Postgame Quotes
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Jan. 22, 2015
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Virginia Head Coach Tony Bennett Quotes
On Virginia’s defensive effort:
“I think we knew how important it was to limit Georgia Tech to one chance. I think holding them at bay with those second chance points was significant. We really worked on playing good ball screen defense and contesting their shots. That combination helped us. There are still areas to improve, but I liked how we rebounded.”
On Virginia’s offense:
“We weren’t great in the first half. The ball was sticking and we were forcing things a bit. In the second half, we started running our offense with ball movement and pace, and got good looks.”
On getting consecutive stops on the defensive end:
“If you can make them come up empty a few times in a row and you can go on the offensive side and get them chasing you, that can do a lot for you. We’ve shown the ability to embrace the possession. We are not going to give in and we are not going to give them an easy look. Everything is going to be contested. The guys embraced that throughout tonight.”
On starting Mike Tobey and Darion Atkins and having Anthony Gill come off the bench:
“I told those guys that they are three starters. It’s going to be based on matchups. I like having Darion in there to give us a defensive spark and some mobility. With the size of Georgia Tech, I started Mike. I thought it would be a way to interject some life into him, as well. They’re all going to play and give us lifts.”
Georgia Tech Head Coach Brian Gregory
Opening statement:
“I give Virginia credit. In the first half, I thought it was back and forth a bit. We had some opportunities to keep the lead to single digits and I thought their defense was very good in the first half. They did a very good job of keeping us off the offensive glass, but in the second half it was another level. They did a really good job. They make it so you have to make every open shot, and we struggled to make open shots tonight. We struggled against their overall defense. The one thing they have done all year long is that, even when they’re not scoring, they play the same defense every time. In this day and age to play that type of defense without always getting the reward on offense is credit to Tony Bennett and his staff.”
On Virginia’s defense:
“They are good on film and in person. They force tough shots, and you have to make every one. Then they wind you up on the other end so sometimes you’re a little less patient on offense. I don’t think that was the case for us today, but you have to be willing to take shots in the last ten seconds of the shot clock.”
What it takes to beat Virginia:
“Teams that have guys that can make plays 1-on-1 and make tough shots are the teams that will be able to play with them for forty minutes. And you need a couple guys to do this; one guy isn’t enough. You have to make every open shot, and that’s what Virginia did. Defensively, we were pretty good too. We own the 28 points. But, they just have guys that will make the open shots.”
Virginia Freshman Forward Isaiah Wilkins
On his development in the season up to this point:
“I think it has a lot to do with confidence. I’m feeling a lot more confident when I’m in the game and I know my role now. I’m just trying to do the best that I can every day.”
On his role on the team:
“My role is to come in and bring a lot of energy, especially on defense. Also, to hit open shots. I just try to pick up the energy when we are feeling sluggish.”
On the Georgia Tech’s frustration with UVa’s defense:
“You can tell a lot by body language. When they start to slow down we have to attack and spread out our gap.”
Virginia Junior Forward Justin Anderson
On this game being one of the team’s top defensive performances of the season:
“Yeah I think in stretches we played really good defense and for a majority of the second half we had guys locked in. We want to try to put our best defensive effort out there every night and I feel like we did a great job doing that [tonight].”
On the defense feeding off of itself:
“We know that when our defense is good our offense starts to click. I think that it was good for us to get our defensive game going early because our offense started to roll and guys started to get it going. It was really good.”
On holding three teams under thirty points this season:
“Now that I hear that it is impressive, but at the same time it’s a long season. We all know how the ACC is with the tremendous amount of talent that we face night in and night out. We have to make sure that we continue to stay humble, play together and put our best effort in front of us.”
On having everyone getting involved on offense:
“It feels good. Those are our best games because guys are getting into a rhythm and making the extra pass. Everyone sees each other open and high-fiving [each other]. I think it was good to get into a good rhythm out there. It felt good.”
Virginia Freshman Guard Marial Shayok
On the blowout win in an ACC matchup:
“The ACC is arguably one of the best conferences in the whole country.”
On the defense:
“We came out and tried to get stops every possession and continued to play hard the whole game. We had a few days to work on this game in practice. We came out with a lot of energy tonight and it was a good win.”
On ten different players scoring for Virginia:
“We try to share the ball, get everyone some looks and play team basketball.”
Virginia Junior Guard Malcolm Brogdon
On his reverse layup:
“I was actually going to dunk it, but I saw [Demarco] Cox, so I took my chances and went up and under.”
On Virginia’s momentum:
“I think our momentum on defense really helps. We build on each stop we get, and then it builds our offense and gets our offense going. I also think our fans get into it. They love the stops just as much as they love the scoring, so that’s really tremendous for us.”
On whether or not getting three stops in a row is enough:
“Some games we really struggle to get three stops in a row. We have to keep working on that. Sometimes its really tough. There are some nights when we can really improve on that.”
On the effect getting stops has on team pride:
“We played a very good defensive game, but we pride ourselves on defense. It’s about learning from the night and learning from what defensive breakdowns we had and then improving for our next games.”
On watching film and scouting Georgia Tech’s offense:
“We knew Georgia Tech was a very good offensive team coming in, so we tried to impose our will defensively from the very beginning and see where it took us.”