Post-Game Quotes: Hillsdale

Michigan State Head Coach Tom Izzo

Opening Statement …
Well, we had very good first half, I thought we did a lot of good things. Second half wasn't as good, but, if you watched that team, they weren't as good as us, they weren't as big as us, we hurt them in some areas. As far as moving the ball and moving bodies, even the officials and my assistant said, "Man." We had our work cut out for getting around screens, those freshmen weren't ready for, and a couple of them got lost to say the least. I was disappointed in that.

I was disappointed in our free throw shooting, and we've been shooting the daylights out of it. A.J. has been 90% every day and he missed them, Coop, he tends to Shaq it, sorry Shaq, if that goes public, I don't want to insult the guy, I love him; but he played his tail off. I mean he played as good as anyone played yet when you go 1-4 from the free throw line it's not acceptable. The real thing that bothered me was the rebounding. They had 17 offensive rebounds on 68 shots. We did not rebound very well, I was disappointed in Malik's rebounding the ball, I was disappointed in Coop's rebounding, Mady didn't rebound as good, he had six. Our wings did not rebound very good, Jaden was sneaking out of there, Cohen, I thought had snuck out of there, and Booker must rebound better. His lack of strength reared its ugly head, but we'll get through that cause if it doesn't get better by the next game, we'll get killed and I mean that. They're (Tennessee) very physical, very good, very well coached, a lot bigger, and they have as many or more players; Tennessee has great depth.

This was a great game in some ways because we played a team who moves the ball well, and I feel we moved the ball well. I thought the second half we took a lot of bad shots, even that shot Steven (Izzo) took, he lost some inheritance money on that one. I was happy and proud, and our players were that he made both of his free throws. He got the game ball, but other than that, we got some work to do. There were some positives, 27 assists on 33 field goals is a real positive. 11 turnovers, Jeremy had four, kind of sloppy, but when you're playing that many people for the first time there's not a real good feel for one another. It was good, it was good in a lot of ways, and I thought they missed some shots they could have hit but I thought they were well coached and moved the ball well.

On his line change approach with the players …
I won't do that, there'll be no hockey game here, I'll leave that for my man over there (MSU hockey coach Adam Nightingale). We just wanted to get everybody in. They did play together, there was some excitement and nervousness. We're not going to be able to do that on a regular basis, I might do it in the exhibition game again, it gives me a chance to give everyone similar minutes in which we did we all did a decent job at that it was from 15 to 21 minutes. By giving everybody a chance, Davis (Smith) got to play some, Steven (Izzo) and Nick (Sanders) got to play because we know, that isn't going to happen often.

On early full court pressure …
Tyson (Walker) is unbelievable and that's against anybody. I was a little disappointed in A.J. (Hoggard), I think he can do a better job than he did. It was funny, I sat the freshmen down for a walk through, then we had free throw shooting which our team shot the highest all year, we were almost 90% as a team. I talked to the four freshmen about different things, and one was they were all cool and casual but tomorrow, you'll be nervous as hell when you take the floor and your wind will probably go. Jeremy was dying and he's been in pretty good shape, Booker was dying going through the warmups. Those are all normal and so, we're going have to rotate our guys, we're going have to pressure a little bit more. We didn't do it as well in the second half, just something we got to keep working on and we'll get better at it, once we get a real rotation down. They were playing in a lineup sometimes with five guards and that created problems for us on that pressure because Booker had to push up the court because his man had the ball half the time. So those are things we won't have to deal with most of the time.

On the team's leadership …
A.J., I thought did a pretty good job in that area, believe it or not, I had each assistant coach write up four things that they wanted their guys to do. One of them on Tyson was to lead a little bit better and I think he did a very good job at that. So, we got a little bit more, Jaden (Akins) got a little bit better, Malik got to continue to communicate better. Communication is still a big part of this whole thing and we had so many different guys playing, which won't always be the case, we'll play more than normal but we're not going to play 12 to 13 guys. As we go hopefully, we can do a better job and they do a better job when they get comfortable on who they're playing with.

On Cooper's performance and how he has grown …
I love Carson (Cooper), he played as hard as anybody, he rebounded as well as anybody, led us in rebounding, led us in points, led us in free throw misses, 2-3 isn't bad. You can see how much he has improved. Mady (Sissoko) as crazy as it sounded went 5-5 from the line and got six boards and only played 17 minutes so that's pretty good stats. We think we got to get more out of Malik, that's normal, Cooper was the star inside tonight, I thought Tre Holloman played really well, we had some guys who played really well and he was one of them.

