California Head Coach Cuonzo Martin

Opening Statement
“Really good first half. I thought we defended really well. We challenged shots and did a sound job defensively. Offensively, we did some good things moving the ball. I thought Tyrone set a good tone on offense for us ”

On Kingsley Okoroh's Performance
“I saw it coming. You can see it in practice. He has size and is tough to shoot over, and you can't get around him. He makes you work to get shots. I'm not surprised by his overall effort. Ten points is good for him.”

On Okoroh Still Playing Aggressively Despite Being In Foul Trouble
“If he's not aggressive, I'll take him back right out. You don't worry about fouls. You can play the game without fouling.”

On Cal's Post PLayers' Defense On Colorado's Josh Scott
“It's not easy to defend a guy like Josh one on one. When you can defend him one on one, you don't have to double the post as much. If you're consistently having to double the post, it could be a long night. I thought we did a good job on him.”

On the Team Defense In Recent Games
“We're getting there. We have to get to 40 minutes. I think we were at about 34 minutes tonight. You can't look at the clock and see you're up by 16, 17, 18. You have to continue to defend every possession. Their 3-pointers were a result of our breakdowns.”

On Different Players Contributing In The First Half
“If we defend, it doesn't matter who is on the floor. We have some guys who are good basketball players and some score better than others. But if we defend at a high level, it doesn't matter who is on the floor. If they are struggling to get a shot off or even a pass every time down the floor, then you've done your job.”

California Players

Junior Jordan Mathews 

On Kingsley Okoroh's performance
“King did a great job tonight. He does it every day in practice. We knew he would carry it over to a game eventually.”

On why his shots started falling in the second half
“I didn't follow through in the first half. My first look, I leaned back and moved my hand to the side. I have to follow through. My teammates made great passes and I was able to knock them down.”

On the team's defense in recent games
“We know we can score. As long as we lock down on the defensive end, it's great for us moving forward.

On getting the first Pac-12 win
“The Pac is tough. It's always good to start off with a win, but we have Utah in less than two days. We have to use this same formula in the next game.

Sophomore Kingsley Okoroh

On his breakout game
“I've always had confidence. Coach Martin always has confidence in me.  Today, he finally said I can do it. I hope to keep doing it.

On whether Coach Martin told him to keep being aggressive despite foul trouble
“He didn't tell me, but that's what you have to. You have to keep playing.”

Colorado Head Coach Tad Boyle

On The Game
“I knew coming into this game that this was going to be a game about toughness. We tried to let our guys know it was going to be like a Colorado State game, that environment that has a lot of emotion. We got beat in every phase of the game, especially the rebounding phase, and we weren't very good offensively or defensively. We gave up 12 layups and only had six assists, and when the ball sticks like that in our offense we are just not very good. Cal is a good team, and they deserved to win this game. We had trouble scoring against their size, and while it was something we tried to work on, we don't have seven-foot guys to practice against.”

On Kingsley Okoroh
“He scored double figures for the first time tonight against the Buffs, and that really describes our defensive play tonight. It wasn't only on our bigs, but failures in our rotations and offensive rebounds. We made their (Cal)'s bigs look better than they played all year.”

On Jordan Mathews
“We did a good job in the first half, and we were there contesting shots. But when you let a shooter like him get one shot going, he starts making tougher ones. We knew the scouting report going in, and we didn't do a good job executing our game plan.”