Coach Boeheim Quotes
Syracuse vs. No. 8/8 Georgetown
February 16, 2008
Syracuse, N.Y. - Carrier Dome
Opening Statement:
“Our defense was really the key tonight. We were tremendous on the defensive end of the court, but the stats don’t look like it. They made so many threes at the end there but our defense was tremendous. That makes it even more disappointing about how we played defensively the other night, but you get days like that and you’re on the road and you have to come back at three in the morning.
We played virtually five guys, five and a half guys tonight. Rick [Jackson] did a good job, Scoop [Jardine] did a good job – went in and made a big basket. Our guys hung in there. Georgetown is going to make some runs. They made a run right away and we countered that well. They made another run and we really countered that well and got back up a big lead. And, then they came right down and hit two threes, had another three-point play and they got to within five or seven.
We had trouble with their match-up and Jonny [Flynn] got some penetration and hit Donte’ [Greene] for that three. I guess he was due by that time, but that was a big play and then Paul [Harris] made a big drive when it was again back in the game.
[Jonathan] Wallace is a tremendous shooter and we did a great job on him for most of the game. We did a good job on [Roy] Hibbert.
Arinze [Onuaku] was very good tonight, this is the way we need him to play – very aggressive offensively. He really did a good job. Kristof [Ongenaet] did a great job on the boards. Paul and Jonny were really good.
It was a tremendous effort, Georgetown is a real good basketball team and this is a good solid win for us.”
On Arinze Onuaku’s play:
“He took it right at them at the beginning and made two plays early. When we get going early then that gets him going. I think he is even a better player than he played today, but he played well.”
On Onuaku’s second-half block:
“He made a good block. There were several key plays in the game on offense and they made a couple big steals to get back in it but we really played some good offense off the double stack. We got Arinze a dunk and we got some real good looks there. Again, they are a very good defensive team and it is hard to score a lot of points against them, 77 is a lot of points, they don’t give up that many points too often.”
On the importance of the win:
“Every game is important, every team is important now. We just have to keep playing well.”
On what worked in the zone defense:
“We were active in it. It’s all about being active. It isn’t technical, it is just being active. The second half they had two turnovers I think because we weren’t active, we just weren’t as active. It is hard to play 40 minutes like that in any defense with any number of guys particularly this small. Your energy level is going to go down. The crowd was great they helped us, no question about that.”
On Donte’ Greene’s play:
“Donte’ was good. He got a lot of good looks, all his shots were good looks. I think he could have a big game and he could bust out and have a real good game. The players screened for him, looked for him and he got a lot of good looks. He has not shot it great for a while but we have to keep looking for him, we don’t really have any other options.”
On the team bouncing back from the South Florida loss:
“I thought we were ready at South Florida. We started out good defensively even though we didn’t play well offensively. We forced a couple turnovers early, we were active, then we had our offense going and got control of it. Our defense was key in the first half, that was the real difference. Our offense was good but our defense was really the key.”
On Georgetown’s slow scoring start:
“They scored first tonight and then they scored 48 in the second half.”
On Billy Smith:
“I’d like to mention Billy Smith back here, a great player for us. I was just an assistant coach but he was part of the turn-around year when we got back to the NIT. Billy was a key guy on that team, we had a lot of little guys and one big guy, and he was a tremendous player for us here at Syracuse. I think he would have had a great NBA career if he hadn’t gotten hurt but it is nice to see him back here today, he looks the same, I was going to put him in a couple times.”
On the crowd:
“The crowd was great, really they have been good all year. The fans have been very supportive. We are a young team. We are going to make mistakes and we do some things that you shake your head about but the effort has been there all year. Obviously, the league is so tough and the physical wear and tear on these guys is going to be tremendous going down the stretch, but they have battled as hard as you could ask them to battle all year long and making some of the plays we made today on offense against a very good defensive team was tremendous. Rick made a couple great plays down there on defense. We really have done a lot of things to be proud of. We’re shorthanded and very young and Georgetown is very good. They came right back at the start of the second half and our lead was gone in a minute, so we had to really come back from that. They’ve battled hard all year, even in the losses. South Florida, we battled right to the end and had a little bit of a chance to get back in that game, but that is all you can ask for. We just have to keep banging, keep playing hard. Louisville, I think is one of the best teams in the country the way they are playing and that will be a great challenge for us.”
