Colorado Milwaukee Quotes
Colorado Head Coach Tad Boyle
Opening Statement“Well this team doesn't make it look easy for darn sure. Here we go again. I told Mark Johnson on the radio, it reminds me of the Forrest Gump line, ‘life's like a box of chocolates.’ This basketball team is like a box of chocolates, you just don't know what you're going to get and it's not just a night after night, it's media timeout to media timeout. It's the first half to the second half, it's possession to possession. We just have to become more consistent, but we made plays and down the stretch, and last four minutes we played well but the first 36 we were as inconsistent as we've been all year. Part of it is making shots, part of it is making good decisions and we just have got to get better offensively. There's just no other way around it and we got some time now to hopefully work on that and we're going to do that. We've got some guys on this team, I know we got guys that can. We had some good looks tonight that didn't go in and that's just part of it. Our defense and our rebounding won us another game. We're 76 and 5 now over the last 11 and a half years when we hold the other team under 40% and outrebounded by eight or more so we've done that twice in a row now, but we can't continue to always rely on that our offense needs to help out a little bit.”
On Jabari Walker
“Jabari was ready to play this game, there's no doubt about it and for various reasons. Number one, because we'd gotten on him after the energy level that he showed last game. Jabari struggled for most of the night. He was pressing. There's a fine line between being aggressive and playing out of control. He kind of tipped over that line I thought tonight at times but down the stretch, he made plays, and I’m proud of him for that. I know it was a big game for him and he knows he could have played better but he played well when he had to and helped make big plays down the stretch to help us win that game. He did it and Evan (Battey) did it. I thought our bench was terrific tonight. Luke O'Brien's minutes were fantastic, Nique (Clifford) did some good things in the first half. Lawson (Lovering) gave us some good minutes in the first half, Julian (Hammond III). Our bench did a good job I thought tonight so it was a team victory. I'm happy that Jabari finished the game strong because he was struggling for the majority of it offensively.”
On the defense
“I was really pleased with everybody except for (Jordan) Lathon. Lathon was a driver on the scouting report and he's a capable shooter. That's what I talked to our team about in the locker room after the game. He's a driver in the scouting report, but he made a couple of shots and now all of a sudden he thinks he can shoot and he starts to so we have to make that transition during the game. Now, if we do our job in the first half, and get through ball screens, he doesn't hit the last two buckets in the first half, maybe he doesn't come out feeling it in the second half like he did. That part of that was on us, but he's a good player. We've got better. The job we did on (Patrick) Baldwin was terrific. We let him get set on two of his shots and he made both but the ones that we were up in him and putting some pressure on him and made them feel uncomfortable. He suits to step-back threes, and he makes those, shake his hand but we did a really good job on him I thought, for the most part, tonight Jabari did a good job, Evan did a good job, Tristan (DaSilva), when he was on them. Really a good effort.”
On the team improvement
“I felt tonight the energy level was much better. It was different than Eastern Washington. I felt like our guys were dialed in. I felt it in the huddles. Our energy and effort were better tonight on the defensive end and we're going to play against better teams, it's going to be harder to keep one of those numbers and that's why offensively we have to become more efficient, taking care of the ball making open shots and we know the task ahead of us here as we go into finals, and we start practicing. This is a nice stretch as a coach where you feel like you can make some strides as a team. We're not going to practice long during finals but we're going to be crisp and get after it and try to get better.”
On Finals Week
“Their finals start tomorrow. We're taking tomorrow off because a lot of guys have finals tomorrow. We'll practice Sunday morning. We basically block three hours out of their day when guys don't have finals so they can come here, get shots up, we'll practice, get a lift in, and get them out of here. So, there won't be a lot of extra time. But in that three-hour window, we're going to use it efficiently, to get better. There are certain days their finals are heavier. We're going to take Saturday off and we're going to take Tuesday off. So, we'll practice Sunday, Monday, Tuesday off, and then Wednesday is the last day of finals and we'll be able to practice Thursday Friday, and get ready to play next Saturday. So we have a little bit of a break here."
