Post-Game Quotes: Penn State

Michigan State Head Coach Tom Izzo

Opening Statement…
I'm really disappointed in maybe my defensive performance. I am taking full responsibility for that because I thought after that game, we'd given up 40 points in the last two games and we did not learn much from it. We talked about it; we talked about it as a staff, we talked about it with our players, we talked about talking to the officials, we talked about the way things are, and I didn't get much carry over tonight. That means that I did not do a very good job getting through to my guys. So, I can promise you that I am going to figure out a way to get through to them. On a positive side, 24 assists on 32 baskets is amazing, 20 out of 24 free throws, we got there a lot and made free throws. Ten turnovers was good, but we had three at halftime and we had four or five in a row when we were up 10. That happened at Northwestern. That means we cannot handle success right now. So, quit saying where we are. We are not anywhere yet. We are a good basketball team that has a long, long, long, long way to go to get better. Frankie Fidler had a hell of a game. Other than that, I thought we were very pedestrian-like. We took bad shots, the wrong guys were taking shots, we need to get other guys taking some shots. I'll answer any question you have. Not many times this year have I been disappointed in our defensive performance but tonight I am. I am very disappointed.

On what he saw from Frankie Fidler tonight…
Moments in your world, it happens once. Moments in my world is 'let's do it five, six, seven times' and then I'll be ready to say Frankie did a really good job. A really good job. Let's not ruin him. Let's just say he did a good job, he's going to get better, and he's going to work on it. He played the floor a lot tonight, and I think that helped. The confidence thing, boom we have it, and boom its gone because we didn't guard anybody tonight. Defensively we have issues with different guys, but I was very proud and happy for Frankie. I was happy that the players were really happy for Frankie. More than scoring the ball, I thought his biggest key was that he got seven rebounds and some of those were putbacks, which means he played aggressively. But, like I said, we have a long ways to go. Right now, from what I saw the last two times I watched Illinois, we have the Celtics or the Lakers coming in here, so we have a lot of work to do in the next three or four days. I am going to try to work and not read.

On how much value goes into rankings…
I said it at the beginning of the year, I said it in the middle of the year, and I'll say it again: zero. I don't think anybody knows how good anybody is still. We are still seeing some of the most bizarre games, bizarre turnarounds. Illinois goes to Indiana in maybe the worst loss in the history of the arena. I'm not resting on anything; I'm not sleeping good on anything. I love my team. I love my guys. Tonight, they did not play as good as they can play, we did not coach as well as we can. We need to do both of those things better in the next three days because we need to get ready for Illinois because they are good.

On Penn State making more free throws in the second half…
I'd like to complain about the officials and I'm sure Mike (Rhoades) would, too. I'm not going to because I would have to be complaining about something. I'd have to say they weren't very good, but we were a lot worse so I'm not going to do that. I thought there were a few blocks. I thought it went from so physical at the beginning to not at the end. But they drove the ball, we told them they were going to, and we talked about getting downhill. We were up seven or eight and we took a timeout, talked about switching and we don't switch. Now I learned a lot in the last couple weeks about saying what about players and what about coaches. If a player doesn't do that, and I have good human beings and good guys, then I did a poor job in the timeout to get that through to them. That was a simple switch, and you can bet that I will never be harder on a player than I will be on myself tonight. Which will filter into the group and see if we cannot panic. That's three games in a row where teams have scored over 40 in the second half. That is a problem. Don't worry about the ranking, don't worry about where we are, worry about what we have to get better at, and let it all come out in the wash.

On the technical foul on Jeremy Fears Jr….
Let me tell you something. I talked to him about this at Northwestern. I talked to him before.  I love these guys. (Mateen) Cleaves stuck up for his guys. Everybody would have stuck up.  I love guys. I stuck up for him. I'm the only guy getting technical.  If some things weren't said, I warned him before. It cost us a foul, that put him on a bench later on, when he got his fourth. You just can't do it.  And I'm telling you now, thanks to our screwed up society, If you say one word now, I mean officials are being consistent with this, they're giving technicals all over. I warn my guys about that.  I'm going to do a better job tomorrow warning them.

On the points off turnovers…
If we would play good enough offensively, even though that zone gave us a little bit of trouble, I thought early we offensive rebounded the ball and Jaxon (Kohler) struggled a little bit. I thought our bigs struggled tonight, that big (Penn State's) played as good as I've seen a big play lately. He played really well.   I didn't do a good enough job on that. I'll do a better job on that. We did enough offensively. It was just defensive we didn't do enough.  We either fouled or we gave up wide open shots. The fouls, I don't know 25 feet because we had 24 and I guess it was an ugly game to watch. It seems like there were a lot of fouls.

