Chattanooga Men's Basketball - Postgame Quotes
Long Island vs. Chattanooga
Dr Pepper Classic - McKenzie Arena - Chattanooga, Tenn.
Dec. 29, 2009

Coach Schulman Quotes:
Opening Statement:
"I thought we scrapped, thought we rallied, with absence of Ridge [McKeither]. Offensively I thought we played efficiently, defensively we can't grab a loose ball to save our lives. We are lacking the presence we need at the four right now without Ridge [McKeither] and Dante [Harvey] we struggled to rebound the ball. Had to play a little zone and I have got to do a much better job mixing and matching defenses so we don't get stuck. With nine scholarship guys we are stuck right now. There is a lot of pressure. This is my eighth year here at Chattanooga and we have played on the second night of the Dr.Pepper Classic eight straight years. There is a lot of pressure we put on our selves as coaches to play on that second night at eight o'clock. We get to do it and I am excited about the opportunity."

"I don't think we have had a whole lot of nights where we have had twenty five assists and nine turnovers, so that is a phenomenal night right there. We just have to figure out a way to guard that basket.

"I think zone is a four letter word, I think it is a bad word and I don't like it and I don't want to play it. But if we have got to play it, we will play it. It is going to make me sick but will play it if we have to."

How do you determine if you need to play zone?
"When we can't guard the other team and man. When you are sitting at the top row Mackenzie Arena and you are looking down there saying why isn't that coach playing zone. It is pretty obvious.

"I think we are hideous at guarding. I think we are absolutely disgusting at guarding. That is who I am and that is pretty disappointing."

"It is getting closer to that time where you better make a decision on what your team's identity is and what you can play. I am never going to stop trying to play man. Never going to stop teaching them how to play man and teach them right way. I have got to do my job besides molding young men, it is to try and win as many basketball games as we can. If it helps us to play zone and win. I don't want to, my staff knows that. I am a hard headed stubborn guy and it makes me sick but we may have to."

"You have to understand that our length. Ridge [McKeither] has great length. Dante Harvey will be fantastic playing zone. If Troy Cage ever gets back out there has great length. So do have a good zone team but I am not ready to throw in the towel just yet."

"Chris Early needs to turn out. I text him last night and said that I know that player is in that body and I will try to be as patient as I can and we have just got to get that guy out of there. He is a talented guy, is just not in shape yet. He is trying to play his way into shape but that is hard to do when you re fatigue from practice and the season. He can really help us. One day we have great length at that spot, right know we don't.

"I know how good Jeff Neubauer is as a basketball coach. Neubauer is one of those smart guys. I am not a smart guy. I am a tough gritty guy; Neubauer is one of those smart business man guys. We have known one another for ever. I wouldn't look forward to playing any body really. I don't want to play any body the rest of the season. I know how well coached they are, and how good they are. So we have one day to prepare and they do a lot of things. We will be ready. It is exciting for our kids. Some of our kids have never played in a championship game. It is good for or kids to be able to play in a championship game tomorrow night at eight o'clock. So I congratulated them and we have got to get a lot better. I am happy for them that we are playing tomorrow night at eight o'clock."

Sophomore Chris Early
Attitude coming into tonight's game
"We got a few people out so we haven't been able to go as hard, but we've been trying to pick-up those that are absent. We've worked hard to be prepared for this tournament."

Sophomore Ricky Taylor
On offensive execution
"I believe we all executed well offensively. We shared the ball, and when someone was open we would get the ball to them. I just thank all of my teammate for delivering me the ball tonight. Without them I wouldn't have scored. I just believe everybody played well."

Attitude in practice                   
"I believe our practices were awesome. To get some rest for the Christmas break made me feel energized. I thank coach for giving us that break. I felt like coming to practice and wanting to do more, play defense more, and wanted to work hard. That break really helped me out personally."

Junior DeAntre Jefferson
On playing the zone
"I felt that it was a different look than we had seen. Usually we get a couple of zones but they played them more than we usually see. I felt we swarmed the ball well and we practiced a lot of our two-chase in practice and I think that really helped. We did tremendous against it tonight."

Attitude in practice
"I felt the enthusiasm was great in practice. I think those four days helped our enthusiasm. You could see a little spark in everybody. Those four days of getting off your legs really helped in practice.

Long Island Head Coach Jim Ferry
Opening Statement
"I thought we played extremely hard. I thought we played very well in the first half, in regards to offensively. We just hit that dry spell. We got down eleven in the second half and then we cut it to six with about 11:50 to go. Then John [Shulman] changed up, went to that 2-3 zone, and we really struggled. We didn't score against it and it quickly went from six to thirteen, to somewhat out of control. We had a couple of stops in there but when you come up empty on the offensive end like that its eventually going to break through."

On Chattanooga's Zone
"I thought Chattanooga did a very good job in that 2-3 zone. They really found our shooters and contained them. Obviously having a shot-clock violation against us, we didn't attack it very well."

Being prepared for Chattanooga's zone
"We are prepared for it because we see it quite a bit. We usually have a point guard that can really break zones down and we didn't have him tonight. It really limited us to be able to break the zone down. When they extended their zone to our shooters it showed that it really took us away."