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2010-11 Virginia Basketball Postgame Quotes
November 24, 2010
EA SPORTS Maui Invitational
Wichita State 70, Virginia 58

Virginia Head Coach Tony Bennett

Opening statement after the loss to Wichita State.

“Obviously we got off to such a good start. I thought our guys made some shots, but defensively I thought we really stifled them and limited them to force them into some turnovers, limited them to tough shots and we cleaned up the glass. There were a couple of momentum swings that were important for us. We don’t have a huge margin of error and the end of that first half was a tough one. The flagrant foul or the unsportsmanlike, I don’t know what they called that, that was a big shift. So there were some things that hurt.

“As the game wore on I thought they got some offensive rebounds against us, we missed some layups and they got stronger. We faded a little bit. Their depth and their experience showed. It’s a good, deep team, but for stretches I thought we touched on being the way we need to be to become the best we can.”

The bench scoring was 28 to 2. Obviously you need to develop a little bit of depth similar to what Wichita State has.

“Yes, I think that’s their strength. We’re not a real deep team, but we’ve got to keep looking to develop our rotation and getting a little more. I played our main five or six guys heavy minutes and they responded well, but we need to get a little more help off the bench and keep finding ways. We had those scoring droughts that hurt us. We got out to such a good start, got good looks and then those droughts hurt us. That puts a lot of pressure on your defense.”

A couple of coaches have talked about Wichita State running really good stuff. Can you expand on that a little bit? Is it their experience and they really execute well?

“Coach Marshall does a heck of a job. They set a lot of screens, run a lot of multiple sets and they have some good players. JT Durley stepped out and was 4-4 from three. I think he was 1-9 (from three-point range) coming into the game.

“They have good pieces, they can stretch you, they can go inside-outside, they’re a good shooting team, they run their stuff hard and it’s physical. They’re a physical team and good depth helps with that.”

Virginia senior forward Mike Scott (16 points, 10 rebounds, 3 assists)

You were up 20-4 and looking pretty good. What changed then, did Wichita State tighten its defense? Did they speed you up a little bit? What changed at that point?

“I think they just got some open threes or we contested some threes and they just made shots. They got some offensive rebounds and some transition buckets. They made that run toward the end of the half that really hurt us.”

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