Everything From Josh Pastner After Win over Louisville
Georgia Tech played their final home game today and they were going against the last-place Louisville Cardinals. Tech played well on offense and did just enough in the second half to stop a Cardinals comeback and the Yellow Jackets won 83-67.
After the win, head coach Josh Pastner spoke with the media, and here is what he had to say.
Josh Pastner praised his team after earning a win over Louisville
Opening Statement
"I think Louisville has continued to get better, credit to coach Kenny Payne, Coach Payne is a dear friend and they have gotten better. They have some good players and have improved so I want to give credit to Louisville and Coach Payne, he is a really good basketball coach, he is a great human being, but he is also a great basketball coach. You know, they run a lot of good actions and have a lot of good players.
Turning to Georgia Tech, it was a really good win. You know, I told our guys in the locker room that I am proud of our young men. You know, we beat Miami on January 4th and think we are about to turn the corner and got a win there, a top-15 win, and usually the teams I have coached have gotten better in January and we have taken off. As I have said, we are a month late. But there was a lot of negativity in this month of January based on what was said, what was written, how we were playing and there was just a lot of stuff and credit to our guys and I am really proud of our guys because it is really easy when that is happening.
You have two directions when you are on the ropes. You are either going to be in the fetal position or you are going to be on the ropes and claw, gauge, scratch, tackle, whatever you gotta do to get off the ropes and to our guys credit, they punched themselves off the ropes. I think we are playing as well as anyone in the ACC. We don't have any margin for error but we are playing better, we are improved, we finished off these last four home games with wins, had some opportunities on our last three road games o really win the game and we are just playing better and it is just a real testament to our young men, to our staff, the job our assistant coaches have done, they have done an outstanding job.
But to our players and I would tell you what it exemplifies what it means to be a student at Georgia Tech, being a student-athlete at Georgia Tech, it is one of the most rigorous, challenging institutions, not in the United States of America, but in the world and it is one of the elite, high-level educations that you can get and on top of that you are competing in the ACC so you have to be a high level, not only at one of the elite institutions academically but also athletically competing so it is a testament to our young men's character that they show... that is what it is about being at Georgia Tech.
To be at Georgia Tech, you have to have character. You can't be at Georgia Tech without high-level character and our men exemplify what our student body is, that's what it is, they are part of the student body and they show what being about Georgia Tech is, being a Georgia Tech student."
1. On the team being able to withstand runs...
"Like I said, we are a month late, but I think we have gotten better, especially with the way we are moving the ball and playing. 17 Assists on 27 made field goals. Defensively we did a great job on Ellis, who is a good player, he had 15 points on 16 shots, we held them to 23% from the three-point line. I thought Jalon Moore had two huge offensive rebounds late in the game and just.... we made plays when we needed to make plays and just really proud of our young men and just the high-level group of guys to show what they are made of when things were not going well. The practices have been great and the energy has been great, so yeah, I am just really proud of our guys.
I thought the crowd was good and did a good job and there was good energy in the building so just a really good day for the Yellow Jackets."
2. On what was going well for Deebo Coleman, Miles Kelly, and Lance Terry...
"We shot 41% from three, 53% in the first half and I think just the way we are playing with ball movement and Kyle Sturdivant had 10 assists and he might have had 15, we had some great looks for some guys, I mean Lance (Terry) had a big three in the corner where the radio row is, he had a big three in that corner there and had a lot of great looks right in front of our bench but we have gotten better and it is a credit to our assistant coaches, give a lot of credit to those guys, our guys stayed together and I think we are playing as well as anyone in the league, that does not mean you are going to win every game, it means you are playing well, we shot well from three today."
3. On how much Kyle Sturdivant's play had to do with the three-point shooting...
"Today, Kyle was as good as any guard in the United States of America in college basketball the way he played, he was great. His vision, his setups, his distribution, he was outstanding the way he moved the ball. He is a captain and he played like it , he had a 5:1 assist-to-turnover ratio and he hit a big and one as well, he hit big free throws and he was outstanding"
4. On the rotations being thinner...
"You know, I have always preferred to play less, that is kind of how I have been as a head coach, I thought at the start of this year and for a while we were playing a lot of guys and part of it was we just did not have a lot of separation and we were just trying to find solutions and I think things just kind of happen where we find solutions and continue to make adjustments and tweaks and we were trying to find answers and that is a lot of credit to my staff.
And I think that embodies Georgia Tech. We try to embody what Georgia Tech is about. We are solution-oriented."
5. On if Terry fouling out against Pitt had anything to do with him taking Miles Kelly out with four fouls...
"Yes. I usually play guys with fouls, but when Miles got his fourth foul, I took him out just to save him for later and Jalon did a great job for us and Jalon played great, he played great."
6. On being able to hold on to the lead after Louisville cut it to five...
"If you look back at my teams in Memphis, those teams have always gotten better, when we got to January, we have taken off and I thought that was going to happen to us when we beat Miami, we just had a bad month, I don't know of any other way to put it, we just had a tough month. But again, we have gotten better, just a month late than we are used to and we have improved and what I will tell you is I think these guys... we forget they are students at Georgia Tech and they embody the student body at Georgia Tech and they have had good toughness and resolve and in those late game situations, we have found a way to go the other way and extend the lead and hang on and get the wins."
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