Oregon State Post-Game Quotes
November 09, 2012 | Men's Basketball
Nov. 9, 2012
Recap | Final Stats | Notes
Oregon State 102, Niagara 83
2K SPORTS CLASSIC benefiting WOUNDED WARRIOR PROJECT
November 9, 2012
Gill Coliseum
Corvallis, Ore.
Head coach Craig Robinson
Opening Comment...
"There were a lot of good things and not as many bad things. So I was really pleased with this game. I thought our guys came out ready to play. I thought that we played such a team game; it was really nice to see. You guys don't know how hard it is to play your first game of the season against somebody who plays a match-up zone. So we had to kind of figure that out on the fly. I thought our guys did a terrific job doing that. We still have to work at the four more stops a game; I thought we let them get too many easy baskets. I got the feeling in this game when you're starting to score the way we were scoring, we were concentrating more on scoring than getting back on defense. So we will work on that. It's a very good first win."
On Niagara scoring its first 18 points on three-pointers...
"It was unbelievable, but we knew they were capable of doing that. It is a natural phenomenon when you are playing man to man that if somebody gets past their guy to help out but you can't help off of a guy who's a terrific shooter, and that happened the first three times . We were in the media time-out and we said, `look fellas they haven't made a two and they made all three's,' so it took a while to get that adjusted. It is nice to be able to make that kind of mistake and still be able to win by 19 points. That is something that we are going to have to learn from and get better at."
On his team's size advantage versus Niagara...
"We saw that they (Niagara) weren't that big and we tried our best to get the ball down and not settle for three's. They were making three's and we were trying to get the ball down low. The matchup was so quirky and they did a good job with it, that we ended up with some open shots and we happened to bang a couple ourselves. That opened it up for us down low. We think we have good size and we want to take advantage of that night in and night out even if the other team has equal size. We have good front court players."
On whether his team relied too heavily on the three point shot...
"It didn't feel like that. My internal clock always tells me when it feels like we are taking too many three's. I thought Angus (Brandt) took a quick one and I thought each of the three guys who can make three's took a quick one. In a game like this, that might be considered a heat check, where you are just making shots and you feel like, `okay I am going to make every single one of them I take.' My internal clock didn't feel like we were taking too many, I thought we took the ones that came to us after we had some ball reversal and some movement where we tried to probe inside and kicked it out to a guy who was wide open."
On his team's rotation...
"Until the freshmen get to be where they can be trusted and I don't mean that negatively, because all freshmen have to earn out trust. The rotation will be the seven who have been playing plus one of the freshmen will get in. This was a game where we had less foul trouble than we thought we would have. In the past we have gotten in foul trouble in the first half of the first half so you've got to go to that ninth or tenth guy. The other thing was that they (Niagara) were playing zone so we weren't as beat as we usually are. It was a combination of having some freshmen that you want to trust in a game that was close in the beginning and that we weren't as tired as we would normally be, so I suspect that this is going to be a nine or ten man rotation once we get guys going. I like our freshman, I think they all have something to offer but they just have to understand that this not high school anymore and that's all freshmen."
On Roberto Nelson's performance...
"It is going to be a surprise to everybody except those guys in the locker room. We all know what he can do and this is the first time he has had a second season because of all the fits and starts with the academics and not playing a whole season and then having his first full season be last year. So we know what he can do because he does it day in and day out. What you saw out there was a mature guy who can beat you in a lot of different ways. He's banging shots, he's going to the basket. He missed his foul shots and he is a very good foul shooter. I hope because he is making three's he is not going to start missing foul shots but I don't think so. He made great decisions and didn't have any turnovers and he had three steals. That is masterful."
On Angus Brandt's performance...
"That is what we have seen from him since the end of the CBI (Tournament) last year. For him, the light bulb has gone on and he understands what he has to do to help us win. He was 8-for-13 and two for four from three and one of his three's was a bad one. He just took it too fast so he would have been two for three and then he ends up with eight rebounds. That is the kind of line you have to go with, with your starting center. The entire team is excited for him because he is a terrific guy and a good leader for our team. The guys are really rooting for him."
On Eric Moreland's performance...
"I have been using the term mature when it comes to Eric all year long. He is growing up and that is what that line shows. He has gotten better but the most important part of his game is that he matured. He was seven for seven from the field and didn't take one shot that he didn't need to take. His three turnovers were because he was being too unselfish and then he had five blocks along with those 13 rebounds. He probably would have had more rebounds if he had less blocks because a couple of those he blocked out of his own hand to get rebounds. If you look at Eric, we had him on a two or a three guard almost the entire game. To have a 6-10 kid who can guard a wing guy like that enables us to be even bigger because we can have Angus (Brandt), Joe (Burton) and Devon (Collier) on guys behind him."
Junior guard Roberto Nelson
On how to better defend against the three moving forward...
"We just need to go out there, close out more and try to make them shoot some pull-ups and mid-range jumpers because their percentage drops once they start shooting those."
On his team's offensive output...
"That is what we are capable of and that is credited to our new strength and conditioning coach (Mark Philipp), getting us strong and making us explosive. We are just going out there and working hard and it is showing out on the court."
On the team's excitement when Jullian Powers scored at the end of the game...
"Jullian's my man. I give him a hard time but that is just how we are as a team. Everybody is pulling for everybody. I am one of Jullian's biggest supporters because he goes hard and he does everything he needs to do. So it's just good when you see him go out there and get a bucket for us."
Junior guard Ahmad Starks
On his and Roberto Nelson's ability to make shots from behind the arc...
"I think it is a sign of things to come. We can shoot the ball outside so it helps us stretch the defense. They (Niagara) were playing that defense tonight so you may not see as many three's out of the both of us, but the zone allows for open shots and we were able to take advantage of it."
On his team keeping up its intensity in the second half...
"We didn't let down because we knew in the second half everyone (on Niagara) was going to try and make a push. Langston (Morris-Walker) made a point to say it in the locker room, so we knew what we had to do. Coming out early we were able to expand that lead and just keep it for the rest of the game."
Sophomore forward Eric Moreland
On his performance versus Niagara...
"I just let the game come to me. I didn't want to force anything and let them (his teammates) take care of me. We are not a selfish team so they'll root for me and when they get in the lane they will see me, and I will get a basket."
On Oregon State's size advantage versus Niagara in the paint...
"They are a smaller team so we wanted to take advantage of me, Joe (Burton), Angus (Brandt) and Devon (Collier). We have a nice front court so we wanted to take advantage of that as much as we could. They were doubling down low so we kicked it back out there and we knocked down shots."
