St. John's University Athletics
Postgame Quotes: St. John's 97, St. Thomas Aquinas 71
11/8/2014 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Recap | Box Score | Photo Gallery 
Head Coach Steve Lavin
Opening statement:
"We struggled early, but I thought the smaller group of four seniors and Rysheed [Jordan] made a nice run with the defensive pressure applied and pace that we are able to play at. Those seniors, along with Rysheed, had a good rhythm going in the second half and caught fire to let us pull away with the victory."
On Adonis De La Rosa:
"Adonis made some progress and took a step in the right direction this week in practice and also in the game today. He saw the results of his preparation in practices carrying over and because of that had a stronger performance today."
On playing with five guards:
"We have the ability to go small and cause some problems at a fast tempo. We like to play small, but we also want to bring the depth of our front line along at a pace that will allow us to be competitive later in the season."
On walk-ons Myles Stewart and Jay Henderson:
"They were Division I prospects and we knew we were losing all these guards with the graduating class of 2015. They are different types of players, but both Jay and Myles could be strong contributors during their career at St. John's. Right now, they just have to keep working on improving their game and be ready to be called upon."
Senior Guard D'Angelo Harrison
On the team being ready for the season opener:
"We are not all the way there, but we are working towards that and still have to get better defensively. We're a work in progress, but I don't think anyone in college basketball is 100% yet."
Senior Guard/Forward Sir'Dominic Pointer
On the slow start:
"It's still a work in progress. Right now we had a good team and came back, but you can't always come back. We have to work on it and it is still the beginning of the season. By the third or fourth game, we should be good. It's mostly because we are taking too many jump shots, we have to get in the paint in the beginning of the game."
Senior Guard Phil Greene IV
On playing with five guards:
"I like it a lot, everyone is interchangeable. On defense we can switch it around because no one out there is a big man. We moved the ball, we worked hard and it was a faster style of play."
On walk-ons Myles Stewart and Jay Henderson:
"Myles and Jay are just like regular scholarship players. They work hard and are always in the gym. Their skills are up to par and are like regular freshmen in my eyes."
St. Thomas Aquinas Head Coach Tobin Anderson
On the game:
"I thought our team played well at times and we got off to a good start in the first half. [St. John's] did a nice job in the second half of moving the ball and finding the open man and their defense kind of wore us down a little bit. I thought we still did a lot of good things and [St. John's] was a good matchup for us. We played well for the first 15 minutes, but we couldn't sustain for the full 40 minutes. That's what good teams do, they wear you down. I thought they played really well in the second half. They shared the ball nad made the extra pass which hurt us."
