St. John's University Athletics
Men's Basketball Postgame Quotes
1/23/2009 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Jan. 23, 2009
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QUEENS, N.Y. -
Head Coach Norm Roberts
Opening Statement:
"Cincinnati is a good team with good players. Deonta Vaughn did some good things for them in the second half. They wore us down. We just have to do a better job of handling the basketball as a team, not just as one. We didn't do that and it led to them getting easy baskets and it leads to us not having the ability to score. We have to keep working on it, we're a young team and we'll get better from it."
On the last five minutes of the game:
"We struggled to handle the ball. We were trying to get into offense. I'm not going to make any excuses: Quincy's got a bad ankle, he had to go back and get re-taped, D.J.'s got the flu. There was a lot of pressure of Ty (Edmonson) and he's a young kid and he was trying to handle it. We couldn't get into offense, we couldn't get any rhythm going. We wanted to move the ball more and get the ball inside to Burrell but we struggled with that."
On the loss:
"It's upsetting, not disheartening. The situation that happened, I asked `Can I remove my guy? Can I go on the court and grab my guy?' I was told `No,' and then he was thrown out. I was trying to get my guy to get him away from their guy and I guess I couldn't get to him soon enough."
On his reaction to the referee's calls:
"The referees call the game and I coach. That's what I do. They said that they were going at each other and didn't stop and I think it did affect the game. I think it was a big factor."
On how to play after the ejection of D.J. Kennedy:
"We still have to stay tough. We needed to make plays and we didn't and they did. We have to be tougher with the basketball. We just couldn't make those plays, they defended us pretty well, but we didn't do a good job of moving the basketball."
On what he can take positive from the game:
"My team always plays hard, very hard. That's what we take away from it."
On D.J. taking the blame for losing the game:
"He's a stud. That's what he does. Paris feels bad that he couldn't do more. All of those guys do: Burrell, Evans, all of them. They try hard. We'll get better. That's life in the BIG EAST."
On Justin Burrell:
"He was aggressive the whole time and that's what I want him to be. That's what I want him to be. He's one of the best 15-foot shooters. I want him shooting. When he's aggressive he ups the whole team."
Sophomore Guard D.J. Kennedy
On his ejection:
"They told me to leave the court. I watched the rest of the game and I take total blame for this game. It was my fault, I lost my cool and I shouldn't have. I should've just played through it. It wasn't the best situation. I feel like I let my team down, I just have to come back."
On the altercation that took place:
"It was basically back and forth. He said a few things and I said some. When I got thrown out it threw me off. I don't know why, I wasn't looking for that. I shouldn't have been talking anyway, I should've just let it go."
On what he had to say after the game:
"I apologized to the coaches and my teammates in the locker room. I take total regards to the game, especially as a player playing in New York."
On his play tonight before the ejection:
"There's no excuses, but coming into the game I didn't feel too well. I was able to fight through that and I let my anger get the best of me tonight."
On what led to the altercation:
"It was the play before where he elbowed me right in the stomach. I just lost my cool. It really wasn't anything to get angry about. I take the blame. It was my fault, like I said."
When asked if this was his first ejection:
"Yes, it was the first time and it will be the last time, too."
Sophomore Guard Paris Horne
On how losing D.J. effected the game:
"A little bit, but we still had the lead. We just didn't execute on offense the way we should've. It hurts us because he's the leading scorer and he's a great defender. But Ty (Edmonson) and Quincy (Roberts) did an excellent job trying to step up."
On having to shut down Deonta Vaughn:
"I was a little tired, but I was still with him. He just got up a little bit by making a couple of 3's, but a lot of his points were from the line."
Cincinnati Head Coach Mick Cronin
Thoughts on the game:
"This was a hard fought and typical BIG EAST game. It was a great win for our team. St. John's shot the ball extremely well tonight from the 3-point line, especially early in the game. Our guys showed a lot of resilience in battling back. I thought our press really affected the game and in the last 10 minutes our defense went to another level. In fairness to St. John's, I'm going to guess that they got worn down a little by playing their guys so many minutes."
On Deonta Vaughn's performance:
"It helps when you have an All-BIG EAST player on your team. My message to him at halftime was that with our point guard out for the year, we couldn't win if he has a bad game. In the first half, he wasn't the All-BIG EAST guard that we know. One thing about him is that he's a competitor. It's tough on him because he's a scorer but he's playing the point. That's something he fights with: when to shoot, when to pass and when to drive the ball. We made an adjustment in the second half and tried to spread the floor. The way the game was being called, we thought we could create some fouls and get to the free-throw line."
On Rashad Bishop's productivity:
"I wasn't surprised by Rashad's productivity when he's aggressive. It's hard to get Rashad to be aggressive because he's such a laid back guy. He is our toughest competitor and in games like this he always plays better. His problem is, when the game isn't physical and bodies aren't flying around, he has the tendency to take a back seat and coast a little bit. He's still finding his ways because he's only a sophomore. If he can give us consistent scoring he can take our team to another level."
On the technical fouls:
"The ejections were a shame. Norm and I agree. You got to give us a chance to get our players separated. There was no pushing or shoving. It was very confusing. Neither one of us were happy with that, it's unfortunate."
On getting a road win:
"Any road win in this conference is a big win. You got to make sure you win at home and if you can steal games on the road, you give yourself a chance."
