University of California, Los Angeles, Athletics
Postgame Quotes - UCLA vs. Saint Francis U
POSTGAME QUOTES
UCLA 95, Saint Francis U 58
November 16, 2018
Steve Alford, The Michael Price Family UCLA Menโs Head Basketball Coach
opening remarks
โI thought the second 20 was the best weโve played to date. Obviously itโs early in the season and I thought our guys did a really good job. Early season, you want to learn some lessons and figure some things out. We were down 11-2 to start; you want to see how young guys can respond and I thought we did a really good job from that point of responding. Then getting a lead before we went into halftime and then I thought the second half we came out and just put it all together defensively and offensively. I thought, defensively, we were pretty consistent in both halves. The first half, offensively, might have been as bad as weโve played. Three assists. Weโre a program that averages nearly 17 assists a game and the ballโs got to move. I think our offensive efficiency was around 106 at the half. Second half, it was 160 and we had 15 assists. Great parallel to the reason why your efficiency goes up and thatโs moving the ball and sharing. I thought the second half, it moved a lot better and I think that weโre developing something out of our d-stops. Itโs special because weโre very good in transition and weโre starting to learn how to play together with different lineups, different combinations. But overall, extremely pleased. I thought, especially in the second half, because this was a very dangerous offensive team and to hold them to 58 points, 30 percent shootingโthereโs a lot of positives, defensively.โ
on Moses Brown
โMoโs a special player. Twenty-three, 14 and eight in less than 30 minutes. Heโs a presence at both ends and heโs very, very active. Seven offensive rebounds is terrific activity. He runs, he catches everything. Heโs got great hands, heโs got quick feet. You saw him a little bit today in getting a loose ball and dribbling to about half court. Thereโs going to be a day heโs going to dribble all the way and Iโm not going to be able to stop him. And heโs capable of doing that. Heโs a gifted individual, but I just love his motor. Heโs a got a high motor and when youโve got a high motor at 7-2, youโve got a chance to be pretty doggone good. Weโre seeing that out of Mo. Heโs had a very special start to his freshman year. People have to prepare for him and I think thatโs going to open up some things for some other guys.โ
on being able to rely on bench for long stretches
โYeah, I think, again, itโs early in the season, but we always have confidence with freshmen. Iโve always played freshmen. I like them coming out of high school, their confidence and throwing them right in there. Weโve always done that with our freshmen, so weโre doing that again with this group and theyโre playing very well. What, obviously, Moses, Jules (Bernard) and David (Singleton) are doing and we got Kenny (Nwuba) in there tonight, which was good because I like getting him some minutes. And then I like that group of sophomores, too, obviously Wilkes and Hands played last yearโand Chris Smithโbut Chris Smithโs playing a little bit different role. Think heโs playing at a really high level and Jay Hill didnโt play at all last year, so heโs learning and doing a lot of good things and arguably might be one of our better defenders. Weโre just a very young, inexperienced team. We break it down into four-minute segments regardless of what the score was and weโre just pounding it into themโthis four minutes is important because weโve got to keep learning and itโs an experience weโre not going to get back. Weโve just got to keep learning in every four-minute segment and I thought the guys did that. I didnโt like our start. If there was a negative, I didnโt like our start, but outside of the first four-minute start, it was a pretty good 36 minutes.โ
on slow starts from Jaylen Hands and Kris Wilkes
โI think they were in a hurry. Those are our two leaders and we talked about that. I thought both Jay and Kris were in a little bit of a hurry and thereโs going to be nights when the ball just doesnโt go in for them. You take good shots and you miss themโฆ Those are two guys that we need playing at a high level. The encouragement was, weโre up seven with those two not playing particularly well in the first half. I thought the second half, they did much better.โ
on Brownโs body
โAs he continues to mature, youโre going to see him get even more fluid. There are not too many bigs at 7-2 [that] run the floor like he does. Not too many bigs have feet like he does. Heโs got quick feet and heโs got terrific hands. When youโre 7-2, long, great hands, great feetโI wish I had him longer than what Iโm going to have him because heโs special. I think youโre going to see him continue to evolve, like I said, heโs got a motor, he cares, he works. You can get on him. He responds to good, tough criticism of making him get better.โ
