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2011-12 Kentucky Basketball[/B][/FONT][/COLOR][/B]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][B]No. 1 Kentucky vs. St. Johns[/B][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][B]Lexington, Ky. – Rupp Arena[/B][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][B]Dec. 1, 2011[/B][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][B]Post-Game Quotes[/B][/FONT][/COLOR]
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[CENTER][COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][B][U]Kentucky Players[/U][/B][/FONT][/COLOR][/CENTER]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][B]#20, Doron Lamb, G[/B][/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On where this team is defensively … [/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“Coach always tells us to play defense, and don’t let anyone else get past you and don’t foul. Just wall-up, and you have a lot of shot blockers behind you. That’s what we live on.[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On how successful the lob passes will be against teams like UNC … [/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“I think we can do that no matter who we play. If we just go past our guy, and the big man collapses, we can go to the lob. It doesn’t matter who we play.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On where this team is offensively … [/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“Coach just wants us to make the extra pass, and have us make the easiest play to score. He sees that we aren’t doing that right now. We have to work on that in practice, and get better.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][B]#1, Darius Miller, G[/B][/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On the psychological impact of blocking so many shots … [/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“We think it causes them to hesitate when they go to the rim. We alter a lot of shots even when we don’t block them, especially Terrence (Jones) and Anthony (Davis), they do a great job.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On defensively trying to funnel them into Anthony Davis in the lane … [/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“Not really. We are trying to keep them out of the lane, honestly. But it always helps when he’s there, he’s always back there to help, him and Terrence and they do a great job of helping us so it makes our job a lot easier.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On if this team is better at blocking shots than the 2009-10 team … [/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“I don’t know, that’s tough to say. Hopefully we can get there and be better than that.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On confidence in outside shooting…[/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“We feel like we have a good shooting team, we have a lot of guys that can knock down a jumper especially when they get going so we aren’t really worried about that. First of all we have to come in and play defense on them and especially get back in transition because we know that is one of their strong points.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][B]#23, Anthony Davis, F[/B][/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On his play and going to the line… [/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“I think I played really well. Those free throws, once again, but it’s the one thing I’m working on. I’ve been wanting to turn my wrist to the side instead of keep it (straight). And when I did, I hit both (free throws). One thing I’ve been working on.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On defensive play… [/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“[Blocking shots] was real big. We did our job on defense. We rattled their head. They had two or three shot clock violations back-to-back-to-back. We blocked out defensively. We agree to defensive changes and we kept playing [defense]. We made them shoot jumpers. We block shots a couple times and they want to start shooting jump shots. That’s what they did today.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On playing against centers…[/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“When a guy’s going full speed and someone quits testing them. They make a shot and I want to be right there to get the rebound and get the big man tired. Just keep subbing, keep subbing. So, that’s what I try to do to keep them on the floor.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On blocking balls to change possession…[/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“Blocking balls out of bounds is giving them another chance. So you block it in to one of your teammates or tip it a little bit to yourself. Then we have possession of the ball. So that’s how I try to do it to keep it in our hands. When I come from the weak side, I try to block it out of bounds. It excites the crowd and gets us pumped up as well.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][B]#3, Terrence Jones, F[/B][/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On playing North Carolina Tarheels on Saturday… [/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“They’re big in the paint just like we are. So it should be really competitive for me and Anthony [Davis] down low. This is a different team. We played a whole different way. But, I believe in Doron [Lamb] and Darius [Miller], Marquis [Teague] and myself on making 3s when we’re wide open, and Michael [Kidd-Gilchrist]. I think this is more of a driving team than last year. Just the different point guards we have and the offense we run. I just think it’s going to be a different game. They have a different team the way they play too.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On looking ahead to the game against North Carolina Tarheels on Saturday…[/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“I’ve just been going game-by-game just because how many games we lost last year. We’ve learned from that experience not to look over teams. So I just take it one at a time.