On Luke Obrien
“I loved his aggressiveness, but aggressiveness under control. I loved how he rebounded the ball. He was in there battling for boards and I liked his energy level on defense. I thought Luke did a really good job in really all the areas of the game. When he comes in there and gives us a lift…that's why our bench is so important. We always say don't count the time. Make the time you're out there count and Luke did a good job of that as he's done in his career tonight. So, hopefully, he can use that as a springboard because there's going to be nights we're going to need Lawson and we're going to need Nique, we're going to need Luke, we're going to need Julian, we're going to need all the guys that come off that bench. Lawson and you know, the whole crew.”
On KJ Simpson and the point guards
“KJ obviously is a big part of the rotation and he gives us good energy off the bench. I thought he was good tonight, for the most part, our 2.2 point guards, KJ and Keeshawn seven assistants, and two turnovers. We'll take that every night. It's a pretty good ratio and one of them was a silly one in there at the end and that shouldn't happen, but it did and otherwise, it would have been seven to one. So, really good job by our point guards tonight”
On hitting numbers
“13 turnovers are too many against these guys. Our sis numbers will go up once we start making some more shots. We did a good job making some one mores as Keeshawn hit Tristan with a one more, wide open, three in the corner. We made some one mores Jabari had a couple of wide-open looks that didn't go in, but we're making the right plays. And that's all I can ask for as a coach offensively is that we are making the right plays, making the right reads, and then we just got to keep getting in the gym and grinding and working. We're going to have a night where we break out. We're going to have one, I just don't know when it's going to happen. I'd like it to be sooner rather than later.”
On three pointers
“It’s about getting to the gym and just having confidence. it's just been seeing one go in. We had a we had too many bad shots early in the game. We had some really tough shots and tough twos in the lane, which we don't want. We had two or three shots that never got to the rim. Jabari had a couple of bad ones early on. Tristan had one blocked Keeshawn had a bad one early. KJ had a bad one in the second half. We have to eliminate the bad shots and I've got to do a better job. Our staff has to do a better job of yanking these guys out when they're taking bad shots because we can't have that. We have to eliminate that because it’s something that we can control. And our players understand what a good shot is and what a bad shot is. They can't take bad shots.
On practice vs. game shots
“I call that practice shooter versus game shooters. We’ve got practice shooters. We need some game shooters and I got confidence in our guys. Look at Eli's numbers last year. Look at your Jabari’s numbers last year. We know how good of a shooter Keeshawn is. We see it in practice and the tracking system that you're talking about. Evan has really worked on his game, you know from three so the three-point shot will come, it will come with this team. It's just It hasn't shown up yet. We’re not going to quit taking them and we're not going to quit working on them and we'll get there.”
Colorado Players
Luke O’Brien, So., G
On Impressive Performance Tonight
“It felt good. I know my hard work is paying off, but at the end of the day I'm just here to bring energy for my team, whatever they need and today the ball was going in the basket. Coach Boyle always talks about don't count the time, make the time count and I felt like I did that today and I'm just going to build on this for my team.”
On Offensive Rebounding
“Yeah, we definitely talked about it at half. We only had 3 offensive rebounds in the first half so I made sure that I was as active as I could in the second half to put us in a good position for our team. I felt like that's part of my game as well just because that's another energy thing I need to do and I felt like it was working.”
Eli Parquet, Sr. G
On the Game plan Against Patrick Baldwin
“Yeah, he likes to take a lot of size up pull ups so our plan was to get him to drive the ball as much as we can instead of shooting threes and pull ups like that. So, we just made him uncomfortable and pressured him. He doesn't like physicality so that was our plan on him.”
