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http://www.soonersports.com/sports/m-baskbl/archive/110611aaa.html
Head Coach Lon Kruger Quotes
Opening statement:
“Second exhibition game, as you might expect, a lot of good things. A lot of things I really liked about what was happening, a lot of opportunities to learn from things that happened. Move the ball early, make good plays for each other. As the game went on I think we got a little bit more comfortable defensively, forcing some turnovers. Also on the other end, maybe a little careless with the ball. Certainly turned it over much more than what we’d like to and much more than this club will. A lot of good learning opportunities. I liked the aggressiveness going to the boards, a bunch of rebounds right there. Got out and pushed it in transition and made a lot of good plays for each other. Good second exhibition game and anxious to get back to practice in preparation for Friday.”
On starting two point guards today (Carl Blair and Sam Grooms):
“We’ll have a lot of different starting lineups. Carl (Blair) did a good job in the first game and does a good job in practice and deserved to be in there. It’s going to be a lot of different guys for different reasons starting. We’ll have a lot of different starting lineups.”
On what Steven Pledger’s shooting does for the team:
“It’s huge. Pledger potentially is consistently a very, very good shooter. Not just a good shooter, but a very good shooter. I thought tonight his selection was great. Every one he put up I thought was going in. He’s a guy that I think will consistently shoot it well on the year. For a club to have a guy that can do that night after night after night is really important. It’s tough to do that, so that’s why it’s the responsibility of Pledge to get ready to do that every night because opponents start focusing on you, they start making it tougher, they start doing different things. To be consistent, it’s tough to do. It’s not as easy as it looks.”
On outrebounding Washburn by 20:
“It was good. Washburn is a scrappy ball club, very active. Just the idea of getting more bodies in there, more guys around the boards is good. We’ve got to have the mindset of having all five guys on the floor being aggressive to the boards, and we’ll do that. Drew (Fitzgerald), there’s not even a guy that’s a close second (on the team) in terms of a guy that when the shot goes up he blocks out every time; which is a great fundamental skill to have. What we’ve been talking about is to block out and then go get the ball. He blocks out and other guys go get the ball but we want him to do both.”
On how defeating an established Division II program will prepare them for the regular season:
“It serves as a starting point, is all. The opportunity to watch film; these guys do a good job at watching film and learning from it. We’ll go to practice and on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday we’ll make a lot of progress and we have to do that. We can’t be from game to game; it’s got to be each day in practice getting a little bit better. We’ll have a good opportunity to do that the next three days in practice getting ready for Idaho State.”
Junior Forward Andrew Fitzgerald
On if outrebounding Washburn by 20 is a good size for an undersized OU team:
“Definitely it is, even with my poor performance rebounding tonight. I really thank my teammates for that. That’s something I need to work on personally. I’m looking forward to practice on Tuesday, getting with my coaches and talking to them. But I think this is a big step for us as a team (in terms of) rebounding.”
Junior Center Casey Arent
On getting used to playing at this level:
“The guys are bigger and stronger. It’s all about staying low. Like tonight, I couldn’t even finish a shot. It was pretty bad. But once I work on that, keep putting time in the gym like I have been, I’m sure it will come to me and I should be fine.”
Junior Guard Steven Pledger
On his ability to score a lot of points:
“It’s more of what my teammates do for me. It’s more screens, passes in the right spots and things like that. It’s really based off of what the team is doing; my scoring is off of what the team concept is.”
Washburn Head Coach Bob Chipman
General comment:
“I appreciate the opportunity to play a big-time program like Oklahoma. Coach Kruger and his staff have brought some big-time defense and toughness to the program, and they just really took it at us. We didn’t want to quit. We were trying. But Coach [Kruger] has got his athletes playing so strong and so together. I was so impressed by them. No individual thoughts at all, a lot of team thoughts. Oklahoma looked great to me, from my vantage point. We really struggled against the press. We couldn’t get up the floor way too many times. Obviously, we have a lot to work on. But a lot of that is Oklahoma. We couldn’t come out of the rebound, we couldn’t keep it in front of us a lot of times. But again, a lot of that is that they’re really solid and they’re so tough. Will [McNeill] had a stretch there I thought he battled with them. You know, that was kind of fun to see. But for the most part, we were outmanned and they have a chance to be really good if they keep listening to Coach [Kruger] there.”
On trying to stop OU’s defense and the size difference:
“Yeah, we were really just trying to stay in front of them and we just couldn’t stay in front of them. We held with their perimeter guy…they are just so good at kicking it to the shooter, No. 2, I’ve got to remember his name [Steven Pledger] because he looked really good. They all shot in rhythm. They were getting each other in rhythm. And then we started helping with inside guys, and when they did miss it, they’d clean up on the board. They really disrupted us there. Credit them. They ran us through enough screens to kind of wear us down a little bit, like Will [McNeill] said. We were trying. It wasn’t like we weren’t trying. And again, the starting group I think held their own a little bit better. We subbed, and the new guys had never seen any defense like that or guys like that. We really struggled, you know. But I think it’ll help us. Through the two games, I mean, even this game, we’re going to take bits and pieces of this game and get some confidence from it. We definitely, like Will said, have got things to work on and it’s pretty glaring. The little trap there at half court where they jumped us there, and we struggled with that.
Junior Guard William McNeill
On the difference in pressure between OU and previous opponent UNLV:
“I think the main difference, those guys kind of got up in our passing lanes a lot better than Vegas did. Vegas kind of laid back a little bit, let us run our offense. And today, Oklahoma really didn’t let us do that. They kind of run-jumped us at the beginning; [we] kind of struggled with it. And once a team sees you struggle with something, they’re going to keep on doing it. We’ve got to get better with that going into conference.”
On Washburn’s tough shooting day:
“I’ll probably credit that to their defense, again. Our legs were probably tired ripping and running with those guys. You know, they’re great athletes. But I definitely think it will step forward. You can expect some of that type of pressure in the conference from Missouri Southern and some of those great teams like that. We can go back and watch this film; things that we did do well, things that we didn’t do well.
