CU-Arizona Post Game Quotes

Colorado Head Coach Tad Boyle

General
“We're disappointed in this result, but we lost to a darn good Arizona team. I think the first thing you have to do is tip your hat to them. They're a hell of a team, hell of a program. They've had an unbelievable year. We knew they were good defensively, and we knew we were going to have to make some shots to beat them. We couldn't get going. Their defense had something to do with that. Our offense had something to do with that. You put those two things together. Again, second half ‑‑ I thought in the first half we really battled. Hit a three there at the end to go up three. In the second half, that thing got away from us quick. If Arizona makes shots and the way they guard consistently, they've got a chance to win a National Championship. So, yeah, you've got to be lucky to do that. You've got to win six games. But they're a good team, and that game got away from us in the second half really quick, combination of things, transition defense, quick shots on offense, and not guarding the ball and their second shots. One of the things we talked about before the game and we talked about at halftime was offensive rebounds. They averaged over 12 a game. I think they got 13 tonight, and it seemed like every one of them was for a basket. We just didn't do what we had to do to win this game. We battled for 20, 25 minutes. I'm proud of our guys. We've got a lot of fight, a lot of heart. We've gotten better over the last three weeks of the season, but it was a disappointing end. But our season's not over. That is the good news. We've got to regroup, and we will. These guys are resilient. They're tough. We've come a long way here recently. So we're not going to let this sidetrack us. We've got to put it behind us and move on and figure out where and when we're playing next.”

On The Momentum Arizona Gained When Aaron Gordon Blocked Xavier Johnson's Dunk Attempt
“Yeah, that was a big play. It was a big momentum play. And their fans travel well. Our fans were great when we gave them a chance to be great about something. Not much in the second half there, but their fans got into that. But that was a big‑time block. We've had trouble for some reason getting to the free‑throw line here in Las Vegas. We are a team that averaged over 22 free‑throw attempts in the regular season, over an 18‑game schedule, and we get to the free‑throw line less than 15 times a game here. That's frustrating. But we've got to figure out how to put the ball in the basket. One thing about Arizona is you better match their physicality, because they're a very physical team. They're a very athletic team, and they're relentless on the boards. We battled, but we got beat. At 41‑25 on the boards, it's kind of the tale of the game in my opinion.”

On Whether Fatigued Played A Factor In The Loss
“I don't know if it did or not. Our guys are young. They're resilient. They take care of themselves. I know Arizona subbed early, and we tried to get to our bench a little bit early in the game. I felt like the USC game we probably expended more energy than we should have, because, again, part of that was USC. Part of that was we didn't take care of business like we felt like we should have, and had these guys maybe play 20, 25 minutes rather than 30, 35 minutes that game. I don't know if it did or not. That's not an excuse. These guys are young. They're used to playing AAU ball where they're sometimes playing three games in a day, much less three games in three days. I don't think it did. If it did, it's our own fault for not getting the bye.”

On Reason For Scoring Droughts In Consecutive Games
“Combination of things. Number one: quick shots that don't go in and you don't make the (opponent's) defense work. Number two: we don't get the ball moved as much as we need to. I thought in the first half our offense was really good. Our guys showed a lot of patience, and we moved it side‑to‑side. We were really screening well. In the second half, we made a lot of one‑on‑one plays. We didn't make the extra pass. I think that's one of the problems. That shows up in your assists column when you have five assists as a team for the game, because our guys were trying to attack the basket. These guys were getting the ball in the lane. Again, Arizona is awful athletic and they make plays at the rim. But finding that extra open guy and making that extra pass is something that we didn't do. When we go on droughts that's what happens, and when you can't get to the free‑throw line when you're attacking the basket, that makes it doubly as hard too. Arizona makes it really hard to score at the rim. Okay. Listen, they're a great defensive ‑‑ they're not a good defensive team, they're a great defensive team. They've shown it game after game all season long. For that, I commend them, and my hat goes off to them. We have room for improvement offensively, whether it's against Arizona or Cal or USC. Our guys know that, and that's my job as a Coach to get us better in that area.”

On What Changed In Second Half That Allowed Arizona So Many Easy Shots
“I know in the first half we talked about it at halftime. Our first shot defense in the first half was great. We held them to less than 40 percent field goal percentage. Now they had 10 offensive rebounds. We said, 'okay, our first shot defense is good enough, but the 10 offensive rebounds is not.' If we have those cut in half in the first half, we're leading. We're leading the game. We've got momentum and confidence. In the second half, again, I get back to quick shots. I get back to transition defense and not boxing them out. There were a couple times we didn't guard the ball, we didn't guard the ball screen the right way, and Arizona made us pay. We made mistakes in the second half defensively and they capitalized on it. Where in the first half, we didn't make as many of those mistakes. We were pretty solid in our rotations and our ball screen defense and our box outs for the most part. Again, the 10 offensive rebounds aside, we competed on the boards. In the second half, we didn't compete on the boards and come up with them; they did.”