On Jeremy's development …
Jeremy's problem is he got tired tonight, I mean he got very tired during the first half. Only knowing him a little bit, like they said with Mateen (Cleaves), he would get so jacked for games he would get like that early and Jeremy was so excited to play. Eight assists is really good, the four turnovers, there were some sloppy ones and that was one of the things on his list, he hasn't done that in practice much. The first time in front of people, its different and that team ran so many things with motion. It was hard to scout that team and they did it very well, as good as anyone would play; not saying the players are the same, but as far as the motion, I give them a lot of credit. Jeremy got tired chasing, pushing, and got some sloppy turnovers but he knows it and he'll do better.

On how to learn from the sloppy play with Tennessee coming in …
We're going to watch a ton of film because I think there's a ton of things we got from them. We played Tennessee last year, most of our veterans know what they're like. They'll climb into us like how we climb into them a little. We got a lot of work to do in four days but, that's the beauty of it, that's the reason you do it. It's going to be so good. I still like playing one team where there are fans and having one team were there normally wouldn't be. This even works out better for us. They'll come in here and it will be a hell of a game and I hope we play well enough. Those four freshmen are playing, they got some freshman who isn't playing as much because they got even more depth and it'll be interesting to see how that works out. We'll have to improve a lot on the boards, we'll have to improve a lot on some sloppy turnovers if we're going to beat a team like that.

On the team's depth, and what an ideal number is for the team's rotation …
Do you want me to list them to you guys or the fans? Because remember last year, you guys were, where we didn't have enough, now we're worried we have too many. I love you guys because then it's always a little controversial. What's the best number? You know, I'm hoping that we play nine, 10 guys. I really am, because I'm hoping that we do what you just said earlier, that you put some pressure on with the guards. But that one year, I think with (Tim) Bograkos playing 10 minutes a game, I think we played 11 guys. If we wear ourselves down by playing hard and Tyson is in the best shape of anybody and he can just go, he's like an ever-ready bunny. Jaden's in pretty good shape too. The rest of the guys, I think you don't realize tonight, they're not in the condition that they need to be too and it's fine because it's the middle of October and we've got a long year ahead of us. There's a lot of coaches that will tell you that eight's the magic number. You know, we had eight last year and it wasn't so good because we had those injuries and we were down to eight that we played so much and so I think we're in good shape where we are and there were some guys that didn't play good enough to play more minutes and it's going to take a little more time.

On what he saw from Jeremy Fears Jr. …
I love Jeremy. I've probably been as complimentary of Jeremy as anybody on our team but tonight he struggled a little bit which is still normal. I mean he didn't even faze me a bit because I knew while he was struggling a little bit, he still looked damn good to me. I mean, he still did things that I see that are going to make him a great, great guard. But he's just trying to figure it out too and he's playing with so many different guys and that's going to be a little bit of a challenge for these first couple weeks ahead of us. I love Jeremy and I love Book (Xavier Booker) and I mean Book came in, hits the three, I think it didn't matter, he just knocked it down and he did some good things, had a couple blocks, that was good. Physically, when they started banging him around under there, all of a sudden, his size, he played smaller than he actually was. He's got to play bigger than he actually is because he's got an incredible vertical jump too. He's just got to see it. It's not Coen (Carr). I can't believe Coen missed that dunk, you guys should write about that, that's ridiculous.

On if the starting lineup tonight is his planned lineup …
You know, I don't know what our lineup is going to look like. This looks like the best lineup to me right now because Mady and Coop are going to share some time there and we'll work those other guys in. But as far as starters, it's my veterans, it's the guys that have been through wars, they've been through losses. They're illegal aliens because they actually failed and didn't leave, so it's really cool that they're still around and they've been through it all and I think that's really going to help us in the long run. But it's hard to say, you know, a lineup might change. I told them in one huddle, 'it's not last year, it's not the year before,' I mean I'm sick of finishing before April, so guys are going to have to play and that's up to them, not up to me.

On Mady Sissoko …
Yeah, that's what I told you man, offensive-dynamo Mady. He made a nice jump shot too. Mady has been really, really good on ball screen defense. Believe it or not, he did not do as good of a job on that tonight, but he knew it too and I absolutely love when a guy says, Jeremy a freshman, says, 'my fault on that coach, that wasn't Jaden's, I didn't switch.' God. Absolutely wanted to kiss the guy. That was great. I think Mady's the same thing, a couple of step-ups. He is better offensively and Coop is better finishing than he was last year and it's a shame because he's working on those free throws guys. Now it's going to triple in the next couple days as I told him tonight, but he's working on them.

On Mady's free throw percentage being five times as high as A.J.'s …
I'll tell A.J. that tomorrow, that'll tick him off. But, no, I can't imagine that. In fairness to A.J., honest to God, last night he shot 93, you know we track them for 15 minutes and I think he was like 94 of 102. He shot the daylights out of it so I'm not worried about A.J. this year as far as that goes. He was good, I mean he was fun to coach, he was easy to coach and yet he knows he's got to play better in some areas, but no problems with anybody right now.

