News From The Lockerroom
12/16/2000 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Dec. 16, 2000
EAST LANSING, Mich. -
Michigan State Head Coach Tom Izzo: "Kentucky won the battle, we won the score. I was very pleased with our performance in the second half, especially at the start of the second half after getting out-worked, out-played and out-hustled in every effort stat. I believe that was more due to them than it was to us, I didn't think we were great but you half to take your hat off to them on how hard they played and how well we played."
"At halftime we discussed some things that were not right, I thought in the second half we began checking a little better, rebounded a little better and we ran a lot better and that led to some easy baskets and dunks and that led to some higher percentage shooting to up our twenty percent shooting average from the first half. I also thought they did a good job of mixing their man and zone and we did not handle it real well, I thought Charlie (Bell) got a little tired and Marcus couldn't go at all so that created some problems for us."
Kentucky Head Coach Tubby Smith: "We had a chance there - I thought our kids gave a gallant effort today, and played to win. I thought we played extremely hard and played with a lot of intensity, but in the end, I think Michigan State made those plays that they had to make at the end of the game. I thought the start of the second half was the turning point where they were able to get back momentum. We just didn't come out of the locker room with the same type of intensity that we had going in and I knew that Tom would have his troops fired up and ready to go. So we tried to convey that to our players - to let them know to come out ready to play. That's the part that I was really disappointed in."
"Gerald Fitch was just unbelievable today. He had a great game, I thought especially defensively. He was all over the court, and he actually led us in rebounding. Although we were leading at halftime in rebounding, we got beat on the boards in the second half. We've got to get our big men working harder on the boards. There are certain principles and absolutes that you have to do on defense and we didn't do it in the end."