Postgame Quotes – UCLA vs. San Jose State
UCLA 93, San Jose State 64
December 1, 2019
Mick Cronin, The Michael Price Family UCLA Men’s Head Basketball Coach
opening remarks
“I was obviously concerned about the fact that we played three games in Maui and didn’t leave until Friday and didn’t get back until almost 10 at night. To have to turn around and play today is tough, but I thought the guys, their energy level was great. I was proud of them. They responded well to it. We’re just trying to get better every day, [and] trying to become a more efficient team at both ends. I thought our defensive energy was really good at times. We’re still practicing rotations. I know, obviously, Jaime had an excellent game. He played, he had no turnovers and he’s seven for 10. The thing I liked to see … was Shareef [O’Neal]. I thought his defense, he’ll get better in time with his turnovers, and he gets excited when he gets the ball too much and [can] get a couple travels. But, his defensive rotations are getting better. That’s going to be big for us, going forward. We’ve got to become a team that can stop somebody because we’re not going to get 93 – be nice to get 93 every night. I’d be all for it. I don’t know how realistic that is.”
on assists
“If we can stop traveling and throwing it to the other team, our offense is pretty good. I’ll say this: they were playing zone, so the zone, sometimes, teams do you a favor when they play you a zone because you have to pass the ball. Less dribbling against zone. Zone defense forces passing on offense and when we do it, we’re a better team. In our ‘mad men’ offense, we’re still finding our comfort zone. We’re still trying to get to the point where we move the ball better. But I would tell you in that game [versus Michigan State], Cody [Riley] missed a point-blank one and had two point-blanks blocked and two where Tyger [Campbell] could’ve laid it in, he threw lobs. Five layups. That was what it was … [when] we tried to keep working it, we found a cutter for a layup almost every time, because I look at the first half, we had 46 points, we only took two threes.”
on freshman Jaime Jaquez Jr.
“Well, he didn’t turn the ball over. He doesn’t take bad shots. He doesn’t get beat on defense. He’s engaged, mentally. He’s a great building block for us. Tremendous building block for our program.”
UCLA sophomore forward/center Jalen Hill
on how his game has grown so far this season
“Just by slowing down, seeing the game. The game’s slowing down as I’ve had more experience playing. Just finding the open guys, making the right decisions.”
on his matchup against San Jose State center Sam Japhet-Mathias
“It was hard, but Cody [Riley] in practice, he’s really aggressive and he’s really good down in the post, so that kind of helped me a lot. The way he plays, we just beat each other up every practice. It was a challenge, but I was ready for it.”
UCLA freshman guard/forward Jaime Jaquez Jr.
on what’s going into the way he’s playing and his development
“I just try to play the same way every single game whether I play a lot, start, sit the bench, whatever. It’s the same mentality every single game, so that’s what I do.”
on what his two steals in the first half did for his team’s momentum
“Yeah, I think it gave us a little bit of a boost, knowing that we can get up in passing lanes and run the floor and get out and get dunks and layups.”
UCLA junior guard Chris Smith
on how far away his team is from playing the defense that they want to play
“I think we’re really far. We’re not even playing the defense that [Coach Cronin] is known for, at the moment. The biggest thing is talking on defense, and we don’t do much of that at the moment. We’ve just to get in the groove, get more comfortable, and we’ve got to talk more, and then I think we’ll start progressing towards what he wants.”
on if the team knows what to do on defense and if they’re just not clicking
“I think it’s just a work in progress like everything else. This team’s fairly new. We’ve got younger guys. I just think it’s a work in progress, you know? Everyone’s just got to I guess get in a groove on defense, and like I said, talking’s a big thing. We’ve got to do a lot more of that.”
San Jose State head coach Jean Prioleau
opening statement
“We just got outrebounded. They were just more athletic. We just couldn’t make some of those short shots. After we drove and kicked and made the pass, we had the ball in the position but just couldn’t make it. I thought we made some plays.”
on the team’s strategy against UCLA
“We tried a lot; we played zone, and we played man. Some of it worked; some of it didn’t.”
on where the team goes from this performance
“We’ll go back and watch film. We’ve got Utah State, who is ranked, and San Diego State coming up. There’s just not a lot of time; we’ve just got to go in and figure out what worked and what didn’t work.”
San Jose State sophomore guard Zach Chappell
on playing in Pauley Pavilion
“This is place is legendary. There’s a lot of history here. I really consider it a blessing playing here.”
on his overall performance
“Personally, I didn’t think I did that bad. As a team, though, we turned over the ball too much. But what we did do well is once we made the pass and concentrated on coming to the pass, I thought we did a good job as a team. But we had way too many turnovers – 20 turnovers – we have to correct that.”
on how to prepare for the next contest
“We just have to get better. It starts with film. Also, we’ve got to make sure we work on our rebounding. They really killed us on the boards.”