California Head Coach Cuonzo Martin
Opening Statement:
“Great game for the Bay Area. Talented team, tough team, they play hard and they play together. I thought both teams played at a high level. You’re talking about two teams that are hovering around 80 points a game, the final score 63-59. We knew they would make shots. They play hard and they play together. It’s a fun game to watch and it was a great game to be apart of.”
On the team performance:
“I said this before we went to Australia that this team won’t be about talent and in most cases talent isn’t enough. You have to be together and you have to be on the same page and have a passion for one another to win games and play at a higher level. We showed that tonight. There’s still plenty of work to do but they showed it in the defense. I think this is the first time all season that we defended. And no disrespect to previous maybe 8 or 9 teams we played, but this is the best team we’ve played as far as both ends of the floor. You have to work on both ends and we showed it defensively. But I don’t mind when the guys meet, as long as they get something accomplished.
On playing Saint Mary’s again:
“I would. Again you’re talking about quality of opponent. You don’t worry about a RPI game but I would. I think we need to especially when you have that type of energy and passion we had tonight.”
California Student-Athletes
Jabari Bird
On his game-winning shot:
“The way Saint Mary’s was playing the game they were constantly sagging in, really trying to stop Tyrone (Wallace) from driving, so I was waiting for my turn, and Tyrone made a great play, got me the ball and I knocked the shot down.
On emotional differences between winning and losing close games:
“I wouldn’t be happy at all if the shot wouldn’t have gone in. I’m thankful the shot went in. Saint Mary’s is a tournament-caliber team and for them to come into our house, come back from 12 points down, that says a lot about how good of a team they are. If there ever was a rematch that would be really fun.”
On adjusting to coming off the bench:
“I just have to stay ready. I get the same amount of minutes. I’m just coming off the bench instead of starting the game. I have to stay ready, engaged in the game and be ready for my shots to come to me. I have to be ready to play defense, rebound and all around play hard.”
Ivan Rabb
On this game’s effect for Bay Area basketball:
“You can see the fan support they (Saint Mary’s) had tonight and both teams really had a bunch of fans rooting for them and people were really excited, wanted to see a good game, and we gave them a thriller tonight. I’ve seen Jabari (Bird) hit shots like he did tonight since I was in seventh, eighth grade, so I know what he’s capable of and I was excited when the ball got to his hands and the shot went through.”
On differences between recent wins:
“We came together, we (the players) had a meeting in which we discussed some things that we’re going wrong, how we wanted the season to end. As you can tell tonight, we came out with more energy, played as a team, took better care of the ball and played better defense. If we want to win games, those are things we have to do.”
On the importance of winning a close game:“I really hand it to the coaching staff. They are putting us in these positions so we are able to win close games. We go through situations in practice similar to the one we were in tonight. We ran that play we practice to perfection tonight. We knew we had a few options to go to, if Jabari would have missed that shot I would have had an inside shot off the rebound so it was all just about winning the game. I don’t get rattled in games like this. I’ve been doing this my whole life. It was fun. This type of game is all I could ask for.”
Saint Mary’s Head Coach Randy Bennett
What was the difference between the first half and second half?
“We changed a couple things offensively. We were a little more patient offensively; I guess with Cal you kind of have to be. A little second penetration against them. We did that better in the second half. We definitely got better shots in the second half.”
Talking about your game plan for the overall game, what was your focus on today?
“The thing I think they are the best at is getting baskets in transition. Brown gets loose in transition and is a much better player. Wallace, much better in transition. Trying to eliminate that and then they are big on the boards and they were in that game big on the offensive board. Rabb is the primary culprit. Those were our two biggies. We thought if we could do that we would be where we want to be and we were close.”
In the last 5 minutes there were quite a few breaks there, is that something you see as the difference maker?
First of all that was a great game. Great crowd, great game, I appreciate Cuonzo scheduling the game. It was great for our program. I think it’s good for theirs too and I do know it is good for Bay Area basketball. It was fun and it went down to the wire and I think I told the team ‘We have to get stops.’ And down to the last possession we didn’t cover that right and Bird made a big shot. He could have missed it but he stuck it and so it got down to that. Someone is going to get a shot and they hit one and we didn’t. You can’t blame it on any one thing but I know good teams make a lot of close games. Great teams don’t play many. And so we had a chance to separate a little bit when we were up five. If we had done a better job offensively maybe we could’ve gotten it done without it coming down to the last shot.”
Saint Mary’s Student-Athletes
Guard, Joe Rahon
What was the atmosphere like in Haas Pavilion?
“It was a great atmosphere. It was a really fun, college basketball game. The crowd was great, they were into it. Our crowd was great. I feel like our fans travel well and we really appreciate the noise they made in an opposing team’s arena. The great atmosphere really added to the game. I think both teams fed off the energy and raised the game to another level.”
If you guys won today, what would it have meant for the team?
“We don’t really think about stuff like that. We just came in and this was the next game on our schedule, playing on the road against a good team. It was a big-time atmosphere. We were really looking forward to it. We felt like we came out kind of flat in the first half. We didn’t play our best basketball. Second half, we turned around but it wasn’t enough. We don’t think of it in terms of what could have been. This was our next game. Unfortunately, we didn’t get it done today. We have to move onto Cal Poly on Monday and that’s going to be a great challenge in and of itself.”
What did you guys learn from this game?
“It was the first real close game we’ve played as a group this year. We made a lot of mistakes down the stretch. We’re definitely going to learn a lot from this. Obviously, we hate to lose this but hopefully this helps us down the road. We’re probably going to play a lot of close games this year, so hopefully this will help us win some of those. We have to take what we can from this and just move on.”
How did this game impact the team?
“It was really good for all of us. We have a lesser-experienced team in terms of college basketball playing time so this was a big road game. It was loud with a lot of fans. All the experience helps - playing games - that’s how you get better. You play more games you get more experience and you gain more confidence. This game will help us when we have to go to places like Gonzaga and BYU or big road games in conference. We won’t be gun shy. We won’t say there are a lot of people or it’s loud. We put this one under our belts and we have to move on.”