On what he said to Coen when he missed the dunk …
I had a problem with that! 'What the hell are you doing? You're embarrassing yourself,' I said, 'your family and everybody else.' No, I'm just kidding, I just said, 'what happened?' and he goes 'I think I was up too high.' I said, 'Well, lower it down a little,' and he said, 'How do I do that?' Good coach didn't have a good answer for him to be honest with you. I just said, 'Don't miss the next one.' You can see where he plays with some energy. He's not free-wheeling yet because I think he just doesn't know everything he's got to do. But him and Booker, all those freshmen, and Normand's been hurt, but he did O.K. He's got a ways to go yet but he was hurt and he sprained his ankle bad a couple days ago so I didn't even know if he was going to play to be honest.

On Tre Holloman and his confidence level …
I can't believe, I'm glad you brought it up. Tre Holloman might've been the most steady. He guarded, he was four-for-five, one-for-two from the three, missed a free throw, he's a great free throw shooter. He only had one rebound, but four assists, one turnover in 20 minutes and he played both positions, which was really cool. If you asked me who our most improved player was in the year, he would be right up there. Sounds like I'm pleased with too many people, so I better go watch the film and get mad at some guys or I'll be getting soft myself. He has done a really good job and he did a really good job tonight.

On Coen Carr and where he's at defensively …
I don't he's bad defensively, but sometimes we're playing him at the three, sometimes at the four. He's the one guy we're moving around a little bit, especially with Jaxon (Kohler) out and that's hard to do as freshman, to try to learn two positions especially when he's switching on one and he's not on the other and I think all-in-all he did a pretty damn-good job considering that. Shooting's got to keep improving, which it will, but if he can defend and he can rebound, and that was the only area I thought – you know he got one offensive rebound and only two defensive rebounds, three rebounds. Not bad in 15 minutes, but not what he's capable of. What we really look at is how many times is he able to go and a lot of times he just got caught on the perimeter like people do. Jaden's still doing that, although Jaden's starting now, to do a better job with going and I think what did he end up with? Six boards but no offensive. But he's getting there and we'll get there, but I think we've got some good combinations of guys that can rotate in and what will the minutes end up? Probably not going to be 50-50, but probably not going to be 90-10 either.

Closing Statement …
Well, I promised you Sunday will be a lot different, and I don't say that insultingly to Hillsdale because I thought they did a great job of moving the ball, I just think they were out-manned, but Sunday they won't be out-manned. I think Rick's a hell of a coach. It's going to be fun for him and I. It was good last year, it'll be good for Maui. I think it's going to be great for our fans, I mean, how many times do we have two top-5 teams playing in here, doesn't happen all the time so I'm still hoping because it wasn't on the season ticket package. I hope it's packed. I know it's close but that will be big too. We've got to promote that a little bit I guess, but I'm looking forward to it and I'll see you all Sunday at 3:30.

Sophomore center Carson Cooper

On adjusting to the first preseason game…
It was a big adjustment coming in. It was a big difference from last year, but I thought it felt like practice all over again. Basketball instincts took over, and I just played basketball.

On filling sophomore forward Jaxon Kohler's void…
Every day I am trying to prove to myself and to the coaches that I belong in this lineup. This opportunity opened minutes up, but it also opened my eyes that I need to be more competitive everyday because we are one less big in the rotation. The rotation will be a little tighter than it was last year.

On the impact from the freshmen…
Coming in as a freshman, you don't really know what to expect. Compared to the Green and White scrimmage, it is a whole different thing. The game is just really fast, even though it is an exhibition game. Especially early in your freshmen year coming in, it is going to be fast. I think all the guys did really well. I feel lucky to have them as my teammates.

Freshman guard Jeremy Fears Jr.

On Hillsdale's offensive motion and if it was hard to defend...
It was different and unique. They moved the ball a lot and played great team ball together, so it's something we have to talk and communicate all the time. It was good though.

On the chemistry with the other freshmen…
In practice we mix and match groups, so just playing together and switching teams. Overall, with everybody I think we have chemistry.

On the college game atmosphere…
We finally get to play another team other than each other in practice every day. First college game atmosphere was great. Overall, I learned a lot. It's a different speed, way different than high school, so it was a big adjustment. Still adjusting right now.

On Hillsdale's motion offense…
It was definitely different and unique. They moved the ball a lot, they played great team ball together, so it was definitely something that we had to make sure we talked and communicated through the whole time.

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Players Mentioned

Xavier Booker

Coen Carr

Carson Cooper

Jeremy Fears Jr.

Tre Holloman

Jaxon Kohler

Mady Sissoko

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