On the performances of seniors Jaden Akins and Frankie Fidler…
Jaden has been playing really well. I thought tonight we get up and then we kind of take some question mark shots. I wanna get more shots up, it's unbelievable that we got 68 shots up. That's got to be a high for the year. So we got 68 shots up, but 62 of them got to be really good shots. I thought we took some poor shots, but Jaden hit that big three and Frankie, I think the biggest shot he might have made was the tip half dunk on the offensive rebound. That's what seniors are supposed to do and they did it. It's a shame that some of that stuff is being overshadowed by the way we didn't guard anybody.   Of course I'm smart enough to know one thing, you still got to be able to defend, rebound, and run. And when we didn't defend well, we rebounded okay, not great. And we didn't run very well. Fast break points 20 to 14, I thought they ran better than we did. I thought they did a better job running than we did, to be honest with you. And Mike (Rhoades) is a hell of a coach, and he did a hell of a job. I thought his kids were tough. Maybe there was some fouls called, maybe they were good, maybe they were bad. But it was physical as hell early.  I think he said we're not going into Michigan State and let them push us around. Hell of a job by him.  Hell of a job. They deserve a lot of credit for that.

On not finishing games strong …
I think it's a problem. I think it's maybe feeling good about yourself.  Maybe the halftime's gotta get uglier. I don't know. But that is a big difference. That is as big a difference as I've ever heard of. And so that is what disappoints me. I'm happy we won, but when we won a national championship we got beat by Wright State.  We had one point wins at Penn State when they weren't very good. We had overtime wins. I get it, I'm not stupid.  I just don't want it. I don't want that anymore. Be different guys, we're gonna be different.  We gotta figure out how to focus in, we got enough players to do it and we got to do a better job. And that's where I'm working on tonight.

Senior Forward Frankie Fidler

On playing the 4 position and what he liked about his game…
I played the 4 a lot tonight. I talked with the coaching staff coming into the game and they thought I would have a good matchup offensively and defensively. That was kind of the game plan going in. I think the ball just bounced my way tonight, so it does feel good.

One his wild three pointer that went in…
I think I put my hand in my face and pointed to the sky. It felt great. The other three did not go in, but to see one go in feels great.

On how it felt having his performance mean a lot in a close game like tonight…
It was great. I think it was a rough game defensively for us. They (Penn State) shot it really well in the second half. And being able to will us to a win tonight, it took everyone, but its better to leave tonight with a win than a loss.

On being in the right place at the right time and having the opportunity to make plays…
Some other games, I felt i was in the wrong place at the wrong time, but tonight I felt it was my night and the ball was just bouncing toward me.

On making more of an effort to get to the basket…
I have always had the same mindset of trying to get to the rim. I shot like top 10 last year in free throws so it has always been my type of game. I think that is a good thing about me, when my shot is not going in, I can try to get to the rim.

On it being more about strength or finesse…
Definitely strength. You gotta want to get to the basket.

On how his performance will lead into Sunday's game against Illinois…
I think I just want to build on the good moments I have had in the last five or so games. And I think Sunday definitely boosted my confidence a bit. Practice has been good and working out more has been good.

Sophomore Forward Coen Carr
On missing dunk opportunities…
Yea they definitely were looking to try and stop me from getting up in there (at the rim). I feel like one of them should have been a foul. And the very first one I feel like was a shooting foul, but they called it on the floor. I got it back and got fouled again and made my two free-throws.

On why the team has been struggling in the second half…
We just gotta focus. I feel we lose focus a little bit. Everybody, including me. I would not say we let off, we just don't make the same winning plays we did to get that lead.

On Izzo emphasizing defense…
He definitely emphasizes it. But we already knew that, we knew how we needed to play so we knew he was gonna say that. We gotta get ready for Sunday. Illinois is a great team and we just gotta get ready for that.

Redshirt Freshman Guard Jeremey Fears Jr.:
On sitting out the last three minutes…
I was just encouraging my teammates, waiting for a moment if he would put me back in, or try to win a game, but you know Tre (Holloman), Jase (Richardson), and Jaden (Akins), they took care of business and they got the win, that's the most important thing.

On Coach's message after the game…
That we gave up a lot of points and that we've got to be better. We have a big game coming up on Sunday. We've got to prepare and make sure we're mentally and physically there. We've just got to be better, don't relax, don't be satisfied, we've got a long way to go.

Junior Guard Tre Holloman
On the foul calls and physical play…
We were just trying to play hard in defense. Give them credit though, they drew some fouls on us and they've got some tough, tough guards. (Ace) Baldwin's tough, he's a tough guard, (NIck) Kern is good, (D'Marco) Dunn played great tonight, so shout out to them. We just have to be better and play without fouling.

