Redemption time. The Wildcats need to get back on track with a win at home tonight against Auburn. The struggling Tigers team will come in to Rupp tonight with something to prove and nothing to lose. It should be an interesting game. 7:00pm on ESPNU, set your DVR’s. Here’s what Coach Cal had to say about the Auburn Tigers.
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[I][B]On encouraging current Auburn head coach Tony Barbee to take the Auburn position when it was open…[/B]
[/I]“I think that all the jobs in the SEC are good jobs. You have a chance to get your team to a Final Four. You have a chance to win national titles. Teams in this league have done it, and if there are other teams in this league that have done it, you can do it. (They have a) new building, with the SEC and their football program doing well financially you have no restrictions, it’s go out and recruit some guys, get them together and let’s go. I think he’ll do fine and he’s done fine. The tapes I’ve watched he’s doing a terrific job of keeping his guys where they have to be for a chance to win. They beat Florida State and they had them from the start of the game to the end of the game.”
[I][B]On Auburn’s six-point first-half performance against LSU…[/B]
[/I]“I didn’t watch the LSU tape. I didn’t watch either half because they play all zone and there are other tapes I needed to watch first. I’ll eventually watch it but I have not yet.”
[I][B]On cautioning his players from taking notice of Auburn’s first half against LSU…[/B]
[/I]“You take this game like you did Penn and you’ll be in the same position. I would say this team is better than Penn. Penn could have beaten us if they could have sustained our effort. This team against Florida State sustained effort. That’s why they won.”
[B][I]On what goes into changing the thought process of junior guards [URL=”http://www.ukathletics.com/sports/m-baskbl/mtt/miller_darius00.html”]Darius Miller[/URL] and DeAndre Liggins…
[/I][/B]“At the end of the (Georgia) game we didn’t make stops and they were all break downs by us. Either we stood behind the post on a zone, a guy didn’t rotate over so then when we did rotate they got a dunk, in the press they throw by us and everything was to be caught in front of us and we didn’t. We broke down, well you can’t in a close game. Then on offense we took tough shots. Part of it was we’re trying to play through a bump and hope the official will bail us out. You can’t do that late in a game, can’t do it. So it wasn’t just those two, but they were out there too. So we had a team full of guys, it wasn’t just two. One of the things I would say, this may be a team that – I told them this yesterday – I may need to use some timeouts, four minutes, three minutes, two minutes, use a timeout or two. And you’d say why, well because this team, we called a play and we ran it, but we ran it to the wrong guy. I think, again, they’re not thinking like I think yet. So you have to use some timeouts. I told them, the reason I don’t like doing that, and why I believe coaches do it, is you want to say watch this play, I’m going to show you I’m coaching. I’d rather you say he just rolls out balls and gets all the best players and that’s why he wins. I’d rather you say that about me. I usually teach them in practice and then they play it out. But this team may need me to stop the game, we’re down three this is a big basket let me show you exactly where we’re going to go with this and then we’ll keep playing. I’ve not coached like that in a while, but this team after watching, I probably need to do that.”
[I][B]On if the workout equipment at practice is used as a sort of punishment…[/B]
[/I]“These guys don’t need to be punished, we just need to keep coaching them; just keep coaching them, they’re good kids. They want to do well, they’re not physically or mentally tough enough yet, you’ve got to go through some wars to learn and what we went through down there we learned. We learned. You tie up the game, go up one, you win that game. You win that game. You break down three times defensively and then you come down and you miss two one-footers, and miss a tip-in and everything’s a fade away versus a foul, you’re going to lose the game, and that’s what we did.”
[I][B]On what Auburn does well when they play with the aforementioned sustained effort…[/B]
[/I]“Well they’re capable. They can shoot the ball; they have a couple guys they throw to inside, their little point guard’s quick and was breaking through any of their pressure Florida State was throwing at them. They had a great effort. They got every 50-50 ball. It was a good game to watch. I told Tony (Barbee), look he’s a little undermanned, but he’s doing a great job.”
[I][B]On his relationship with Auburn head coach Tony Barbee as opposed to any of his former players…[/B]
[/I]“Well not all of my former players have worked for me. Tony’s worked for me. I coached Tony when he was 16 years old. When I recruited Tony he committed to UMass before he even visited the campus. He said, ‘I want to play for you. You’re the guy I want to play for.’ There’s been a bunch of those now, but he was the first one because I was not expecting him to say I’m coming. I was just hoping he was visiting. And he said ‘I’m coming.’ I went, ‘What?’ And I did a back flip. I was younger then, my hip wasn’t yet replaced; I did a back flip and I hugged his mom and dad and I made our staff leave immediately before anything would change. Just, ‘Let’s go, hurry up, get your stuff and let’s go.’ And he ends up being the third or fourth leading scorer. He was a four-year starter. Hard-headed kid now. He’s funny, when I used to get on him he’d run down the other side of the floor. If he knew he did something he ran down the other side from me. ‘Tony!’ He’d be down on the other end running. He was smart.”
