Postgame Quotes – Marquette 71, UCLA 69
POSTGAME QUOTES
Marquette 71, UCLA 69
Honolulu, Hawaii (at the Allstate Maui Invitational)
Nov. 20, 2023
Mick Cronin, The Michael Price Family UCLA Men’s Head Basketball Coach
on how he evaluates this game.
“Well, we didn’t play near as smart. Two things where our inexperience showed. The [Marquette] run. We got rattled offensively. I told the guys it was coming. They got great players and we got rattled. It took us too long to get our composure back and that’s where you don’t have a veteran guy to calm [the team]. Adem is a great player, he’s still a sophomore. It showed right there. The second thing where it showed was there were too many defensive breakdowns against their penetration. That’s just gameplan stuff, specific stuff you have to execute against a team. Obviously, we showed what we’re about. It’s all irrelevant. It goes down as an ‘L’ and we got to get focused on tomorrow. I told them the things we needed to go over, from here on out. To have to play at noon tomorrow is tough.”
on what he thought the team did right defensively
“I thought we competed. Here’s the thing – when I say we had defensive mistakes. You play smart, solid defensively 80 percent of the time, you don’t got enough. Not against this team, you’ll get exposed. As the competition changes, the margin of error shrinks. That’s why it’s great to play these games. Because you can have a multitude of mistakes. … We gave up two fake handoffs to [Oso] Ighodaro. We went over that for five days. And those are two dunks and we lose by two. Against a team like that, you can’t have the mistakes that we had tonight.”
on UCLA freshman Berke Buyuktuncel’s performance
“He got tired. I had to get him out of there. Look, he’s going to be a big player for us, so might as well throw him in there and get him ready. I thought playing Adem and Aday [Mara] together was going to be tough to do with their speed. We haven’t had enough time to work on our zone [defense] yet, where I’m confident enough to play it, which then you don’t have to matchup with them. We tried it in practice a couple days and I didn’t like what I saw with it, so we have to continue to work on that.”
on UCLA sophomore Will McClendon’s 3-point shooting
“See if there’s another game that’s played this year with one transfer [between both schools]. We believe in recruiting guys that are good guys with character, and they might not end up being your best player, but they help you win games. I happened to do that and the guy got drafted in Jaylen Clark. I’ve been doing that for 20 years. It’s just something I believe in, and Will is one of those guys so I was happy for him, personally. He’s been through a lot. It’s been a traumatic knee injury and it’s just been a tough comeback for him. I was very, very happy for him.”
UCLA freshman guard Sebastian Mack
on what he was doing offensively
“I was just trying to do whatever takes to rally the troops up and do whatever it takes to win. I’m just a competitor. If the team needs me to score zero [points] and get 25 assists, I’m with it. I’m just trying to get the job done.”
UCLA sophomore forward/center Adem Bona
on the team coming out with great intensity
“I think we had a gameplan. Obviously, we didn’t finish the job tonight. We plan to finish the job next time.”
on bouncing back after Marquette’s 17-0 scoring run in the second half
“I would say we got distracted a little bit and we lost sight of the gameplan we had. Towards the end of the game, we got back into the gameplan.”
Marquette 71, UCLA 69
Honolulu, Hawaii (at the Allstate Maui Invitational)
Nov. 20, 2023
Mick Cronin, The Michael Price Family UCLA Men’s Head Basketball Coach
on how he evaluates this game.
“Well, we didn’t play near as smart. Two things where our inexperience showed. The [Marquette] run. We got rattled offensively. I told the guys it was coming. They got great players and we got rattled. It took us too long to get our composure back and that’s where you don’t have a veteran guy to calm [the team]. Adem is a great player, he’s still a sophomore. It showed right there. The second thing where it showed was there were too many defensive breakdowns against their penetration. That’s just gameplan stuff, specific stuff you have to execute against a team. Obviously, we showed what we’re about. It’s all irrelevant. It goes down as an ‘L’ and we got to get focused on tomorrow. I told them the things we needed to go over, from here on out. To have to play at noon tomorrow is tough.”
on what he thought the team did right defensively
“I thought we competed. Here’s the thing – when I say we had defensive mistakes. You play smart, solid defensively 80 percent of the time, you don’t got enough. Not against this team, you’ll get exposed. As the competition changes, the margin of error shrinks. That’s why it’s great to play these games. Because you can have a multitude of mistakes. … We gave up two fake handoffs to [Oso] Ighodaro. We went over that for five days. And those are two dunks and we lose by two. Against a team like that, you can’t have the mistakes that we had tonight.”
on UCLA freshman Berke Buyuktuncel’s performance
“He got tired. I had to get him out of there. Look, he’s going to be a big player for us, so might as well throw him in there and get him ready. I thought playing Adem and Aday [Mara] together was going to be tough to do with their speed. We haven’t had enough time to work on our zone [defense] yet, where I’m confident enough to play it, which then you don’t have to matchup with them. We tried it in practice a couple days and I didn’t like what I saw with it, so we have to continue to work on that.”
on UCLA sophomore Will McClendon’s 3-point shooting
“See if there’s another game that’s played this year with one transfer [between both schools]. We believe in recruiting guys that are good guys with character, and they might not end up being your best player, but they help you win games. I happened to do that and the guy got drafted in Jaylen Clark. I’ve been doing that for 20 years. It’s just something I believe in, and Will is one of those guys so I was happy for him, personally. He’s been through a lot. It’s been a traumatic knee injury and it’s just been a tough comeback for him. I was very, very happy for him.”
UCLA freshman guard Sebastian Mack
on what he was doing offensively
“I was just trying to do whatever takes to rally the troops up and do whatever it takes to win. I’m just a competitor. If the team needs me to score zero [points] and get 25 assists, I’m with it. I’m just trying to get the job done.”
UCLA sophomore forward/center Adem Bona
on the team coming out with great intensity
“I think we had a gameplan. Obviously, we didn’t finish the job tonight. We plan to finish the job next time.”
on bouncing back after Marquette’s 17-0 scoring run in the second half
“I would say we got distracted a little bit and we lost sight of the gameplan we had. Towards the end of the game, we got back into the gameplan.”