On the 3-point shot attempts…
I think they were giving us some threes, but I think we were settled into it for sure. Next time I think we just need to play inside out.

Senior Guard Jaden Akins
On the younger plays as the season gets into the Big Ten season…
As the season continues to go on, the games are going to get bigger and bigger, you've just got to be more focused and ready to go. I'm going to do my best to tell everybody what to expect going through it, but it's that time of the year.

On winning 10 in a row and Coach not being happy…
I am very used to it, I know what type of coach he is and I know he's been to the mountaintop before, so whatever he feels or whatever he's thinking, you have to respect it because he's done it at the highest level. I'm just trusting him.

Penn State Head Coach Mike Rhoades

Opening statement…
Intense road game in the Big Ten, credit to Coach Izzo and Michigan State they have a great team, and they made more plays than us, especially down the stretch to find a way to win it. I loved our guy's effort, and I loved our approach today. We made a run there in the second half to get back in it, and be close and have contact, just had some tough turnovers late that really hurt us. It really hurt us, and we needed to get a couple of rebounds. Some of those turnovers we couldn't defend, and their free points, I thought that was a big difference in the game.

On Penn State play in the second half…
No, I just thought we got tougher. I thought we got tougher. We didn't care about … we just got tougher. So no excuses, not good enough to win a Big Ten road game. You got to make adjustments when you're playing on the road, and I thought we were just a little bit tougher with getting shots, moving the ball, and being more physical around the rim. I thought in the second half we settled down on the defensive end a little bit and got some consecutive stops, which I thought was huge. When we made that run, we got back in the contact. I thought we got stops, and we rebounded better. We just didn't rebound it enough to win the game.

On implementing the zone defense and Ace Baldwin Jr performance coming off injury….
Yeah, well number one, Ace is a warrior. He's just a warrior and fell the one time hard, but he's just a warrior. We were asking him to do a lot, but that's what senior leaders do, and I'm proud of his effort and approach. Yeah, we've been working on it, a little bit of keeping our guys inside so we could rebound better out of it and keeping Yanic (Konan Niderhauser) in front of the rim. Getting people pushing people out a little bit, I thought we got them standing a little bit because we just stored our zone a little different than other zones. It's a little different. Sometimes it's a little bit of a match, sometimes it's not. So, I thought that got them standing a little bit, and not getting downhill as quick, and that also takes their ball screen offense out of play. So yeah, It was a good change up. We got to continue to get better at it, sometimes you got to find different things, they help your team win. I was proud of the guys trying to execute it the way they did.

On Frankie Fidler's performance……
We didn't put a body him. I thought the one time he caught it in the high post, I think it was a four-point game, and we over cut him, and he spun back and scored. There's another time he got downhill, and we over cut him again. So, he has a good feel offensively, as you guys know, and a good player I've seen him play for a few years now. He's probably the one guy against the zone he's got a good feel, and you saw that today.

On preparing for a deep team like Michigan State……
Well, it's my second year in the Big Ten, there's lots of good players on every team. Michigan State has a lot of really good ones on their team. So, you have great respect for your opponent, and you have a scouting report, right? All coaches have secret meetings to get ready. Some scouting reports are eight or nine guys, some are 10 or 11, Michigan State is a 10 or 11. You play the tendencies, and you do the analytics, but as you watch tape, this guy you run them off the three, this guy you got to keep in front of ball screen, everybody has it. And that's the part that we call 'KYP,' know your personnel. 'So that you're going to guard against these two or three guys, this is what they do the most.' It's the stats of it all, the analytics and the tape that you watch. Some only have eight or nine, some 10 or 11, Michigan State has a little bit more. You have to dig into it, and we got to continue to get better at it because we overran some guys that aren't shooters, and we lost some guys on the back side that were shooters. So, it's something we just continue to improve at. But Michigan State has a lot of really good players.

On his teams shooting in the second half…...
It's amazing, we really got downhill, and we drew a lot of fouls … I'm pausing on purpose. So, we got to the foul line, and we got downhill. We had 20 assists on 28 baskets. We played the right way today. Were really good when we get to the free throw line because we drive it really hard and all year long, we shoot a lot of free throws. And then when we share it and we get inside outside threes, we had 20 assists on 28 made baskets and that means we were playing the right way. I just thought down the stretch we had a couple of unforced turnovers that led to baskets, that really hurt us. But it's amazing, when you drive it and you get good shots, and you get to the free throws line, you can score some points there. Scoring 49 in twenty minutes on Michigan State, means those guys are playing the right way. I'm proud of them.

Players Mentioned

Jaden Akins

Coen Carr

Frankie Fidler

Tre Holloman

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