Chattanooga at Charlotte
Saturday, November 10, 2018
Chattanooga, Tenn., McKenzie Arena
Postgame Quotes

Lamont Paris, Head Coach
On EKU's Nick Mayo scoring 40 points, 35 in the second half.
"He was in foul trouble in the first half and we also fouled him a lot in the second half, he was 12-of-13 from the free throw line. They were in the bonus in the first four and a half minutes and that's something I've never been around my entire career. That was a big part of it. He had no assists and we talked about that. He's about to break the school record in scoring, a first team all-league player three years in a row. We talked about that and sending help to show attention. We did not do that at all, so that was disappointing. He was in situations in which he could operate one-on-one and that was not our plan coming in."
 
On the pressuring style EKU plays.
"It affected us. We had multiple guys that did not respond to the pressure well. Even some guys who did in the first half, they didn't in the second half. We were getting the ball in the backcourt and picking up our dribble, then there's two guys on you. We weren't as aggressive to come and get the ball in the second half. We made some bad decisions and turned the ball over. Statistically, it was actually better in the second than it was in the first. We were fortunate to be up in the first half with 11 turnovers. You can't turn the ball over like that and give up 45 points in one half. At the end of the day, that comes down to semantics. You can't give up that many points in one half and feel like you should win. I was really disappointed in that."

On dealing with the up-tempo pace.
"They play like that, that's how they play. I think we took more advantage of it in the first half. They have five guys in the front court sometimes, that's really aggressive. We just didn't take advantage of it in the second half. We were trying to do too much at times and at other times, we'd one dribble and pick it up. I can't tell you how many times we did that. Second half, we weren't aggressive and weren't attacking, we were tentative. That's what the press does. It snowballed on us, we just had multiple guys that didn't handle the pressure in an effective manner."
 
On moving forward and what can be learned.
"They'll be plenty to learn from. I talked to the guys about that. You get on the road and go down and get a good win at Charlotte, looks better after what they did today against Oklahoma State. They have some players and have a good team, you'd like to ride that momentum and walk through a game and not play well, but if you play well enough to get a win, you see that you can handle certain situations. They'll be plenty to learn from for these guys."

Thomas Smallwood, Sr.-C
On matching up with EKU's Nick Mayo.
"I think I did pretty much what I hoped I would do in the first half. First play of the game I drew a foul on him and then drew another down the road. It got him off the court for most of the first half, and that's what I wanted to do. I think I relaxed a little bit coming out of the half. I didn't feel like I relax, it was just a few plays puts you with a couple fouls and it goes fast. He's a good player and was going to come at me the whole game. I just needed to carry on that first half.

On what was learned after tonight's close loss.
"I think there's still a lot of good to take from that win at Charlotte and especially after tonight. As coach said, we should of tried to ride that wave a little bit tonight. It's not all bad, we're a young team. You can learn a lot from losses, so as long as everyone is aware of that, I think we can learn a lot from tonight. Including having a lead at halftime doesn't mean much, you have to come out in the second half with the score 0-0. You have to come out as hard as you do in the first half. It's not all bad. Obviously it's disappointing right now, but once we watch the video we'll learn from it and use that down the stretch."
 
Kevin Easley, Fr.-F
On what was the plan and difference in the game.
"We just wanted to break the press, that was big the whole game. I think we were sped up a lot once we broke it, but coach wanted us to slow it down. That was just us being young as a team, we learned a lot this game. First time actually dealing with that kind of pressure, we needed to take better shots."