Chris Richards Quotations

We don't have anybody on this team who believes they're the superstar. We feel like we're all equals.

We felt like we let those two (games against South Carolina) get away. We've got to come back in more focused (today).

We're a defensive team. I think we can stop anybody.

We're a pretty unselfish team. We all like to keep each other involved.

We didn't want for them to have that exceptional story -- Glory Road, all that stuff. We don't want to be the team on the movie that got beat, that got upset. We didn't want to be that team.

We've still got a lot to prove to a lot of people. So we just want to go out and advance as far as we can and try to win the whole thing.

We're happy to be winning at this stage, but by no means are we satisfied. We were never looking to just reach the Sweet 16. We want to win it all.

Lee was the villain today. The fox, the crocodile, all of that. We couldn't have asked for a better game.

Minnesota. Nobody knows anybody here. We're in a foreign place.

My knee wasn't that bad the second half of last season. It was a factor, but it wasn't as much of a factor as you would think. It was more of a mind thing.

Moss played great. He got a lot of key early offensive boards, got some big-time points and some key stops.

Personally, I think we'll be pretty good. I think we're a defensive, stopping team, I think we'll score more points than a lot of people think that we will, but I mean I think we'll be pretty good.

If we go out and win it, we'll have a greater chance of going to Jacksonville, even though towards the end of the season we didn't play as good as we're capable of playing and lost a few key games. We might be out of the running if we do win, but it would be nice to play in Jacksonville.

If we get complacent with where we are now we could easily lose (to George Mason). It's not good enough now. We want to win the whole thing.

If we rally together and play the way we're capable of playing, we can maybe win the whole SEC.

If they want to leave, I'm behind them 100 percent, if they want to come back, 100 percent. The chances for them being drafted a little higher could have gone up a little bit because of this win. Anything could happen (now).

I'm all about pro-choice. If they want to leave, I'm totally happy for them. If they want to come back and try to win another one, that's great, too. I don't know what everybody's like as far as their family money situation. Some people may have to go.

I can't say I'm surprised. We've been playing together a while and impressed a lot of people in the summer. I'm not going to pinch myself. You know, I'm not cocky, but I knew we had a great team.

If anyone wants to go, I'm happy for them. I'm behind them 110 percent. I'll kind of push them to go.

I don't think we're Cinderella. We're kind of like Superman.

He says he's really happy for us. But it's eating him up inside to see us do this.

We can change it. This a whole different team, a whole different season.

(Jacksonville) would be like home-court advantage for us. It would make it that much easier for us to win and make it to the Sweet 16.

I think it must be his hair. You know, the ponytail.

I think it's kind of been hard for a lot of teams to match up against us in the post as far as speed and quickness and all that kind of stuff. If they weren't able to do it, too, it wouldn't be a surprise to me.

I think it's been hard for any team to match up with us in the post as far as speed and quickness and all that kind of stuff.

It got kind of frustrating. But I came through it, and tried to fight through it everyday, talking to my family and praying a lot, so I got through it.

I think that starts in our scrimmages where everybody is talking trash and challenging each other. During games, once we get a defensive stop it kind of leads to a fast break, and a fast break equals points. Then everybody gets more hyped because they want to get more steals and more dunks.

I was just trying to get out of the way and that turned out to be a two-goal swing. That was the game, the difference.

Some of those players in New York have made a name for themselves in those parks and I guess Jo played pretty good against them. You know how street ball is, there's no referees. It's a tough game. So when he came back from there, his confidence was through the roof. He was a tougher player. He was ready for anything.

I was getting a lot of passes from the guys. I should have had five goals.

It felt great, but we don't feel as good as a lot of people may think about advancing to the next round because it's just another game.

I think if everyone comes back next year, it could be scary. We might not lose a game. We might go down as one of the best teams in history.

I think I have the drive to do it. I think I'm capable of doing it.

That would make it that much easier for us to advance to the next round. It would be like home-court advantage for us. So we need to try to win out and do the best we can so we can make it to Jacksonville and make it easier for ourselves. All of us want to finish strong and wrap it up. That would be huge.

That's the way it is in practice. Every time he misses a 3-pointer, the coaches keep passing it to him until he makes it. We want him to keep shooting.

We don't get caught up in all that (favorite) stuff. It's just a lot of talk. We came in (to the season) as a team that might not make it to the NIT and now we're in the Final Four, so all that stuff is irrelevant.

We just didn't execute down the stretch like we needed to. Same exact thing happened twice. We didn't play as good as we can and we didn't execute at the end of the game.

We were just a little more hungry that Kentucky. We wanted this one for so many reasons.

We didn't play like we were supposed to in the first half. We want to win so bad.

We still feel like we're the better team. We kind of let it get away from us. If we were to play them again, I think we could pull it off. The same thing happened in both games. We really didn't play as well as we could.

You make contact first and it's a lot easier to defend him. I kind of knocked him off balance. We did a pretty good job on him.

Why do we have to lose? If we play our best, there's no reason we can't run the table.

We want to win the championship. That's what it's all about. Just winning the championship.

We want to win it, and we'll do whatever it takes to win.

We don't really get caught up in that kind of stuff. That's a lot of talk.

We just had to dig in and focus, because we didn't want to lose. We came a long way and put it in a lot of hard work for us to blow this game.

We might not lose to anyone if everybody comes back. I might be going outside of myself right now, but I think if everybody came back we could be one of the best teams in the history of college basketball.

We're going to be eager all day. I bet most of the guys wish they could get up at 7 p.m. and then just go play. There's going to be a lot of sitting around, and we're going to get anxious.

