USF 76, Seton Hall 74
Jan. 28, 2010
Postgame Quotes
Stan Heath
"That was a great game. Both teams fought extremely hard; battled back and forth. We didn't turn the ball over much, and that's a team that is really active with its hands and gets a lot of steals. They lead our league in steals. And so Chris and Dominique, Crater and Mercer, all those guys did a great job just being strong with the ball.
It's crazy, I thought Chris did a good job with Jeremy Hazell and he had 28. So I don't know what else you could say about it, but that guy is an amazing scorer and fortunately we have a guy on our side too, who can put the ball in the basket as well.
The key with the second half was that we did a better job, especially the last 10 minutes, of rebounding. We couldn't come up with some of those rebounds and loose balls in the first half.
The other thing that was huge for us is how well we shot free throws when we needed them."
On the key to taking Saturday's emotion and carrying it over ...
"It was a springboard for us. I didn't think we got overconfident or anything like that, we just felt good about ourselves. Monday might have been the best practice we've ever had. I love the energy that the guys brought, all of them, even some of the guys that don't play a lot. We were very focused, I thought there was a lot of attention to details with the film, and knowing some of the things they do or like to do, that we were trying to guard. I thought there was an extra boost, an extra pep in our step, going into this game."
On the composure of the players...
"We've got some veterans out here. They struck first honestly. They had two or three possessions the first time they got it. And fortunately we came back down and countered it, and I thought from there we picked it up a little bit, got a little bit of a lead, made some plays, and held them off. It wasn't easy holding them off but we were able to do that."
On if this kind of a win will help get the team to not be seen as an easy game in the Big East...
"I don't know the perception everybody has of us. We think we have a good basketball team. We think that we're capable of winning games. We've been doing it a little bit short handed and I think pretty soon we're going to be with a full slate of guys and we'll be even better. I can't get caught up in what other people think of us, I can only worry about ourselves. I think most people know if they come to the Sun Dome, they've got to be ready to play."
On the disparity with free throws...
"I don't blow the whistle, I thought there were some calls out there that we didn't get. I thought that we were attacking the basket pretty good. But I probably wouldn't have felt so good if I lost either."
Chris Howard
On his basket at the end...
"Well Dominique was calling for the ball as usual. When I had it and I saw Hazell was guarding me, and once 'Nique cleared out to the wing, it was the whole basket. So I figured if I could get one step on him, it was either going to be a foul or I'm going to miss the layup or make it. So that's the opportunity; I thought that was the best play for our team. And I completed it and it looked good."
On the back to back Big East wins...
"It was big. When they had that first basket in overtime, a guy was left open. We came back into the timeout and the first thing 'Nique and I told the team was we've been here before. Remember Providence. We bounced back, like that was the main focus, everybody looked in our eyes and we've been here; we can get this win. And once that was said, I think everybody just focused on the finish line and we sprinted to it."
Dominique Jones
On how the past two wins set him up for the next two tough games...
"It builds up our confidence as a team. And I think if we just keep working hard in practice and just go in the game and play hard and play smart and just do the best that we can, we give ourselves a good chance to win."
On having the help of other players on the team...
"Like I told Chris, I don't know what I would do without him. I told him that on the court, because the layup that he got, I was calling for the ball - because I always call for the ball - but I was tired. And when he made the layup I was just feeling so good. And I feel like I trusted my teammates this game again, and it paid off. So that's the direction that I'm going in."
Seton Hall Head Coach Bobby Gonzalez
Opening statement...
“Basically it was obviously a hard fought game. It was everything we expected. Winning on the road in this conference is tough, I don't care who you play, we knew South Florida was going to be a tough game tonight because you know we had beaten them five in a row. We knocked them out of the Garden last year. You can't continue to beat teams all the time, sooner or later you're going to get knocked off, unless you are one of the elite teams. If you are one of the elite teams, you might beat someone ten in a row or something like that, but it's just hard to keep beating somebody all the time. They're getting better, obviously. We're better this year. We're an emerging team. They had confidence coming off the win against Providence. I don't believe that we had a letdown coming off the two wins against Louisville and Pittsburgh, but I do believe we did not play as good as I would have hoped or would have liked. I'm not taking any credit away from South Florida, they played very hard. We didn't make shots. Jeremy Hazell didn't have a lot of help tonight, other people didn't step up and make shots and that's tough for me. We have to have other people make shots for us to win, and of course Dominique Jones. They both had 28 tonight, but he was just as unstoppable as Jeremy was, maybe even harder because he got to the free throw line and made 10 out of 11. I thought there was a very big discrepancy in the free throws, and I don't know why that is. I'm going to look at the film and figure out what they were doing that we weren't doing, because we thought we were putting it on the deck and going inside. Why we only took 19 free throws and they took 35 is a little confusing to me, but that sometimes happens in this league for whatever reason.”
On turnovers and steals...
“I think it was a little bit of both. We didn't press as much as we would have liked, and we didn't turn them over as much as we did the last two teams we played and that hurt us. I think it was a little bit them. I thought Crater and some of their guys handled the ball a little better. They did a good job. They were solid with it and it was a little bit of us. We didn't do as good of a job with our pressers. We did try to press at times and we didn't get much out of it.
On the key to being able to hit the free throws toward the end of the game...
“You get to the line enough you're going to make them. I mean they're at home. Dominique Jones is obviously a very good free throw shooter. Jarrid Famous is a kid that we recruited and helped come back to beat us a little bit. We knew he was a very good player. We were definitely on the right guy, and I think that for whatever reason, they got to the line a little more than us. Our defense wasn't as good off of the dribble as it has been the last two games and I think that's something we are going to have to go back home and work on because that really hurt us tonight, their dribble penetration.
