UCLA 72, Washington State 67
March 1, 2015
UCLA Head Coach Steve Alford
Opening statement …
“I was really proud of our guys in the second half to do what they needed to do. It was a gut-check game for them. All the pressure was on us. Not a whole lot of pressure was on Washington State. I thought Washington State did a really good job of competing and playing extremely hard and that credit goes to Coach Kent and his staff. They played very hard and were very well prepared. They already got a win here in the city so we knew they were trying for a sweep. We took their best shot. We had a lot of guys do some really good things tonight. Obviously our senior in Norman [Powell] had a terrific game, not just with his career high but he did a lot of good things for us tonight. I thought that was big. What Tony [Parker] did off the bench gave us a big lift. He was disciplined a little bit for being late for shoot around and I credit him with how he responded. He responded in a very big way. Obviously it's a very big win for us. They are not going to be easy, and Wednesday won't be any easier, so we had to get by this one to set up that last one before the season concludes. This was a really good win, and I am proud of the guys.”
On Norman Powell's play as he closes out his collegiate career …
“He has stepped up a lot and done a really good job of attacking the rim. He got to the free throw line 10 times – that is the kind of activity that we need to have. He has really matured in handling his body and who he is about as a player. Last year, he was anywhere from a 22 to 26 minute guy. You really couldn't play him much more than that because he would have lapses. I think where he has really matured is that now there is no pacing to his game where he has learned how to play hard even in a game like this where I couldn't get him a blow. He was in there for all 40 minutes. The same thing goes for Isaac [Hamilton] and Bryce [Alford]. They have played a lot of minutes here late in the season in these crucial games. You can't worry about rotations – you have to go with who you are going to go with. Norman has really raised his game and that is what you really like to see out of your seniors.”
On the pace of the start of the game …
“Defensively we were doing some decent things and made some big shots. I didn't like our pace on offense. We weren't cutting at the rate we wanted to cut or screen at the pace that we want to screen. But those last 10 minutes, all of a sudden, we got stops, and in transition we started to cut harder and were doing a better job of screening, and we made some shots. We made some big plays when the game was around being tied and made some big plays to make it a two-possession game.
On the pressure of being the favorite …
“Our guys couldn't tell you who the favorite is or not. We obviously know we are ahead of Washington State but we are not looking at games to see if we are favored or not. At Arizona, I assume they were the favorite, but we never talked about going in there as an underdog. It is about playing well and trying to get better, and it doesn't always work out that way. I thought we started out the game really well, we got on a good run to start the game, but then you have to credit them. I think they are first or second in the league in free throw attempts per game. We held them to 12 free throw attempts, and we had 31, so sometimes a sloppy game can look sloppy because there are a lot of free throws. I have to watch the tape. We only had 11 turnovers on the night and that's a low turnover night again. The assists were down because we were driving so hard. In the post play, Tony had two or three bounces to get to the rim, so that takes assists out of there. But you score 72 and shoot 44 percent and only shoot 14 threes and get to the line 31 times, you outrebound your opponent, they had more turnovers than you do. There are a lot of positives in this game.”
On the stakes of making the NCAA Tournament …
“It is not so much stakes. Our guys know what we have to do. They understand what we have to do. Our resume looks better as we get wins. We can't help the scheduling. We said five of our first seven were on the road and down the stretch we are going to have five of the next seven at home. Other teams are going to have to finish on the road, or their record looks different by what they are doing on the road. Our resume is just going to change by getting a total number of wins. We get this one on Wednesday, we are 19-12 with the hardest strength of schedule in the Pac-12. So our schedule strength even with everyone we have lost, we have played the toughest schedule in the Pac-12. That is hard on a young team, and yet they have a chance to finish this thing at 19-12. If we win this thing, we are 11-7, and that is one game back from where we were last year, so to finish that strong would be terrific for this team. It is going to take a lot of work because we know we are going to get USC's best shot – it is a rivalry game – so it makes it a lot of fun, it is senior night. There are a lot of pressures to that, it is not easy to do and hopefully our guys will continue to play well. We are going through a stretch where we are playing pretty good basketball.”
UCLA senior guard Norman Powell
“My game felt good tonight. I just tried to be aggressive, despite a slow start. Coach just told me to keep attacking early. The team started to locking it down more defensively and the game started to open up more.”
“I've always been good at attacking. Coach says that I'm one of the best at driving to the rim. He does a good job of finding mismatches for us to exploit and once I got a couple of buckets to go down, the game really opened up from there.”
“We knew that Washington St. was a good team and they were playing good on this road trip. We took them too lightly; young teams tend to do that. But we eventually started hitting the glass and focusing more on defense. Coach talks about how big March basketball is and some of the freshmen were just anxious to play. The meaning of this game was big and it was important to hold serve at home. I really liked how we played through the adversity and got the win.”
UCLA junior center/forward Tony Parker
“I knew this was a big game. It's March and we have to start playing hard and aggressive. I apologize [for being late to shoot around] to our guys and our fans. It's not professional and I wanted to prove to my team that I take it seriously.”
“We started sluggish and they were hitting shots. They out rebounded us in the first half, that can't happen. We just had to bounce back and play harder. It's March; everyone is playing hard and trying to prove something.”
“The USC game is a big game for us because it's March and we have to win games. We have senior players and we have to play hard for them. It's their last game in Pauley Pavilion. We want to come out a play well for everyone.”
Washington State Head Coach Ernie Kent
On the factors that brought UCLA back into the game …
“The factors were that I told this team that they're going to be sick when they look at tape and see what I saw – at minimum 50 basketball efforts on the floor, offensively and defensively, that we did not make. What I mean is, we saw the play but couldn't make the play. Sometimes we never even saw the play. We had so many scoring opportunities that we did not capitalize on, very similar to the USC game, very similar to Washington even more. That's hard to do on the road – when you lose those opportunities and give a team of that caliber the opportunity to come back, that's tough to do. The biggest thing is we left too many plays on the floor.”
On wearing down in the second half …
“When you get up on a team and start running, they get fatigued a little bit. We had a chance to fatigue them but we didn't do it. To their credit, they took advantage of all of our wasted opportunities to create some distance that would have given us a chance to do well and put Josh (Hawkinson) on the bench and rest him. But we could never get the lead to where we wanted it to so we could get him out of the game to get him some wind. He had to stay on the floor, and unfortunately it cost us.”
On playing in Pauley Pavilion …
“I had a chance to give a hug to Nan Wooden, who has been fabulous to our coaches' association throughout the years. To come back to this building and see what a terrific job they did here at remodeling this building … this is a fantastic venue to play in. I don't think people understand what a shrine this is here and what a wonderful job they did to renovate this beautiful building.”
On returning home for their final games …
“It's our seniors' last home games, and it's imperative that the underclassmen do not let them lose at home in their last two games. It's really a passing of the torch, in essence. Our underclassmen need to step up and carry the seniors so they can go out winners in their last two games. At the same time they need to understand the responsibility and leadership they have to have as underclassmen in taking over the reins of the program going forward.”
Washington State senior guard DaVonté Lacy
On if the loss hurts …
“Being a competitor at this level, any loss hurts, no matter if you're in the game or out of the game. It's just disappointing that we played well but not well enough to win.”
On what the team needs to do for their final two games …
“We've just got to get back into the gym and work on our fundamentals. We need to clean it up and come out with the fight we need to win.”