We could win championships every year and that's just how it is.

Everybody wanted to see us lose. We just had to make the Cinderella story a different outcome than all the ones in the movies.

There was a good pace to this game, but we didn't get the breaks. It's unfortunate because we need a win at home.

I've never seen Corey shoot like this, never in my life not even in a pickup game. Corey was feeling it today, he was hot. He played great.

I've never seen Corey shoot like this. Corey was feeling it today -- he was hot. He played great. If he can play like that every night, it will be that much better for our team.

It would be like home-court advantage for us. So if we can try to win out and do the best we can so we can get to Jacksonville, it will make it that much easier for us in the tournament.

The thing about our guys is they don't need the money.

Anyone who would say they're not, subconsciously, they are. Everybody wants to get the best seed they can, so it can be easier for them in the beginning.

That's just how it is; that's how people are, how they think. If we go out and lose in the first round (in the NCAA Tournament), everybody will say, 'I told you so.' If we go to the Sweet 16, everybody will be surprised, like they were at the beginning of the season.

They stepped up big time. David stepped in and hit a shot. Walter ... dominated for his size and the effort he put in.

A lot of us want to prove ourselves against bigger teams.

There was nobody talking to us when the season started. Now look at this.

All of us knew what he was capable of when he first got here. He just is going out and playing ball. He's just getting opportunities and he's taking advantage of it.

It's just regular length. If I had to, I'd wear them. But I don't think we need the short shorts.

It was crazy to lose to them twice. I never lost to them until this year. Twice in one year, we felt like that was pretty bad.

It was a lot of going up and down the floor, post moves, finding different ways to score.

It motivates us a little more. Away games are a lot tougher to win. So, our mindset has to be right. We've lost two road games already this year. I know all of us think about that.

It's great for us. We've just got to keep playing defense and play even better if we want to win the whole thing. I think we can do it.

It's great being here, but I don't think it's good enough. We won't be happy unless we win the whole thing.

That's the guy that talked all that crap about us in the Alligator before. That's him right here.

That's one of the great things about our team. Anybody can step in and score the points for us at any time. It's just somebody else's turn on any given night. . . . We were smart enough to pick up what they were doing. We knew once they started doubling (down low), our guards would be wide-open.

Everyone is psyched about getting in them. Everybody wants to play in them.

Everyone has been pulling against us. We're used to it. From day one, nobody expected us to be where we are now. Everyone expected us to be in the NIT and now we're in the biggest game we can be in in college. All that stuff is a bunch of hype. We don't care about that stuff, all we have to do is go out and execute.

Everybody is eager to play defense this year. Everybody wants to get stops, everybody wants to press, everybody wants to do all that stuff, there's a lot of pride on defense.

Everybody wants to win a championship, and to win the first one would be great. It's a milestone. Nobody else has done it so (we would) be remembered forever for that.

The best part is nobody is jealous. Because if we keep winning, the attention goes to all of us, anyway.

It's hard to believe we're here in the state of Minnesota. I never thought I'd go to Minnesota for any reason. But here we are, and we're excited to be here. I'm glad I don't live in weather like this, though.

It's crazy. It's like you're on a stage.

It's human nature. They try to protect themselves from being embarrassed.

It's intense. Sometimes, you get tired of losing, so you do whatever you can. You try and foul the guy every time.

I'm really glad Tushar stuck with it, even if it was slow at first. I'm really enjoying it.

I hope those uniforms don't mess anything up if anybody is superstitious.

I never in my life thought I'd end up in the state of Minnesota. It never crossed my mind coming to Minnesota.

I'm unhappy because we just lost. We thought we had it in our hands, but we just didn't execute.

If Peyton saw how Lee shot the ball, he'd have to be proud of him. I don't know as far as (Manning) it being an inspiration or anything but Lee played great, one of the best games I've ever seen him play. . . . If Peyton saw Lee shooting the ball like he did, he might want his autograph now.

I look at this is another road game, because everybody is going against us obviously. It's another game that we have to come in and execute more than we execute at home. It's crazy.

I think all of us have competed for a championship at least once in our lives. So all of us know how to deal with it. It's kind of like we have a test. You study for the test all day long, every day. You just think about the test all the time.

His improvement is more of a shock to the fans. We always knew what he was capable of doing. Now he has the opportunity to showcase his skills.

George Mason is just another team that wants to win as badly as we do. They deserve the Final Four. If we come in with the wrong mind-set, we won't be playing very long.

If he plays like this every night, we won't lose.

If everybody comes back like I'm anticipating, we've got a great chance of doing it again next year. The scary thing is we still this year haven't played our best ball. I think if everybody comes back, next year we'll be an even better team.

I don't think anybody's ready to leave yet. Everybody loves each other, and we want to come back and try to repeat.

I don't think we communicated as well as we should have. A few times, we got mixed-up. We just didn't do a good job containing them on the perimeter.

He's one of the best in the business. He does a great job. He makes corrections sometimes when the coaches make mistakes. He's pretty good.

I could be wrong but a lot of the fans that are here now, I don't think they were here in the beginning. I think it's crazy. I personally feel like there were a lot of people who weren't coming to the games at home when they were free. Now they're spending thousands of dollars to come to games when we're far away.

I don't look at them as underdogs. I think we're underdogs in a way because everybody is pulling for them to beat us. Everyone wants that story to have a perfect ending.

You watch him on film, and maybe you think he's a little small. So you can bang him inside or do something with him. But you get out on the court, and he's completely different.

The last time I did something like that was in high school.