Chattanooga Basketball Postgame Quotes
Tennessee Tech at Chattanooga
McKenzie Arena – Chattanooga, Tenn.
Saturday – December 1, 2018
Head Coach Lamont Paris
On the opening run instilling confidence for the rest of the game.
"I think it did. When you shoot the ball that well then, from an offensive standpoint, that does wonders for what you believe in that day. You feel like you got your mojo from an offensive standpoint. The biggest keys to it were, that we made the shots, we were 10-22 in the first half, but the biggest part of it were the decisions that we made that led to the quality of shot. We had some high-quality shots."
"We had a couple we missed. Dave was completely unguarded in transition one time and missed one. The quality of those shots, when I look back on it, I know it is going to be high quality overall.
"It doesn't mean we are always going to shoot that high percentage, but your chances go up. That is for sure."
On shooting so many threes:
"That is what was there. They crowd the paint when you get the ball inside. We like to establish ourselves on the inside. I think there were a lot of those balls that came from inside out, and that is why we had 19 assists on 24 baskets. The percentage was really high in the first half too.
"I think a lot of those were, ball started off in the paint, they collapsed, we either threw it out for an immediate shot or threw out and got a hockey assist that led to another pass for a shot. That is their philosophy, to not give up a lot of stuff in the paint.
"When you make a bunch of threes it looks great. If we didn't make a bunch, we would be in here talking about how we struggled offensively. Either way, I honestly try to evaluate it not taking into account if we actually made the shot or not, but just the quality of shots I thought the quality of shots was good.
"We didn't get near as many in the second half. They started amping up the pressure and we weren't running as many. We ran some sets in the first half, they were trying to take us out of that in the second half. A lot of stuff was in scramble mode. We got some more stuff around the basket in the second half because they were really trying to turn up the pressure and get more aggressive. I thought we handles the pressure [pretty well overall. I thought we had a couple of decisions that were iffy from time to time."
On the effort on the defensive end:
"We held this team to 60 and that was with a layup at the buzzer. If you keep a team in the 50s, you give yourself a great chance to win a game. We've been stressing that to our guys. That's what I was most impressed with today, competing on the defensive end."
On the bench play today:
"Bench production is always important. That's two games in a row where they produced. It's always great to get comfortable with those guys out there and what they're going to provide. I though we got great productivity out of those guys especially Keigan (Kerby). I thought he was really, really good. Not because he was able to make a couple of shots, but I think he's shown consistent progress from the time he got here."
On carrying the momentum into conference play:
"We think about it one game at a time just trying to improve game-to-game. I thought it was very important going into the Hiwassee game that we play well, whatever that looked like on the scoreboard. I thought we built on that into this game, especially defensively. We keep trying to emphasize improving every day, maturing as a team every day."
Jerry Johnson – Jr.-G
On getting the offense going today:
"It really did. We weren't surprised by it, but we were trying to preach ball movement … cutting … getting everyone involved as much as we could in the 30 second shot clock. It really clicked today whether it was for a cut, a guy stepping out for a three, extra passes, it all worked out for us.
How important was the early lead?
"It was very important. We try to do that every game . Some games it doesn't happen. Shots were falling. Especially when we get the extra ball movement it gives us better shots and the percentages go up when that happens."
How important is it to do things away from scoring?
"Coach Paris and I have long talks and it's not all about scoring. Trying to get other guys coming along, like Keigan. Keigan had a great day today. We haven't seen a variety of scoring like this from multiple guys in a big time game this.
"Something I want to challenge myself to do is not just rely on scoring, try to get assists, try to get rebounds and try to get guys open shots. Just try to be different."
Maurice Commander – Fr.-G
On the big shot at the end of the first half…
"I think it was important to give us a good cushion coming into the second half for sure. It was just a shot. It wasn't a plan. It kind of came to me and I got it in a good spot where I knew I could hit it. It wasn't too far out, not half court or anything, but a good spot where I could try to get it off."
How important was the fast start?
"Me being a freshman I got a few games under my belt so I'm starting to get more comfortable. I think our team as a collective whole is starting to be more comfortable. We are going to keep coming out being more confident and more aggressive. I think that's that biggest thing for us now is to be aggressive and to be smart while we're doing it."
