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Quotes: North Carolina 83, Duke 76
3/4/2006 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Duke Coach Mike Krzyzewski:
Opening Comments:
“It was a really good game. I thought our kids played really hard. Carolina's kids played hard. The crowd was amazing. Somebody's got to win and lose. I thought they deserved it. I thought they played better than we did. I don't think they wanted it necessarily more than we did. In some respects I thought we made it bigger than what it was. Sometimes you can want things at such a high level that you end up putting pressure on yourself. Carolina played really hard and good defense, and then we added that to it. We have to learn from that because we're going to be in other big games. This is a big game because it's Duke and North Carolina. It wasn't big because of what it would do in the standings or anything else. We are going to be now in games that mean that, and we can't do that.
“Carolina is playing really well. (Tyler) Hansbrough was terriffic. I thought (Marcus) Ginyard really gave them a huge spark. I thought he played really well, and Quentin Thomas, off the bench those two, I don't know all their stats, but after being in that game, they gave an energy boost. They were fresh. They had great energy and kept them at a really good level. I thought they played at a really good level the whole time.
“I want to thank our fans. They were unbelievable. They were positive. They were classy. They honored our seniors in such a magnificent way. Just a thank you to them, and then we need to move on.”
On defense:
“I think when we started subbing, we didn't keep up the intensity defensively. We're not playing defense like we should. We do it in spurts, and you can't beat good teams that way. We have won some games like that because of our offense or J.J. (Redick). We're probably not going to beat a really good team with J.J. going 5-for-21. You are who you are, and we're 27-3 because of using that. When it's taken away, or he's human, it makes it more difficult, and we need other guys to step up.
On individuals:
“I thought Lee (Melchionni) played the best he's played in over a month. I thought DeMarcus (Nelson), after his initial few minutes, played very well. Greg (Paulus) has to take his shot, and Sean (Dockery) has to do that. I was happy when we were down by three that Sean made that agressive move to the basket. We had a chance maybe to get a bucket and a foul, but at least he tried. I'm good about guys trying to do that. We just need to do that throughout and not just wait until the end. When you have a couple of guys like Shelden (Williams) and J.J., there's a tendency to step back a little bit. We've played 30 games now. We start 0-and-0. These guys need to shoot freely, and I think that's how we can become better this next week in preparation for the NCAA Tournament.”
On defense being worse lately:
“I don't think we've played very well defensively in the last few weeks. The last time we played well defensively would have to be the Miami game. I thought we played very well that day. The thing that hurt us that day was our offense. We turned it over, and they scored because we had poor offense. That's part of the problem with our defense. I bet they got four buckets on four really weak shots that we had in the first half. If you want to shoot, shoot them strong. You've got to shoot them strong, make strong moves.”
More on why Duke has had problems lately:
“One, we won the league. You've got to be careful. Sometimes you can look, not consciously, but you've moved ahead to March. You've moved ahead to the NCAA Tournament, and that can happen. I don't know if that happened. All I can tell you is we're not playing as well defensively. Carolina is playing great. They've done a terriffic job. They've got great kids playing together. I'm impressed with them. It's always an honor to play against them, and win or lose, there were a lot of great kids on that court tonight. They played better than we did, and we've got to get better.”
On referees:
“I thought the game was really well officiated. Those guys had a good demeanor. It was one of our best officiated games that we've had. I thought they were really in control of the game, and in this type of atmosphere, that was nice to see.”
On consoling seniors:
“It's not bad to hurt. That's the great thing about sport is sometimes you don't learn things until you hurt. We got hurt tonight. Let's see what we do with it.”K
Senior J.J. Redick:
“You obviously know you're going to lose some games at some point. It's obviously really frustrating to be on a two-game losing streak. Carolina played a great game. In the big scheme of things, this game doesn't really mean a whole lot as far as ACC [Tournament] seeding, but it means something to us and it meant something to them, so we're obviously disappointed.”
“27-3 is a great record, especially with the schedule we faced. It's been an interesting season because we were trying to mix so many youngs guys with old guys and we did a good job. If we play well in Greensboro, then we might put ourselves in a position to be a number one seed, which would be a great thing, and we could be right back in Greensboro the next week. Our season isn't over. The regular season is - this part of the season has come to an end. We just have to take the next step and move on to the next play.”
“Tonight, we just didn't play good defense at key times. Any time we did get a lead, we just let up on the defensive end. And Carolina was just so aggressive and really relentless tonight on both end of the floor.”
Senior Shelden Williams:
“Carolina played great. Everytime we went on a run, they answered back with a big shot. They weren't backing down, and we expected that from Carolina. We know that they're a good team, number two in the conference, so you know it was going to be a tough game, especially with the rivalry. They played really well against us.”
“The team that we saw tonight is more mature than when we played them at their place in Chapel Hill. They're a team that's going to keep progressing and keep getting better, and if we meet down the line in the ACC Tournament, hopefully we'll have a different outcome.”