On If The Defense Is Improving
“Yeah, for the first 35 minutes we were just kind of trading baskets. The last four minutes we really locked in and so that's the way we got to play for 40 minutes. We’re trying to put 40 minutes together, the whole game. We haven't really been doing that the whole season so going forward we need to have that energy at the end of the game, the rest of the games.”
On Finishing Games
“I mean, if we have to finish games like that, we'll take a win like that, if not. But we have to play 40 minutes, like I said.”
Jabari Walker, So., F
On Guarding Patrick Baldwin
“I knew he had the ultimate green light so I just tried to make him shoot tough shots, tried to block his view from the basket. I knew it was going to be a long game when he shot that first one. I was there and he shot with a with a hand in his face, but those are the shots you got to make him shoot and I think the percentages are a result of that.”
On If It Was Personal Against Patrick Baldwin
“It wasn't. He's a great guy, he talked to me at the camp and he said he had been watching film on me and he's one of the few guys that came up to me and talked to me first so ever since then, I was like, okay, he's a humble guy, and I just love his game and I just love who he is as a person. So, it really wasn't personal, but to the people that made the decision now that was a little personal.”
On Adjustments at Halftime
“Yeah, it was like they keyed in when I drove so my teammates started talking to me like, man, I'm right there like my guy is going to help you and I was like, dang is that really happening? Like I couldn't see it. And then the game slowed down for me in the second half and I was like, okay let me find one to attack, let me find where to dish it and I think a lot of teams are starting to do that. So, I have to figure out when to just drop the ball off, make the easy pass and when to drive. But just being aggressive overall, that was key for me.”
On His Mindset Down the Stretch
“Mental toughness, really. I didn't have the game that I wanted to in the first half and I knew I just had to impact. I heard Coach Boyle talking in an interview and he said he liked the fact that I could still impact without just my jump shot falling and scoring and I just want to still create that identity that I could rebound, block shots and just do other things without my shot falling. So, once I got one to go in, that's when the three came shortly after. So, the game will just flow with the energy.”
Milwaukee Head Coach Pat Baldwin
On the Loss
“It was about 35 minutes where I thought we really fought, whether we made shots or not, and we gave ourselves an opportunity to win tonight in those last six or five minutes. That’s when it turned. To not be in the bonus late, that hurt too. We were shooting a lot of jump shots, but we weren't getting to the basket fast. We didn't put any pressure on (Colorado’s) defense. Our guys really fought tonight. I told them they played well enough to win. We need to play better to finish and to get the win.”
On Milwaukee’s Defensive Effort
“That’s what we talked about. Our defense has to carry us, and we have to travel with it. If we get this type of defensive effort on many nights, we're going to be successful. I'm proud of our (players). They played hard and they fought. They gave us a chance with our defense, and it was not enough. Our legs were tired towards the end. We couldn't make the plays that we needed to.”
On Milwaukee’s Rim Defense
“(Colorado) had sixteen points in the paint in the first half. I thought (we gave up) a little bit too much. Our guys did (protect the rim). You see Joey (St. Pierre) with three blocks. (With) the presence in bodies down there, we made it difficult for them to score around the rim. Our guys played hard. They gave us what we needed, especially down low. We’ve got to learn from this. We have a short turnaround before we play again (against Rhode Island on Monday).”
On Jordan Lathon
“Jordan got hot in the first half, making some threes, and did a great job with his energy on the defensive end. (Colorado) has some very good guards and he did a great job on those guys. It was great to see him make some open looks.”
On Patrick Baldwin Jr. Taking Advantage of the Dribble-Drive
“He’ll be the first one to say that. He wanted to play better. There were some opportunities that he missed. He did have some opportunities to take advantage. It wasn’t his night. He's going to come back (and play better) just like all the guys are going to come back (and play better).”
On Playing a Pac-12 Team on the Road
“It’s good to know how stifling we can be on the defensive end if we play together. I thought we were all in sync. We did a great job with our scouting report. Showing up (on offense) will help us out.”