Chattanooga Basketball Postgame Quotes
Chattanooga at VMI
Cameron Hall – Lexington, Va.
Thursday – Feb. 7, 2019

Lamont Paris, Head Coach
Overall thoughts after tight 71-70 win at VMI.
"We did. I thought we did a good job of getting stops when we needed to. I thought one possession we gave them a pretty good look that they missed, but we rebounded it which was most important. Overall, we got stops when we needed. Once we got back and took the lead, which we did a good job to get to that point, but once we got down to those crunch time situations, we did not do a good job on offense. We turned the ball over multiple times, we traveled, we turned it over in a dead ball situation, we were at the rim and didn't get fouled. We had to make stronger moves."

On making key plays and difference of two halves.
"We made enough plays. Thomas [Smallwood] made a big three in the corner in front of the bench, that was big one, just from the momentum swing and seeing some points go on the board. We only scored 25 in the second half, what a difference in halves from an offensive standpoint. I thought they did a great job of adjusting to some of the stuff we were doing in the first half. We ended up with 45 in the first half and we sold ourselves short with some of the shots around the basket. We could have been in a much better situation at half time, but that's just how it shook out. They made some good adjustments in the second half and we kind of got stagnant in what we were doing on offense."

On moving forward and what can be taken from this win.
"The body of work was what it was. I always say that. Are you happy that you made one more shot than they did? Of course. That's how we're judged. Under the circumstances, I'm going to let some things slide today. I will. We'll get back and I said to the team, we're going to actually learn from this one. We'd be forced to try and learn if that shot had went in at the end. I said, let's learn now. Let's learn what we didn't do, why things happened. I thought there were some times we made some big times errors and in the second half we didn't score the ball."

Thomas Smallwood, Gr.-C
On getting key stops at the end of the game.
"Yeah. I think we were looking for those stops all game. Overall, our defense wasn't very good tonight. The most important part is that we get the stops in the last three minutes and get a win. I think we'll have a lot of things to look at on the defensive end when we go back and watch film."

On capturing tight road win.
"A road win is a road win. No matter how you get it, the most important part is to get it. After that, the coaches will dissect it a little bit and see what went well and what went wrong. We'll grow from it, but the most important thing is that we got the win."

On playing a lot of minutes tonight.
"I think it was because I was hitting shots. I'm ready for those minutes whenever they come my way. I was happy to get them tonight and be good for the team on the road when we were kind of struggling a little bit. I'm happy to come up big and help get the win for the team."