Portland State vs. Rice Post-Game Quotes
11/15/2008 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Nov. 15, 2008
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Rice Quotes
Head Coach Ben Braun
Opening Statement
"There were enough positives here. You have to be careful as a coach - you want to be objective with your team - and that's why we played Portland State. We played a team that went to the NCAA tournament. I wanted to give our team an objective view of where we are and what we can do well against a solid team. Some of the stats that we had usually spell a victory. We shot over 50 percent from the floor, we went to the [free throw] line almost 30 times, we had almost 20 assists and we kept turnovers down to six."
On Rebounding
"Unfortunately the area that really plagued us was the inability to secure defensive rebounds. We found ourselves against a three-point shooting team in poor defensive position. I didn't like that our team was stationed in the paint. Usually you say get inside the paint and get inside position. However, inside position means inside your man, not just in the paint. Very few long rebounds land inside the paint. A number of rebounds came over the top and we didn't get those because we didn't make proper contact with our men. Certainly, rebounding was a huge key for Portland State. They scored a lot of second chance points. I don't think we gave up any fast break points tonight. This is a team that has been good at getting transition baskets. We worked very hard at not giving up transition but we obviously didn't focus enough on the defensive rebounding. We have to be a lot tougher than that."
On Defending Jeremiah Dominguez
"We were a little inconsistent in containing Dominguez. When we contained him our defense was good. When we didn't get out on some ball screens, he got to the rim and created some buckets. So we have to get consistent there. In stretches we did a pretty good job."
On Areas to Improve
"We did some good things. Trey [Stanton] hit the floor for some loose balls and our big guys did some things that showed aggression. But it's about consistency. Aleks Perka had nine rebounds. We can't have our second rebounder be a guard that totals only four - with Rodney Foster. There were over 30 missed shots out there, we have to get more rebounds. We have to go to work in that area. This is a game that we were able to find some things out as we knew we would. It was important to play this game. It was our first game. We have a bunch of games coming up this week - we have three. We don't have time to get out of control with preparation. Our habits are going to have to kick in. If I can change one thing between now and Thursday it will be rebounding."
On First Half vs. Second Half
"The same problem that we had throughout the game was rebounding. They outrebounded us dramatically. There is no reason why we should give up that many offensive rebounds. We knew going into halftime that if we limited that we would put them away in the second half. But we came out in the second half and they knocked down shots and that's how it turned out."
On the Offense
"We were running our offenses the best that we could. They weren't pressuring us too hard like we thought. We were able to run our offense like we wanted to, but we couldn't knock down shots."
On Portland State's Zone Defense
"They threw a zone at us for a while and I don't think we were ready for it. We were about to run a play that we'd drawn up in a timeout, but they were in the 3-2 zone and we weren't ready for that."
On Defense
"We concentrated a lot on that - trapping ball screens. We did a lot better job on that in the second half. Previously we let the guard go around the ball screen to the basket. But we got a lot more aggressive in trapping and that helped a lot."
Portland State Quotes
Head Coach Ken Bone
Opening Statement "The first game of the year is always a big game because it's just that - you're first game. It's on your mind for months. Not that it's more significant than any other game, but you want to win your first game of the season. To be able to come in here and play a team with the caliber of Rice - and what I think they will be, especially with a coach like Ben Braun - I think they did a phenomenal job. I'm extremely happy with the job our guys did today and I'm glad we got the win."
On Rebounding
"We work on rebounding nine out of ten days. We were the Big Sky champions as far as rebounding goes. We take a lot of pride in that. I thought our guys came out and did the job in that area."
On Shot Selection
"Our shot selection was not very good - especially in the first couple minutes of the game. But we settled down and we were able to let the game come to us. I thought we took better shots in the second half and we shot it well from behind the arc - 7-for-11. We were 2-for-13 in the first half and we did a good job of letting the game come to us."
PG Jeremiah Dominguez
On Big Second Half Performance
"In the second half we made big plays, but I every play counts. I wanted to control who had the ball at what time and who was going to score. It helps a lot to have guys like Dominic Waters and Phil Nelson who can spread out the defense so they can't key in on me as much as they wanted to."
On His Big Three-Pointer late to Seal the Game
"That last shot that I took - my feet were set and I had the confidence to shoot it. We needed a big bucket at the end to seal the win."
