Trent Johnson Guys Quotations

The last time we played at home we got beat by a really good team. I thought tonight our guys were really looking forward to the challenge and knew we had an opportunity to be successful.

Quite frankly, I don't care if we had six guys who could have stepped in, when Matt's playing like that, you leave him on the floor. They're college kids. I've never seen a guy who's healthy who wants to sit. And when the ball's going down and you're playing well, nobody wants to come out.

We're playing better. Certain guys are figuring out that you have to defend with a sense of urgency and you have to compete with a sense of urgency. It's a different team out there.

They're a good basketball team. They have a very hostile home environment. They are very balanced. They have seven or eight guys who can score for them. They are probably a little bitter since they didn't get an at-large bid to the Tournament.

He's done a good job passing out of the double team. And, yeah, there have been a lot of guys on our team (who have) been open and not knocked shots down, but he hasn't gotten frustrated with it.

I feel very fortunate to be coaching and our guys look at it the same way. I think their last experience at home was embarrassing. I think they would like to get that taste out of their mouths.

We don't make that decision. The NIT is money generated and if the NIT powers say we want you to play at home, we will. ... But if it was my decision, I would like to take this basketball team on the road. Because we compete well at home, but for the guys that are returning next year we've got to fight through on the road.

Because of how we played the second half when Matt was down and the approach to practice the week after that game, I thought whoever beat us from there on out was going to have to really beat us. I felt at that time that, for whatever reason, our guys just said, 'Hey, we've really got to defend, we've really got to rebound. We've really got to play with a sense of urgency.' And I feel we've done that.

Chris, Matt, Danny - these guys have been through some wars. All we ever talked about was the next game and the next practice. This is a very bright, articulate group. There was never any sense of panic.