt in practice, and it seems to work for other people, and so we'll stick to it ourselves and let him rehabilitate.
Q. Talk about how hard it is to win every game and what kind of a feat it is to go 32-0.
TOM CREAN: Oh, goodness. You probably don't think about it enough, but I don't -- it's hard to even imagine. Even last year with what Kentucky did and maybe some of the others have been close, Wichita State, obviously, I can imagine the pressure those people are under, the mental toughness they had to get from things like that has just got to be so incredible for them in their lives.
But the odds of that ever happening again for anybody are really, really slim when you look at the 40-year window that's passed that no one has done it in.
Q. What did you see there as far as OG Anunoby and Juwan Morgan?
TOM CREAN: Well, they match up body-wise. It's so important. He's a unique player because they're playing him at 3. He's got the body of a 4 or 5, and he can pass. He's really a good passer, and that's where he's improved so much.
And then they've got other guys. Vitto Brown can step out. He shoots a lot of long twos. And (Ethan) Happ is a good player, so there's going to be match-up issues throughout the game, but he's the biggest one, and you've got to have somebody that can match up as close to size as possible, and we thought Collin (Hartman) was a good match-up. We knew we were going to have to have numerous guys guard him tonight, and I'm proud of the effort that they gave on him.
Q. Are you surprised that those two are ready for that kind of task defensively?
TOM CREAN: All I know is they're improving. All I know is they work really hard, they're improving. Juwan is getting healthier, which certainly he was behind when you look at when he got hurt in Maui and how much time he missed, and then he came back and got hurt again. They're smart, learning. They're winners. They've won. Those kids have won, so that's really, really important. We just want to make sure they keep improving. We've got a long way to go, and we've got a lot of games left.
Q. What was the defensive key to start the second half?
TOM CREAN: I think just that. They probably missed some shots. We'll look at the film, they'll look at some shots they could have made, we'll look at some shots we could have made, but the bottom line is we persevered. Our block-outs got better. Our block-outs weren't very good in the first half, and we didn't gamble. The one time we gambled and Troy went for it, I mean, he was flying to get a steal, but then they back -- they kind of made a play. They're good. They really know how to play without the basketball, obviously.
I think when you do that in a game like that -- we challenged their shots, so I think that's important, but we stayed pretty compact. We didn't gamble, and we've got to continue like I don't know where everybody else is at, but understanding how to defend the ball screen right now is hard because you're not always sure what's going to be called and what's not, and it's just -- that's just the way that it is, and I feel for the referees, too.
But we've got to continue to work on that and make sure that we're leaving very little chance for error because offensive players, it's just going to get more and more. They're just going to drive right into the defender and there's going to be a call 90 percent of the time. There's going to be a lot more foul shots shot in games, so we've got to work at that, too, to keep figuring that part out what's going to be best. There's a lot of strategies you've got to come up with now as the officiating continues to kind of get to somewhat of a level. I'm not sure it's all the way there, but this is the third game now we've had calls on the ball screen that we've got to get used to, and we're really trying to do a better job of showing our hands, but yet when the offensive player drives into your body it's a foul on the defense.
Indiana Players - Kevin Yogi Ferrell, OG Anunoby, Thomas Bryant
Q. Talk about the comeback out there tonight.
YOGI FERRELL: Well, I think the main thing was us getting stops. We came together, had a collective mindset that we wanted to get stops. We weren't really converting on offense, we weren't scoring, they weren't scoring, and we were just able to come out at the end of the game.
Q. Talk about building on this game.
FERRELL: I think that's very important for us to build on, and I think this game the fans definitely helped us out a lot, so we thank them for being here, giving the building a lot of energy and helping us get this win at home.
Q. Talk about OG's performance tonight.
FERRELL: I saw OG's potential in the summer. He was just a shy, quiet guy in the summer - he knows it - back then, but we've been on him about bringing that out; we're going to need that to win. And these three big-time games that we've played, I feel like OG has been a great factor for us in these wins.
Q. Talk about your defensive performance tonight.
FERRELL: Like I said before, each game is going to give you something different. Every team has their stars, and the next step is we can't play hard defense in just the second half because that's not going to get us a win down the road playing somewhere like Michigan State. You've got to play defense for 40 minutes and just find a way.
Q. OG, talk about your shooting tonight.
OG ANUNOBY: I used to shoot a lot with Yogi and Rob (Johnson) and Nick (Zeisloft), and they just stay on me about it.
Q. So are you ready to challenge Nick and Yogi?
ANUNOBY: No comment. (Laughter.)
Q. Thomas, talk about OG; how have you seen him grow into the offense?
THOMAS BRYANT: I've seen him grow a lot. Since the Kentucky Derby, I saw he was a real guy on and off the court, and I saw the potential when we came in for the summer, when he was finishing with the guards instead of the bigs. That caught my eye quick. He just kept improving. I'd see him going to get extra work here and always wanting to get better, and that really shows on the court.
