Dec. 20, 2008

Recap |  Final Stats |  Notes

Cleveland State Head Coach Gary Waters:
"I thought we went out and had to play ourselves and take care of business and defend and play. I thought we did that and did better offensively in the second half. The thing is, we get a lot of open shots and have to knock them down. Every game, we have a lot of assists on our baskets. We are starting to understand that we have to value the basketball and are doing a much better job of that."

"I look at their effort. If they don't bring effort, that means they are looking ahead. If they aren't giving me effort, then they aren't going to play. It's also about execution and we had to execute on offense and defense."

"Practice is what makes you play well in the game and if you don't practice hard, you don't play well in the game. I try to make our practices so hard that our games are a formality. And they go at it hard. I have two groups and they play hard. I tell them that their playing time in the game depends on how they practice."

"Tre has to get comfortable out there and he wasn't afraid to shoot the ball which was good to see. I wasn't afraid of him missing shots because he hadn't played in a long time. I never take a player out for making or missing a shot. If it's a bad shot, I am going to talk to them about it. I take them out for defensive issues."

"George is paramount. In the early part of the year when we weren't rebounding well, we didn't have George on the list. He is averaging five or six now and has brought us up a level on the glass. If we can continue to do that, we will be right there rebounding wise. We were more physically poweful last year with J'Nathan at the three and this year, we are a lot quicker with him at the four."

"You always want to be better than you are. I felt that we should have won the Kansas State and Butler games if we did the things we needed to do. I felt we would come out of the preseason with maybe one more win, but I wanted to come out of preseason on a run so we would be ready for league play."

"This program is moving in a direction where we are adding youth to the program and that helps. I am trying to get the younger players to play with the veterans and it's time to start doing that more. Jeremy has been playing well and is starting to play well with the veterans.

"It's (Kent State) is another game. I don't look at as the same program that I looked at it even two years ago. There are different players and people there and I just look at it as another game."

"The Kent State game is big for us because we are on a track and we don't want to get off track as we get ready for league play. This is going to be a tough league this year with a lot of tough teams and every game is going to mean something. Even this game, we are playing to help us in our league. We have our work cut out against them and have to play well on both ends of the court."

Cleveland State's J'Nathan Bullock:
"I am sticking with the team concept. Teammates are finding me and getting me the ball."

"Everybody has to enjoy the game and we wanted to cheer the bench on. They go hard at us in practice and we wanted them to produce on the floor."

"When your head coach is Gary Waters, we practice hard for any game. So it wasn't about who we were playing, it was about playing the game hard. We looked at today as preparation for Kent State."

Cleveland State's George Tandy:
One of the things we stress in rebounding and we have to go get the ball. That's how we are going to win games and I feel that I have to step up and get more rebounds. The more rebounds we get, the more possessions we can get."