Post-Game Quotes
2/4/2004 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Feb. 4, 2004
Iowa vs. Michigan State
Feb. 4, 2004
Coaches' Quotes
Iowa Coach Steve Alford "Obviously, we ran into a very good basketball team playing very well. I thought Michigan State played a very good basketball game. They were hard to guard, made a lot of shots and had a lot of different guys step up and make shots for them. We didn't shoot a particularly high percentage. I thought we did enough good things offensively; we just couldn't get enough stops. You've got to give their offense a lot of credit, they've been clicking and they continued that tonight. We've got to learn from this, get better and try to make a split on this road trip this week and finish that at Indiana."
On the end of the first half "Obviously were not deep and we had Pierre (Pierce) out of the game. We are a little bit different team when Pierre is out on the floor. He's the one guy we've got that can create and when things break down, we've still got an offense out there. Having him in foul trouble in the first half really hurt us...I though (Jason) Andreas came in and gave them a big lift. They had guys come off their bench and really give them a big lift and he was one of them."
Michigan State Head Coach Tom Izzo "Let me say this first - I have an appreciation for what Steve (Alford) is going through with a depleted roster and I thought his guys competed really hard. Other than that one stretch in do a better job of that, we are not going to reach the goals that we have set. We had talked about transition defense and Iowa is one of the best running teams there is - but the first half when we got a little lead, I was pleased with our offense. But to tell you the truth, I was a little disappointed in the things we went into the game plan with. If we don't I thought we were very average in that area."
"Jeff Horner is as good a point guard as there is in this league. Stopping dribble penetration was ridiculous. They got to the basket or we fouled them. They deserve credit for that and we deserve blame for that. We start the game and let them get three offensive rebounds - that was disappointing. On the other hand, Kelvin Torbert is continuing to play better and better, not only on the offensive end but on the defensive end as well. Paul Davis did a very, very good job of letting the offense come to him. But if we don't start checking better, we're not going to get anywhere you don't have to worry about what you're doing later on anymore. Something has got to change in that area."
