Post-Game Quotes
December 05, 2004 | Men's Basketball
Washington 89, Eastern Washington 56
Sunday, Dec. 5, 2004
Bank of America Arena/Seattle, Wash.
POST-GAME QUOTES
WASHINGTON HEAD COACH Lorenzo Romar
General Comments:
"We are happy to come back and get a victory. The loss to Gonzaga just lingers with you, so we are glad to bounce back and play relatively good basketball. We forced them into 30 turnovers, and I think that shows that we put some pressure on them tonight. I thought we probably turned the ball over too much tonight, had too many unforced turnovers. We know that Eastern is a good team but probably not the caliber of Gonzaga. We still wanted to come out tonight and judge this game based solely on how we played. I thought for the most part we did a good job of that."
On the absence of Hakeem Rollins:
"His knee flared up on him yesterday at practice. It has been bothering him, he has a little case of patellar tendinitis. It has been a nagging injury and it flared up yesterday and we didn't know up until game time if he would be able to go. Fortunately we were able to come in and play a relatively good game even though we were missing Hakeem and Brandon Roy."
On the improved play of Hans Gasser:
"Hans did a nice job. He has been working hard in practice and asking questions about how he can improve. He came in today very focused and it was good to see him come in off the bench and get some minutes."
On the play of Mike Jensen:
"Mike just wasn't able to get the ball in the basket. He did come back in the second half and get five rebounds for us though, which was good to see. He just needs to come out against San Diego State and do a better job."
On improved defensive play:
"It was good. It is something that we stress and our guys understood that it was something they were not doing well in the last few games. In spite of a victory over Alabama, we just didn't defend the way we know we are capable of doing. We were pleased."
On rebounding from the loss to Gonzaga:
"I said last week that I'm not one of those coaches that says we're glad we lost because we learned from it. I'm never glad if we lose. But we did lose, and when you lose you need to learn from it. I think Gonzaga did the same thing at our expense, after the tough loss to Illinois on the road. They made some adjustments when they played us. When we look back, we have really done well in our non-conference schedule, and I don't think it was that big of a loss in the grand scheme of things."
EASTERN WASHINGTON COACH MIKE BURNS
On Washington's defense:
"They did a great job of getting out and making it extremely difficult to establish any offense. On the other hand, I think that we had a lack of poise throughout the game that cost us dearly. We told our guys that Washington plays with great emotion and if you can withstand those plays, then there will be some good shots available to you. If you can't withstand their initial wave, they are going to take the ball to the other end of the floor and get some great shots."
On Washington's full court press:
"We had to be handle the ball well because they were putting a lot of pressure on us all the way up the court. Our main goal was to get the ball over halfcourt first. It put a little added pressure on our guards tonight, but we thought that this was something that we had to accomplish."
On playing Washington after a loss to Gonzaga:
"Washington is a very quick team. I think this was bad timing for us to play them because of what they went through at Gonzaga last Wednesday. We knew that they were going to come in here fired up because of that game and we were aware that was going to be the case. We tried to prepare for that and obviously we didn't do a very good job, but they are a very aggressive team."