“We've got to regroup and rebuild. We've got a week before the ACC Tournament starts, so we have to kind of analyze things. We're still 14-2 in the Conference, so we still did a pretty good job. Our two losses just came at the end. It's just something that we're lucky we're experiencing now, and hopefully we don't have that same problem down the line.”
Senior Sean Dockery:
“It's a disappointment. You always want to go out with a bang, but you have to give it to Carolina. They played great today, they played together, they played as a team. They played great ball. We have to get on with this loss.”
“Two losses - you just have to learn from them. I know this team. We're a bunch of guys who care about each other and do anything for us to win and get on the right path, so I'm not worried about it. I know we'll be back.”
Sophomore DeMarcus Nelson:
“They got a lot of easy buckets in transition, either getting rebounds or steals. They just got a lot of run-outs, and we didn't get back and we didn't play Duke defense. We didn't play like our normal selves on the defensive end. That made a big difference in this game.”
“[Losing this game] is very hard to swallow. We played very hard out there, and to come up short tonight against Carolina in this game is very hard to swallow. It makes it even harder because you put so much effort into it to win this game for the seniors and to end our last game at home on a positive note. It's a bad feeling we have to leave home with.”
“We have to get better. There are a lot of things we can do to get better. This feeling that this team is feeling tonight. This hurt and this pain has to motivate us this coming week to get better and to prepare and get refreshed for the ACC Tournament. We really have to come out in the ACC Tournament and really have an edge and a fire in each and every one of us.”
“[Losing two in a row] keeps reminding us and lets us know that if we don't play together on both ends and if we don't play well, we'll lose. Somehow, maybe people put out there that we're invincible, but we're not. Sometimes a team can get caught up in that, and each loss just knocks us right over the head and says, ?Hey, if you don't play your best, you don't play defense, you don't rebound, you don't play together on offense, then you can lose.' We have to get better.”
North Carolina Coach Roy Williams
Opening Statement
“I guess it goes without saying that we are extremely pleased. Before I get in to our team, I think that all of us as coaches, players and media should be thankful that we got to watch J.J. Redick and Shelden Williams. You are not going to see very many times in the culture we have today that players of that caliber stay around for four years. I don't know of anybody that I have ever admired or respected more than J.J. He is so hard to guard and takes everybody's best shot. Different guys try to stay fresh on him. I was hoping at the end that I could let him see that I was really clapping for him. I don't know if our league or any league is going to see guys like that come along very often. For Shelden and J.J. to play that way and do what they have done, we feel so fortunate and are very lucky.”
“It was a first half that was an ugly game. We had so many turnovers that I felt like were careless turnovers. I challenged them to be stronger with the basketball. Something that is exceptionally important to our team is that we keep competing all the time. I thought we did a much better job of that in the second half. Tyler (Hansbrough) was something in the second half. We talked about trying to drive the ball to the basket and try to get good spacing and I think we did a much better job of that in the second half. We tried to stay fresh on J.J. but he got some good looks and just missed them. For us it had to be like that. We needed to do a good job defensively but at the same time we wanted to make sure that they had an opportunity to help us by missing some shots. Driving the ball to the basket and the work on the backboards were the two biggest things that we talked about offensively.”
On Tyler Hansbrough driving to the basket in the second half
“In practice this week, we worked on spacing and trying to spread a little bit more and get some drives to the basket. We are a team that does a better job normally of passing the basketball. Against Duke's defense they are so strong on the perimeter and they get into you so much that you do a better job of dribbling the ball to the basket and it helps you. I think Tyler can put it on the floor.”
On how the freshmen played
“It is Cameron Indoor Stadium and everybody who is a college basketball fan is watching and it doesn't get much bigger. I have said all year long that those kids are tough kids and they are competitors. They were raised in athletic households where they have heard the words focus and heard the words poised and toughness. The fact isn't that our freshmen outscored their seniors it is that North Carolina outscored Duke.”
On Marcus Ginyard
“It was difficult for Wes (Miller). They were going to make sure that Wes got no open looks. Where he is extremely effective is when he can get the ball on the perimeter and shoot the ball from a standstill position. They did a great job defensively and Marcus gives us more size guarding Sean Dockery and J.J., (Greg) Paulus and those guys running around screens. It was a little bit of both, they were doing a great job on Wes but Marcus was a little bit more affective defensively in a game like tonight.”
On play late in the game
“We put ourself in a bad position by being stupid. I told Bobby (Frasor) that he needed to be a little more intelligent. He is not the biggest jumper I have ever seen and he is trying to lay it up over the best shotblocker in America. Reyshawn's (Terry) shot from over there, I have no idea why anybody would try and shoot that ball. On the defensive possessions we were switching everything on the perimeter at that time. We felt like we got a hand up on a shot but on the possession before we gave up a second shot so we had to make sure we got the rebound.”
On what the win does for confidence
“We were a pretty confident bunch beforehand. I am confident and I hope it isn't cockiness but I told them that I thought we were the only team in the country that could come in here and win this game. I believed that we could if we played. We couldn't come in here and win unless we played our best game. At halftime I told them we have to play our best half and if we did we would win the game.”
Players Mentioned
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