Jan. 14, 2009
Vanderbilt 50 – Georgia 40
January 14, 2009 – Memorial Gym
Attendance: 13,972
Kevin Stallings, Vanderbilt Head Coach
Opening Comments:
“I thought our guys played excellent defensively. It was a hard-fought, hard-played game and we did just enough. We played hard defensively, but there are going to be nights like that. Georgia played hard. They had us on the ropes.”
On A.J. Ogilvy being the lone player in double figures:
“On most nights, we’ll help him more. I didn’t think that I would ever come in here and look down at the stat sheet to see that Brad Tinsley had one field goal made and it was a dunk. When you look at what we did defensively, it was huge for us.”
On the Team Maturing:
“They are doing great. They’re fun to coach. If I’m enjoying coaching them, it means that we’ll get better.”
On the Offensive Game Plan During Defensive Games:
“We have to drive it inside. For us, getting it inside is key because we’re getting the ball to A.J. [Ogilvy]. He practiced 30 minutes yesterday and that was the first time he had practiced since last Friday. His timing is off a little bit offensively. He’s a good competitor and we don’t win games without him. Hopefully, his foot won’t get any worse.”
On Vanderbilt’s Defense:
“I didn’t even know I could coach a team that could play this well defensively. There will be some nights when we struggle to score. Nevertheless, if we play defense together, all we need to do is hit a few and hopefully that will be enough.”
Dennis Felton, Georgia Head Coach
On Vanderbilt’s defense:
“That’s not out of the ordinary for what Vanderbilt’s been doing all year. They’re holding their opponents to 35% the entire season, which I’d be surprised if that didn’t make them No. 1 in the country. They’re holding their opponents to only 58 points a game this season. They’re really good at that. One of the main reasons is because they’re huge. They’re just so big. They not only have big post players, but big guards. Their wings are 6’8″, long and athletic. Their point guard is 6’3″ and big and strong. They do a really good job of staying in front of you, making it hard to penetrate the paint. A big part of it was that they had seven blocks.”
On Georgia’s play:
“We did do a good job of getting it to where we wanted it inside. I’m proud of our defensive effort on them. Considering how mightily we struggled to put the ball in the basket, we stayed really, really gritty defensively. It was 44-40 down the stretch, so we gave ourselves a legitimate chance to win even as much as we struggled to put it in the hole.”
On Georgia’s offensive performance:
“I think our offense got a little better as a team today from the standpoint of being more persistent and poised to get the ball in places we want it. We had less young panic possessions than we’ve had sometimes. The turnovers were the most disappointing part of the game for us.”
On Howard Thompkins’ play:
“He’s a freshman. It’s the first time in a long time he’s struggled that much for us in a game. We’ve got to continue to coach him and help him understand that when you’re having a tough night like that, you don’t waste any time getting frustrated. You just keep at it and keep plugging away.”
Vanderbilt Players
A.J. Ogilvy, center
On how it feels being back on the court:
“It felt a lot better being out there and being able to contribute to the team instead of sitting on the sideline.”
On missing practice this week:
“It’s amazing how quickly you lose your rhythm. It definitely helped to draw a couple of fouls early and get the line. I was able to work my way into the game.”
On how his foot feels after the game:
“I’m not feeling too bad right now. It just depends on how I wake up in the morning. It’s a day-to-day basis.”
On having four steals:
“The ball was in the right spot and I was able to get my hand on it a couple of times. I was just trying to make some plays and help the team down the stretch. It worked out I guess.”
Jermaine Beal, guard
On the team’s defensive performance:
“Defense wins championships. Our goal this year is to win championships. We are just taking it practice-by-practice and hopefully we’ll improve tomorrow.”
On the team struggling offensively:
“It’s conference play so everyone’s intensity increases a little bit. At the same time, we had open shots that folks usually make. Shots weren’t falling today, but our defense picked us up.”
Georgia Players
Terrance Woodbury, guard
Opening Statement:
“This game was very frustrating. It was as if the basket had a lid on it. The game felt good for the most part, but the ball just wasn’t going in.”
On Turnovers:
“We did well with our rebounding and were hoping to do the same with turnovers, but we just turned the ball over too much tonight. We just couldn’t score. We were trying to do the spectacular play instead of the smart play.”
On Cutting Into Vanderbilt’s Lead:
“We cut it to six, but in the end we kind of got stuck and turned the ball over way too much. We tried to get inside, but Vanderbilt was guarding us too well inside the paint.”