The University of Alabama at Birmingham Athletics
UAB vs. East Carolina Coaches Quotes
2/16/2005 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Feb. 16, 2005
East Carolina Head Coach Bill Herrion
On the win: "This is about the sixth consecutive game like this (for us). A great win for our kids. A great win for our team. We have a lot of respect for these guys because of their success: Two years ago going into the final eight (of the NIT), last year in the Sweet 16, the level that their program and their team has been winning."
On how his team shouldn't be a surprise: "Believe it or not we have been playing very good basketball for about the last month. We play in such a difficult league. For us to come in here tonight and win this game with arguably two of our better offensive players not much of a factor- and then Mike Cook who is our leading scorer-who was really struggling with the basket, it says a lot about our kids."
On the youth that led his team to the win: "We are young-we only have one senior, the big shot blocker. It was mostly freshman, sophomores and juniors on the floor. It was a great win. We made plays. When you make plays, free throws and re-bounds down the stretch of games, you can win. I wish we could have won it the regular way and not foul a three point shooter at the buzzer, but we'll take it. We are battling like crazy trying to get into the Conference USA tournament. This is a good win for us and a good step. It's in our hands now."
UAB head coach Mike Anderson
On the game: "I'm very disappointed and frustrated, but you've got to give credit to East Carolina. They didn't go away. They did what you've got to do on the road, and that's hang around and hang around. Before you know it, looking at the free throw line, and there's the difference right there. We knocked down free throws, but they shoot 81% in the game. That's the difference in the ballgame."
On the tempo: "We controlled the tempo for a while. Then they went to a zone and we couldn't make any shots. We struggled in terms of shooting the basketball and just finding someway we could score. There was a time for about six or seven minutes where we didn't make a bucket. Of course, the big work-horse for us, the guy that can score, Marques continues to get in foul trouble and we don't have a go to guy."
On Marques Lewis and his fouling out: "He's a guy that's playing awful well for us right now. We've got to get somebody else that can come in and give us a lift. I thought the bench played very well for us in the first half, but not as well in the second half. We made them turn the ball over 26 times, and the key is what you do with those turnovers. We had our chances, even as we went to the free throw line, but it just didn't happen tonight."
On Richard Jones' missed free throw at the end of the game: "He got a chance to learn right there. He made two-for-two earlier in the game. Hopefully it's going to be a learning curve for him. Some of our younger guys continue to grow up for us, and you'll see more and more of those guys. As I look at some of the playing time of some of the older guys and we're not getting it from some of the guys, especially during crunch time. Again, I thought it was an off night. I thought we did some good things defensively, but we just couldn't put the ball in the hole."
