What Darian DeVries Said After Indiana Basketball's 84-66 Win at Maryland

COLLEGE PARK, Md. — Indiana basketball coach Darian DeVries spoke to reporters following the Hoosiers' 84-66 win over Maryland on Wednesday night inside the Xfinity Center in College Park.

Here's what DeVries said during his four-minute press conference.

Q. Is there a hurdle, like trying to win on the road? Is there like a hurdle you just kind of have to clear?

DDV: Yeah, I don't know if it's a hurdle, but you gotta do it, right? And we didn't have the success we wanted to have in our first two road games, but there were reasons for that. I felt like there were reasons within our control and we played a little bit out of character in those two games in some different areas and I thought we were able to fix that for the most part tonight. Even though we got off to a little bit of a slow start, but really at both ends of the floor, I thought the guys responded very well. Because it's easy when you're on the road to maybe kind of give into it and just fall into that trap, but I thought the guys really did a nice job taking the offense and getting more movement, getting downhill a little bit more and then defensively cleaning up some of the things early where we were letting them get to the rim kind of at will and then they did a better job of keeping them in front and making those shots a little bit tougher.

Q. Is it helpful at all when the crowd here isn't packed, it's not lively, it's kind of a lower level crowd relative to packed, loud environments? Does that help at all?

DDV: I think it can go both ways, to be honest with you. Sometimes when there's not a lot of energy, you can be a little flat and not as juiced up and sometimes get those really big crowds and a lot of energy and that can cause some communication problems and things. So it can go both ways. No matter what it is, like I told the guys, nobody, full house, doesn't matter. It's got to be our team connected and figuring out a way to come out of 40 minutes with a win.

Q. Starting with the crowd size, it seemed like there was a lot of similarities between this game early and the Minnesota game. Was there anything you learned from that Minnesota game? Obviously a totally different result tonight that kind of played into the factor tonight.

DDV: Yeah, I thought we did a much better job than we did at the Minnesota game of adjusting mostly offensively. I thought the Minnesota game, our movement never really got going. We didn't get them to chase us around and we got really stagnant. We started the game this way again tonight, but the guys did a really good job of taking some of the concepts we were trying to do and now getting downhill a little bit more, not settling quite as much early in possessions. I thought that led to much better opportunities for us as the game went on.

Q. It seemed like the offense opened up after that first media timeout. Lamar got some better cuts. Was that the emphasis in that media timeout about cutting and movement?

Yeah, we wanted to get a lot of movement. We thought the way they were guarding Lamar, they're going to put a lot of pressure on him trying to limit his touches, and he had to give himself up a little bit. It could be for a score for himself, which he got a few of those, but also just to create some attention as he's cutting and other guys are having to help a little bit. Now we can get the ball side to side a little bit cleaner.

Q: That run Lamar had, I think it was like a 16-4 run on his own. Just what happened there? What clicked for him there, do you feel like?

DDV: Yeah, I thought once he made one that we were very intentional to make sure that he kept getting opportunities. We called a few plays, some quick hitters for him to try to get a touch. Like he does a lot of times when he's in the zone a little bit, he took advantage of it. The guys do such a great job of understanding when a guy's got to go a little bit to look for him, to screen for him, to get him open.

Q. Conor had 12 last time. I think he had like 16 (tonight). What did you tell him over break? I mean, he's a brand new player now.

DDV: (laughs). Conor just does whatever the game entails. He's all about winning. He doesn't care. I've said that from the day that we signed him. All he cares about is that final score. If it means he scores 16 points, fine. If it means he has nine assists, no turnovers. If it means he didn't even play as long as we want, that's all he cares about. That's what makes him such a special player for us.

Q. How much do you think that Minnesota game where they were basically daring Conerway and Enright to shoot helped them in the game tonight?

DDV: I think they've done a really good job. They're good shooters. If you're going to leave them open and give them the type of shots that they've been getting the last couple games, they're going to make them. I watch these guys shoot every day. They got off to a little bit of a slow start early in the year, which we all knew as coaches that's not going to hold up because they're too good of shooters for that. We're very confident in what they can do from the perimeter. They've worked hard at it. You're starting to see now their confidence and stuff is starting to come out as they've seen a few go down in games.