[an error occurred while processing this directive]
Coach Williams' postgame comments
after Kansas 111, Xavier 70
courtesy of Jack Alden

Related pages

Box score

Game summary

impressions from the game

Season stats

Possession analysis

advertisement
[an error occurred while processing this directive]

""(KU's shaky start) is funny now. It wasn't too funny at the time. But I tried to stay calm with the guys. You didn't see my jumping up and down and calling a crazy timeout and rant and rave. We just had to be more poised, we had to take care of the basketball, and I don't think our guys understood how much pressure was going to come (from Xavier) or with how much fury that press was going to be there. I think it shocked our guys a little bit, but after they got used to it, we were able to go. And we'd talked about that, if they were going to press us and put all that pressure down court, we had to have some openings on our end of the court going to the basket, and I think we really did some nice things at that point.

"(Boschee high man with 16 points out of 111) says a lot of guys are scoring. Kirk Hinrich was really sensational for us tonight. Last night he got in so much foul trouble that he didn't get involved in the game, so I knew his legs were going to be much fresher than Jeff's. And when we made a run after the first five or six minutes of the game, I think Luke made a couple of threes and got us going in there. And Ashante Johnson gave us a big lift in the first half as well.

"I talked to the guys at one of the timeouts, and I said, 'If you don't enjoy this, there's something wrong with you,' because nobody was trying to make a great play, they were just moving the ball and finding a teammate. If you play basketball like that and share the ball as unselfishly as we did tonight, good things are going to happen.

"The first half I wasn't as pleased with our defense, and we talked about that at the half, because they were just able to drive the ball to the basket on us. We got people in support positions much better in the second half. And when you're stopping them and getting the break going and getting easy shots on the other end, everything looks a lot smoother.

"I really like Xavier's club. I think they're a fine, fine basketball team, and are going to be an NCAA tournament team at the end of the year, no question. I'm just glad we were as fortunate to play as well as we did.

"We played better (than last night vs. Georgia). If you want me to feel better, just play better. Last night we did some really dumb things and didn't play defense, just kept reaching and grabbing. Our depth wore Georgia down a little bit, and I think it did some of that tonight, too, but that was an impressive exhibition by our guys in the second half.

"We'll have our hands full tomorrow night with the two (Georgia Tech) seven-footers up front for them. They'll be able to match us size-wise without any problems, and they're going to present some unique challenges for us."

| Share


News | Daily Links | 2015-16 Jayhawks | Historical Stats | The Rock Chalk Board
Tradition | Recruiting News | Fan Zone | Links

Further information: privacy information, about this site, feedback, advertising info

Copyright ©1995-2015 Rock Chalk Zone, All Rights Reserved