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On blocking shots… [/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“[Blocking shots] was really big. Just a chance to represent the school and how many great players and great teams we’ve had. To be down in the history books is always great. No one really wants to get their shot blocked. So it really makes you conscious going to the hole. It makes teams think about driving sometimes.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On Anthony Davis’s play…[/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“I knew he was close [to a triple-double]. I thought he had it but I didn’t know exactly what the stats were besides the points. But I knew he played a great game.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[CENTER][COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][B][U]St. John’s Assistant Coach Mike Dunlap[/U][/B][/FONT][/COLOR][/CENTER]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]Opening statement … [/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“Well we learned a lot today about ourselves. Again, we are a work in progress and we knew we would be in for a battle. The disappointed part for us were the turnovers, 19, when you go on the road you have to take better care of the ball. That put a lot of pressure on our defense as far as easy baskets go. In the second half there was a period there where we widdled back, we were going to the free throw line, we were able to stop the clock even though there was a disparity in the score but we kind of worked ourselves back and then the technical pushed us away from any chance of bringing it to single digits. In the locker room we just talked about what we have to do better and what they did well.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On Anthony Davis’ ability to block shots … [/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“Well, he’s got really long arms and he’s very good at it. We wish we had one of those. He’s done that to a lot of opponents. Also for us to experience that, to drive the gap and get into the paint but he took care of the mistakes that were made on the perimeter. We call those guys ‘catchers’ and he is a tremendous ‘catcher’.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On the goal plan of taking the ball down low… [/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“I don’t know about taking it to him (Anthony Davis), we are a paint team. We’ve been averaging a lot of free throw games, that’s part of how we can get points on the scoreboard, it’s just who we are. I thought God’sgift (Achiuwa) did a good job when we were able to feed the post and go against Davis.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On the game plan… [/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“Well we had two gears, one is our run game in the first six seconds and the other is play through the mental part of the possession because we wanted to make sure there were some mistakes made and there were but the problem was that when we got into the paint we couldn’t finish or make that extra pass and that’s something that we are going to have to learn. I thought that we were a bit passive so we are going to have learn but I thought that was also the 23,000 people.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On sensing frustration from his team…[/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“The frustration would have come towards the end, I didn’t really see that coming in terms of that kind of a moment and I don’t think it was a big moment. I would just simply say it wasn’t a big dust up and for us to get that technical at this point early in the season and learn from it will benefit us down the road.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[CENTER][COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][B][U]St. John’s Players[/U][/B][/FONT][/COLOR][/CENTER]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][B]#10, Nurideen Lindsey, G[/B][/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On his overall thoughts on the game … [/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“I think Kentucky played very good tonight. They did a good job of containing the good things that we like to do. I don’t necessarily think I had a tough time tonight, you just have to give credit to Kentucky. They played very good defense.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On what it is like shooting over Anthony Davis … [/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“It’s like shooting over a tower. I have watched him play a lot this season, but I didn’t know he was as long as he is and as athletic as he is until he caught a couple of the dunks and a couple of the lob plays. He was blocking shots all over the place. It was tough.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On the trouble they had getting late in the shot clock … [/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“We tried to stay aggressive. We tried to get to a stage where we weren’t forcing so much so early in the shot clock. We tried to stay discipline and try to make those guys play defense for longer than they normally play.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][B]#11, D’Angelo Harrison, G[/B][/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On getting so many shots blocked … [/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“You just have to keep going after it. I got blocked three times. You just have to be crafty and learn how to play.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On how they regroup after the loss … [/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“We have to pull together. We have to bounce right back and have a hard practice tomorrow. We need to get better as a team, grow and get better.”[/FONT][/COLOR]
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[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow][I]On how they get better after playing UK … [/I][/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#000000][FONT=Arial Narrow]“Kentucky is the No. 1 team in the country. We were fighting. We were right with them in the first half. We had 19 turnovers, so that isn’t going to win you any games in the Big East or anywhere you play.” [/FONT][/COLOR]
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