on inability to stop Saint Francis U on offensive boards
โIf there was negative, Iโve got to watch tape, I thought we were much better in the second half than we were in the first half with their offensive board playโbut they did miss 50 shots. You miss 50 shots, thatโs a lot of chances to go get it. If you miss 50 and get 19 of those back, that means we got 31 of them. Sometimes there are so many misses and thatโs going to be a difficult thing. But itโs something that weโll stress. We want to make sure that weโll continue to work on that, but I think our defensive efficiency tonight was around 81. Regardless of what board play looked like, if our defensive efficiency is going to be at that level, you saw that in the second half, we scored almost 60 points in the second half because we got a lot of stops and we can get out and run.โ
UCLA freshman Moses Brown
on adjustments after slow scoring start
โYeah, I tried to do a couple post moves, but I was getting doubled a lot. Coach [Alford] sat me down because I wasnโt giving a lot of energy. I got back in the game, but I had to do it the best way I know howโwith the backboard.โ
on adjustments to the physicality of college basketball
โItโs been a real big adjustment just because in practice, when we play each other, we have Jalen Hill, we have [Kenneth] Nwuba, we have Alex [Olesinksi], we have [Shareef OโNeal], and we all just bang at each other and go hard against each other. Doing that in practice helped me get ready for the game.โ
UCLA redshirt junior Prince Ali
on how team responded to lack of early scoring production from Jaylen Hands and Kris Wilkes
โThere are going to be nights like that where they donโt score that much, but thatโs what teammates are for. Theyโll pick you up. Everyone competed well, so that was welcome.โ
on comparing tonightโs dunk to 2015 dunk against Kentucky
โI actually thought I missed [the dunk against Kentucky]. I didnโt know I made it. I donโt know; that was so long ago. I just saw it and I took off. Thatโs all.โ
on team shooting 25-31 in the second half
โIn the first half, I think we only had three assists. We werenโt really moving the ball much. In the second half, I think we had 15, so we really started to move the ball. Thatโs when weโre at our bestโwhen weโre moving the ball, everybody getting clean looks. Thatโs a testament to the ball being moved around.โ
UCLA freshman Jules Bernard
on playing with Moses Brown
โItโs a lot of fun. When you have a player like that, you better use him. You better use him as much as possible. He came into the summer and proved himself right away. Weโre confident; we knew these types of games were coming. We knew what he was capable of, so this is just a testament to all his hard work.โ
on keys to first-half run
โJust energy. For me, a big thing is energy, crashing the boards, playing defense. I think it starts with one guy. If one guy comes in and brings energy, I think it picks up the whole group. I thought we did a good job of playing defense, getting boards, and pushing out into transition. We started to get into our rhythm and from there on, we got in a groove and pushed the lead up.โ
on dunks and momentum-shifting plays in the second half
โIt helps us on the court, it helps on the bench. The bench brings energy, especially on those big plays. They get us going on the court. It gets our adrenaline up. Once we see big plays like Princeโs dunk and Moses getting boards and dunking it right away, it just gets our energy flowing. It makes us less tired. When weโre on the defensive end, weโre active, getting steals, and then we push in transition to get those types of dunks. Itโs a lot of fun.โ
St. Francis head coach Rob Krimmel
opening remarks
โIt really was a tale of two halves. The first half we really executed the game plan and then we let them have too many offensive rebounds. The second half they really willed their way. They really got going downhill and when they do that, they are a really good team. I also give their defense credit. They are really good. Like I said, the first twenty minutes were good. I just wish the second twenty was a little bit different. We had fifteen turnovers and they scored twenty-three points off of those. Glad how we started. We are a work in progress.โ
โI hope so. Time will tell. Our captains stood up and said what they needed to say to our team. Our goal is just to get better. Like UCLA, we are playing a team with a ton of tradition. We just want to see if we can put two halves together.โ