Quotes: Duke 71, Georgia Tech 58

Duke Coach Mike Krzyzewski

Opening statement:
“It was a strong game between two really good defensive teams. I think they're a very good team, despite what their record shows. They lost their four home games by six points total and I really respect how hard they played. I thought both teams played so darn hard tonight. It was tough to make passes, let alone make shots. I thought it was one of the best defensive performances that our team's had all year. To get 20 turnovers against just three assists, that means passing was really hard tonight. We've been working on that, contesting passing lanes. It was a man's game tonight ? very physical and a good, hard defensive game. Points were hard to come by tonight.”

On the defensive play of Gerald Henderson:
“That's the best Gerald has ever done. G made about three plays in a row that kind of broke it open for us. One was the dunk, but then he got a couple steals too. Those are plays that he hasn't made in the past and it was like all of a sudden the birth of a new talent. It's so exciting when you see a kid do that. He's been a good defender on the ball, but he hasn't really had that off-the-ball denial. As you go on in your career, like in anything, you become more familiar and then all of a sudden it just hits you. It's that little fraction of a second where you anticipate instead of saying ?oh I missed it.' Tonight he didn't do that ? he had that anticipation. Anticipation is a key word for that.”

On cutting down turnovers against Georgia Tech:
“We've been working on being strong with the ball. It's not that they were easy plays. In the two games we lost, we had 45 turnovers and tonight we had nine. A lot of it had to do with being strong with the ball, making sure of your passes. Getting prepared for Georgia Tech helped us because we know how hard they play. It forced us to play a little bit better than we have been playing.”

On how points were hard to come by:
“You have to give credit to their defense for that. Our window of opportunity to shoot the three was small. We had to get it and get rid of it quick because they were out there. When you're playing a physical game like this, it takes your legs out from under you a little bit. I think both teams suffered from that, so we had to invent some ways to score. Their inside defense was very good, which is why we tried Brian early, but we knew we weren't going to get much around him. That's why I went to David (McClure). Not that I'm down on Brian (Zoubek) right now, but I think Dave just gave us a bit more for this game.”

Sophomore Jon Scheyer

“Our defense hasn't been good in our last two losses, so for us tonight it was a really big key to come out defensively and really try to lock them down. We did a pretty good job for the most part, and getting out in the passing lanes and creating turnovers is a huge thing, and we did a pretty good job of that tonight.”

“I thought we really just made some plays on defense ? deflections and hitting the ball out. We're not always going to be able to pull down rebounds, but we need to make scrappy plays like that. That creates opportunities on offense. And then there was a stretch where we let them back into it.”

On the upcoming matchup with NC State and the possibility of Coach K's 800th win:
“I wasn't even aware of how many wins it was, but we're going to want it just as bad regardless of what win it was for him. Obviously that gives us a little something extra, but we know going into NC State on Saturday it's a huge game no matter what.”

Senior DeMarcus Nelson

“Our defense was key tonight. We played against a strong interior with multiple guys inside and shooters on the perimeter. We were able to contest them a lot. We forced 20 turnovers, and I think they only had three assists, so when your defense is that good, it lends itself for you to play that much better on offense.”

“I give our defense a B+. We definitely were good tonight with our help side, defending, rebounding, contesting. It was definitely a good effort defensively but there's always going to be something throughout the course of the game that you can get better at. There were different times in the game where they were struggling for points and our defense kind of gave them a couple of drives that we could've been a little smarter on.”

On the upcoming matchup with NC State:
“It doesn't matter how they've been playing prior to our game. They're going to play their butts off. They're a great team, they're talented, and we'll have to be ready for a great game.”

Sophomore Gerald Henderson

On the possibility of a Duke win on Saturday giving Coach K 800 in his career:
“It just really shows that he's a winner. To even coach 800 games is a heck of an accomplishment. It would be good to help him get that. He doesn't coach to get records, but it'll be big for his legacy.”

Georgia Tech Coach Paul Hewitt

On Duke's defense:
“Duke has done a great job all year turning people over and particularly getting steals, and that's something we talked about a lot. I felt like our guys worked extremely hard. We had a lot of looks around the rim, especially early. We had three or four lay-ups off of offensive rebounds and we have to put ourselves in position to stick those back in.”

On their game plan for Duke's shooters:
“We switched a lot on ball screens at the top and put a special emphasis on getting to [Jon] Scheyer, [Greg] Paulus and [Kyle] Singler. It's nothing that no one else hasn't tried. Tonight we unfortunately missed some shots and I thought we did a good job contesting some shots.”