Troy Graefe Quotations

What he does is really what maybe no one in our program does. He makes plays that you can't anticipate, that you can't coach for.

If we don't defend we don't have a chance against anyone, and our kids have bought into that. We had some nice stops defensively down the stretch.

I don't know that I've ever coached a team that has won in this gym.

He typically guards the other team's best guy, regardless of size, and he has for three years. What I thought he did a great job of tonight was keeping everyone focused on the defensive end. I told him I thought it was his best overall game as a Wildcat. He scored well, he shot well and was an outstanding leader.

We told the kids this had to be one of the greatest comebacks in the 101-year-old program.

We may have been a little bit tired. But certainly we didn't do a very good job of stopping dribble penetration.

I thought there were probably maybe six or seven teams that were pretty even and probably two or three others that, if you didn't play well on any given night, they could beat you.

Our statistician has harped on us all season that we are probably the only team in the state that has been up at the half in every single game we've played.

I thought it seemed like every team had one or two pretty good players that you had to focus your defense on. You certainly had to pay attention to those guys or your chances of winning were slim.

I was particularly pleased with our two starting sophomore. They played with courage. We didn't get the breaks tonight, but I thought those guys played hard and courageously throughout the game, as did all of our kids, but in particular those two.

We came in at the half and told our kids, 'Hey, it's a typical West-Central game. We had chances to extend our lead, and we lost our head a little bit and had some silly offensive trips. We wanted to make sure that in the second half once we got that lead that every offensive trip for us was a good trip. I thought we showed a little bit of maturity that way in the second half.

Those two guys are our leaders, and they do more than just score and get rebounds and get steals. They give courage to the rest of the guys with the way they play.

You have to know where he is all the time when you play those guys. Because of that, other kids on their team get open looks. He's just a very, very good high school basketball player. I was very impressed with how hard he worked tonight. Not just the way he score, but he was tough on the boards and was a leader out there.

We just wanted to regain our composure. We kind of started playing a little too fast on offense and consequently we started pressing a little bit on defense and gave them so easy looks.

Even he got a little bit rattled and had a couple of turnovers that are uncharacteristic for him. But, he gets big rebounds, he hits big shots and hit those free throws down the stretch. He's just a tough competitor, and we're a lot better team when he's on the floor.

Isiah Martinez had a great day, and if you're not your best you need someone to step up.

Coach Thompson comes to just about every game and those guys who played for him and Coach Baggot talk about how they used to just terrorize teams with their defense. Coach Hicks is here a lot and we talk a lot, and his teams obviously were great defensively. ... That tradition is an advantage we have.

They really picked up the intensity much more aggressively. It was possession by possession. We went on a run in the third with nine unanswered points and cut their lead to three. When that happened, we had the confidence we needed to finish it.

It's like immediate energy. He just comes in, and something happens. The other night against Mountain View it was a critical time in the game, and he just took his man off the dribble hard and scored a big basket for us. It was one of those possessions where we were kind of starting to stagger a little bit, and he got us settled again with a big basket. He's capable of doing those kind of things.

It was huge, and that was the most important outcome of the night. This is the hardest we've played since Longmont. We're the kind of team that we have to be energetic and have to play with passion against the people we're playing in order to be successful. If we do that, we're pretty good. If we don't, then we're pretty average, and that was evident our last two times out.

I love Joey. He plays so hard for us. He's pretty long and he's got pretty good feet, so he's versatile for us defensively. We can put him on a big kid or put him on a perimeter player and he just always gives a great effort.

He's now been our leader for a couple of years.

He plays with so much more confidence. Last season he essentially was our fifth starter and was out there to defend, and every now and then he'd get out in a passing lane and make a steal and make a play. But this year, he's one of the major players on the floor. He's playing with great confidence at both ends.