Q. Yogi, what was the defensive key in the second half?
FERRELL: What was key for us was to get stops. We knew this was going to be a grind-out game, and the only way was to basically just buckle down on defense and just try and take away some of the key tendencies like (Bronson) Koenig and (Nigel) Hayes and what they wanted to do.
Q. Can you talk about what it means to get the win in front of the 1976 team?
FERRELL: That definitely means a lot, and in my eyes that's something I'm going to remember, for an undefeated team to come in and see us get a win in front of them, that definitely means a lot to me and definitely my team.
Q. We asked it of OG, but as a guy who's started a lot what do you think about the young guys and how they can sustain their impact over the course of the game?
FERRELL: The main thing is you've just got to stay ready always. You never know when your name is going to be called when you're on the bench, and you've got to have that mindset of, okay, 'how am I going to go in and impact this game for our team to win?' and I feel like guys like OG, Harrison (Niego), Ryan Burton, guys that are going to come in the game for us, tight game, and they can come in and impact the game for our team.
Q. OG, do you see yourself as a guard or forward?
OG ANUNOBY: Just a basketball player.
Q. Can you use more words than OG?
FERRELL: I told you he's shy.
ANUNOBY: It's not true. I'm not shy.
Q. You had 10 points in the first half, pretty effective inside. Did they do anything different to you in the second half that you were able to get some of those looks?
BRYANT: No, getting those points in the first half really freed up my teammates. I believe Nick got a three, he got a clutch three right there coming up when they all came down on me, and Yogi got some real good looks and got fouled, too, with me coming up and demanding the ball, but also it opens up so much for my teammates. It doesn't matter about me scoring points. As long as we get the win, I don't care. My teammates can score as much as they want and I could end with zero points and still get the win, and I'd still be happy.
Q. It's been 40 years since the team went undefeated and won the NCAA National Championship. It's like ancient history to you; you weren't even born, but how spectacular or impressive is that to think about, that nobody else has able to do what that team did out there?
FERRELL: I think about that every day walking into Cook Hall and then seeing the history right here. That's unbelievable when you get to meet those guys, you get to talk to them, there's a certain humbleness you have to yourself and you try and pick up anything that those guys will try and give you. You just want to go out there and play well and get a win for those guys when they're here to watch and just show that you're representing them to the best of your ability.
Q. Thomas, talk about the defensive improvement this year.
BRYANT: Just continuing the steps of our defensive work. We got better and better as the season went on and practices. Coach got on us before. We get on each other now, and we don't want to go into a game where like it's only offense carrying us. We're an offensive and defensive team, too.
Wisconsin Head Coach Greg Gard
Opening Statement…
For our guys to be able to come in here and be able to battle and compete like we did. We will find about 50 things on film this week that we will have to get better at. I liked, in terms of following the game plan and trying to execute it as we had worked on. We were able to touch the post a lot. We have to play through the post, it makes us a better offensive team. We were able to get to the free throw line, which we wanted to do, unfortunately we left a lot of points at the line. We had a couple of key turnovers at the end and that is always going to get magnified. We just have to get better, which this group is doing. They have bought in to what we are doing and are working and battling to get better.
On the second-to-last possession…
We were looking for (Nigel) Hayes, and we had him. I will have to look at the film, but from what I saw the pass was not deflected. He just dropped the pass. We had what we wanted open, it just comes down to us needing to execute.
On taking over for Bo Ryan in the middle of the season…
It has not been as hard of a transition as you might think. We have great players that understand, and bought in from a standpoint of listening and working. They have been able to do it really quickly. Obviously this situation is a lot different than being able to take over in April or May when you have the time to put your fingerprint on the program and really establish it. We have had to accelerate the process a lot, and we have talked about how they have been able to learn on the fly. They have grasped all of that terrifically. Our execution is not as good as I would like it to be. We have only practiced 10 days since I took over. We are taking steps in the right direction. Obviously the loss stings a little bit and it will, which is good for those guys because they are competitive. To bring a young team in here and have a shot to win with 50 seconds, we are going in the right direction.
On Wisconsin's defense…
I though we were pretty good on defense. Early it was a lay-up contest between us, but then I thought we settled in a little bit. We were able to stop dribble penetration a little bit better, much better than the last time we were in here. I though we did not set the alarm clock fast enough on a couple of 3-pointers late, Max Bielfeldt and OG Anunoby hit one each. But overall, I thought our defense was very good tonight.
Players Mentioned
Forward
/ Men's Basketball
Forward
/ Men's Basketball
Center
/ Men's Basketball
Forward
/ Men's Basketball
Guard
/ Men's Basketball
Forward
/ Men's BasketballFB: Under The Hood - Week 3 (Indiana State)
Thursday, September 11
FB: Elijah Sarratt Media Availability (9/9/25)
Tuesday, September 09
FB: Roman Hemby Media Availability (9/9/25)
Tuesday, September 09
FB: Under the Hood with Indiana Football - Week 2 (Kennesaw State)
Thursday, September 04