Jim Calhoun Took Quotations

What Louisville needed late in the game was experience. That's what we had, some guys coming down the stretch who know what to do. We turned our defense up in the last 4 1/2 minutes of the game, we took care of the ball, took good shots and made good decisions. This was a grind-it-out game.

I am so proud of my kids and the way we took every shot that Kentucky gave us. We're trying to earn our ropes as an elite program and we're still trying to do that.

I am so proud of my kids and the way we took every shot that Kentucky gave us. But I don't find it unusual for Kentucky, with its incredible history and a great coach like Tubby, to turn it into that kind of game.

I don't think we shot well (38.7 percent), but I think we played well and yet it took us 30 minutes to shake them, maybe 35 minutes to shake them. That's just by their tenacity and how hard they played. Providence has a young team. The three guys who I think played really well for us happened to be seniors and that makes a difference in college basketball.

He was magnificent down the stretch, making big shot after big shot. He criticized himself and really took it out on the team. From a coaching standpoint, you can't ask for anything more.

Jimmy put it in perspective and told me exactly what had happened to him, ... He encouraged me to get the best medical advice I could get. He took me through the scenario of what would happen.

I said all along that Marcus, in my opinion, is the best passer I've ever coached. I think he took an affront to that because now he's got two 20-point games.

People have asked me a lot about Marcus and even Rudy this season. I have said that Rudy is emerging every day and we're watching something beautiful. And with Marcus, I said recently he is the best passer I've ever coached. I think he took offense because now he's had back-to-back 20-point games.

John Thompson took something that could be perceived as almost menacing, because he was so big and was so serious looking, and used that to his advantage to create Hoya Paranoia, ... Every game they played, John was the underdog and yet he had Ewing and Wingate and Williams. That takes a masterful genius to do that.

We're not a team that breaks you down off the dribble. We have to do it in other ways, on the full-court break or with our power game inside. (Wednesday), South Florida took us out of what we should have run. We stopped setting screens, stopped doing some of the things we're capable of doing.

We were living on an 11-0 season that meant absolutely nothing. We took a 15-8 lead and from then, didn't play an ounce of basketball.

We got out ahead and they just took over the game as we started standing around. But we came back with that run which really speaks to the character of this team.

Villanova doubled us all night and took us out of our offense.

Both against Albany and tonight, although in different ways, these teams forced Marcus Williams to make plays to beat them. And Marcus took advantage of the opportunity both times. He was magnificent.

Every Saturday, my dad took me to a football game,

Elvin Hayes was such an incredible scorer that it was hard for me to believe, ... I had seen Bob Pettit do it to some degree, he was 6-foot-9, but Elvin Hayes took it to a different level. He was a scoring machine who went outside at 6-foot-9 and that was so foreign to what we knew. He never really got the credit he deserved for what he accomplished.

I've said Marcus, in my opinion, is the best passer that I've ever coached. I think he took affront to that. Now he's scoring. There aren't many better point guards in the country than him.

I've said all along that Marcus is the best passer I've ever coached. I think he took affront to that, because he had back-to-back 20-point games (in the tournament). There aren't many better point guards in the country.

Normally, it takes us about 10 minutes to get into the game. Today, it took us 25.

The national championship in 1999 took me back to my career at UConn. This has taken me back to my life, to where it began, my brother and four sisters and how meaningful they have been, to my family, my parents, my friends, my players, my assistant coaches. It's pretty deep.

They doubled us, trapped up, took us out of our offense. They were allowed to be physical. The way this game was called and played, they were able to keep the ball out of the paint.

They don't measure heart by inches, they don't measure courage. They took advantage of what they have better than we took advantage of what we have.

It reminded me of a Big East game, probably back in the early 90s. (St. John's) took us out of our offense early, played us very physical and did not allow us to get into a flow.

It's both being fortunate and having the basketball gods smiling on you a little bit because quite frankly they had every right to win that game as much as we did. We took our foot off the pedal and we can't do that.

It took us 30 minutes to shake them. Maybe 35 minutes, and that's due to their tenacity. Hilton Armstrong changed everything in the middle.

It took us 30 minutes to shake them, maybe 35 minutes.

I keep saying he's the best passer I've ever coached. I think he took an affront to that. Now he's scoring.

I'm so proud of my kids. We took every shot Kentucky had. It's amazing we were playing Kentucky for the very first time.

He's the best passer I've ever coached. I think he took that as an affront because then he responded with 21 and 20. That shows what kind of player he is.

He took the blunt. And he took it with class and dignity.

He put it in perspective and told me exactly what happened to him. Jim took me through the scenario of what would happen. Jim has been in my life more than I realize. We're the two old-timers in the league, but we're also two friends.

Their big guys stood up and knocked our guys off the block. Our guys took it, accepted it, and weren't really much of a factor.