On Lack Of Ball Movement Contributing To Scoring Droughts
“We were talking about it. Our guys do a good job of going into Josh [Scott]. And Josh has gotten double teamed basically every game in this tournament. He struggled passing on the double team tonight. We've got to get better spacing for him. We've got to make better decisions out of the double team. When we move it out of the double team, we have to get the ball moved, because there are two guys guarding Josh. Sometimes when Ski comes off ball screens there are two guys guarding him. That's when we have to get it moved, find open guy, make them rotate, and hopefully get an advantage. In the first half, I thought we did a better job of that than in the second half. So, again, that's an opportunity for improvement.”

On What Impresses Him About Arizona's Program
“The thing that impresses me the most is that Arizona's players get significantly better from year to year. I look at Kaleb Tarczewski's body relative to where it was a year ago, I look at his skill level. I look at Nick Johnson's game and how it's evolved and gotten better, T.J. McConnell, I can't emphasize what an addition he's been to that team. I think that kid is the difference personally. Yeah, between Arizona, and they've had good teams, but he brings an element of toughness and just unselfishness and ball movement to that team. So I think player development. That is something we pride ourselves on. If you look at these two guys to my left, Askia [Booker] has gotten better every year, something as a Colorado staff we take pride in, and we want our players to continue to add to their games. There are some players in this league that are the same players as juniors as they were as freshmen. But I think Sean [Miller] and his staff do a great job of player development from year to year.”

On Preparing For The Post-Season
“I'm hoping to get in the tournament. I'm not going to be presumptuous and say we're in, because these guys weren't with us three years ago when our team didn't get in and deserved to get in. That was a hell of a team that got left out. I think we're in, but that's not for me to decide or anybody else in this room to decide. I do know we're going to be playing in the postseason, and I hope it's in the NCAA Tournament. We're going to prepare like we always prepare. We're going to take Sunday off and get these guys rested and have a good practice on Monday. Hope we figure out who we're playing, where we're playing, when we're playing and move forward. We've got to regroup quickly. But the one thing about our guys, if you've watched us over the last two, three weeks of this season, they're resilient and they've bounce back. We had that really disappointing loss to Arizona at home and then followed up by a disappointing loss at Utah. They bounced back in the Bay Area and beat Stanford, and should have and could have beaten Cal, but came up a little short. A good two games here in this tournament. Again, Arizona is a hell of a team. My hat goes off to them. But I believe in these guys, and hopefully we're playing in the NCAA Tournament next week. We're expecting that. We're hoping for that. But we're not counting on that.”

University of Colorado Student-Athletes

Jr., G, Askia Booker

On What Was Going Through His Mind When Arizona Got On A Roll
“When they're on that roll, I think we had great defense. We just couldn't get a rebound, and it's hard to get out in transition and run and get easy baskets when they're jumping over your backs and they're dunking the ball. Those are big momentum swings. On the offensive end, you just want to slow the ball down and get the ball to the post or inside to the paint, and maybe you kick it out and maybe you get fouled and take away the momentum a little bit. But we didn't do that very well. We just kept giving them chances to get in transition and get easy baskets.”

So., G, Xavier Talton

On The Feeling When Arizona Continued To Make Big Plays and Extend Its Run
“I think being on the court is definitely draining to an extent. But us as Colorado and what we try to do, we try to have mental toughness, and I think it slipped a little bit today.”

Fr., F, Wesley Gordon

On What Arizona Was Able To Do In The Second Half
“They were able to kill us on the boards in the second half. The offensive boards hurt us a lot. The transition hurt us, also. They were able to get in quick shots. Everything went wrong for us in the second half.”

So., F, Xavier Johnson

On What Arizona Was Able To Do To Get The Win
“In the second half, they started getting easier buckets. They were able to get the easy jump shots and the easy layups. They were able to score on the easy stuff.”

On How The Pac-12 Tournament Will Help The Team Going Into Post-Season Play
“We've been able to become better overall. We've done a lot to improve and been able to do things that will help us going forward. We've got to focus on our principles and our defensive rebounding and then go from there.”

*Some quotes contributed by FastScripts by ASAP Sports

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