Jan. 14, 2009
Recap | Box Score
Coach John Thompson III
On Syracuse's play...
"That's a hard team to play against. They're an experienced team and they have pieces. Every person they put on the court can hurt you and with that zone, they know where the holes are, they know what to take away. We were fortunate to get some looks and stuff going inside; they ended up going man to man a little bit."
On Georgetown's composure in the second half...
"The start of the second half where we didn't score...we were able to settle in then get back on track. That's something we were focused and attentive even though we didn't put the ball in the basket."
On Georegtown's ability to score....
"We put the ball in the basket. The ball just happened to go in. We have guys that can make shots and we did a very good job of throwing it in, throwing back out, getting penetration, throwing it opposite. They were the kind of threes that tend to go in more often than just whip it around the horn. When we get it into the paint and back out, for some reason or another, the ball seems to go in a little more and we did a good job of getting it in and coming back out. (Our) guys were ready to shoot and make shots."
On Syracuse's zone defense....
"I wish I could tell you the key to attacking their zone. They've been doing that for so long that whatever you think the key is, they have the answer, they have an adjustment, they have a tweak, but they can take away something. So I think the key is just to play. You have to be able to move the ball, obviously you have to get it inside, you can't be lauded into swinging it around the perimeter, chucking up threes. I thought we did a good job of mixing up the kind of shots that we got."
On Georgetown's communication...
"(Syracuse) has a very good offensive team, they put five guys on the floor that can hurt you but I think our guys did a very good job of covering for each other. We have to cover for each other and I thought for the most part our communication was pretty good and we didn't make the same mistakes over and over so I thought the guys did a good job of helping each other."
On Georgetown bench play...
"I told the team, everybody played and everyone made significant contributions. Julian (Vaughn) I thought was terrific in the time that he was in there. Nikita (Mescheriakov) comes in, and he's been a bit of a 'deer in the headlights' and all of a sudden...I throw him in there and he bangs two shots in a row. That's how it should be. We have confidence in each other. When you get in the game you come in and do what you're supposed to do. Everyone was very good today, everyone helped out as a team. That was a team victory, in the truest sense of the word.
Georgetown Junior Forward DaJuan Summers
On his emotion...
"Yeah I'm just trying to be aggressive, and trying to do what the team needs me to in order for us to win. Being a leader... guys follow me, in a sense of being energetic or being vocal, and talking or whatever is needed. Just trying to do those things consistently is what I was trying to do tonight, just staying aggressive."
On what he learned from tonight's play...
"Just sticking with it, guys taking good shots and being patient, and doing the things we worked on in practice. I think that helped us get better against the zone as the game progressed."
On hitting shots...
"I guess it was just one of those games, just hitting it on all cylinders, guys making extra passes, I think when we do that were a great team."
On the first half 14 -0 Run...
"We are very capable of doing that on a consistent basis, it's just about us being aggressive, and making the right plays and the right reads and I think we did that tonight."
"That was huge, because most games are a game of runs, like Coach always tells us, we gotta withstand the other teams run. We showed a lot of toughness tonight, just being able to withstand the run and staying together and doing the things we need to do to stay in the game."
On the rivalry:
"I like to say that we don't think about it, we say each game is the same,. We've got to prepare for each game the same way. But it is a big game, it is a big rivalry."
Freshman guard Jason Clark
Getting comfortable in the game...
"I'm a lot more comfortable now, this week in practice we were working on a lot of shooting cause we know there zone is big."
On midrange game...
"I've been working on that a lot because, I knew I could get past the defender, or not taking the three all the time and getting past the three. A lot of defenders like to fly out on the three."
Sophomore guard Austin Freeman:
On being fouled at the three...
"I just took the shot and it went in, I don't know what else to say about that"
On Georgetown facing a tough schedule...
"We're all thinking, we are going to be happy today, but tomorrow we have to go back to work, prepare for duty. That's pretty much what we're going to do."
Syracuse Head Coach Jim Boeheim:
Opening Statement...
It's kind of crazy, but the game started out and we did a good job early on the boards, had some great opportunities, but missed two or three lay-ups, three or four foul shots in a row. We just could not get anything done and it hurt our defense. I think we didn't play defense the way we've been playing defense all year. Our defense has been really good, I think we just lost some of our emotion down there on the offensive end and we couldn't come back.
On Georgetown...
Georgetown played extremely well. They really made some big shots, got some big offensive rebounds early in the game and we got in such a hole that it was difficult. We started the second half pretty well, we did a good job early, but we never really got the defense that we needed to get going in this game. We gave up too many open looks and they knocked them down, which again is to their credit.
On Syracuse's defense...
We were getting beat in both defenses. We started out going man-to-man and they scored the first five points. We did a decent job there in the zone for a while. It was really more our offense through the first seven or eight minutes not converting when we had the opportunity. When you don't convert it leads to bad things at the offensive end and they made a couple threes and we did not respond well at the other end. We played equally bad in both defenses we gave up about seven threes in our man-to-man and five or six in our zone, so it's not what defense we played it's how we played defense.
On Rick Jackson's play inside...
He was active, he hurt us early when he missed a couple and missed some free throws, but he was active, he went after the ball and that's one of the bright spots coming out of this game. When we have the two big guys in the game, especially against a team like Georgetown, we're a zone team, because we can't cover that spread out offense, we can't cover Summers in a man-to-man situation.
