Bill Self Postgame Arizona Press Conference
Opening thoughts on the game:
“I assume you’re talking about to start the game and then after we cut it to whatever we cut it to, two or four or whatever it was.
I think we helped them. They physically dominated us inside, obviously evident to anybody watching. And then our shot selection was so poor and we didn’t share the ball during that period of time. We had wrong guys taking guarded shots where you’ve got to play to your strengths, and we didn’t do that whatsoever.
I think you guys got I think it was 48 to 26 on the boards to be exact. They were just so aggressive. I thought we played really soft, to be honest with you. Foul problems don’t help, but still, we played soft.
When we played them at our place, we made them not play great and kind of uglied the game up. There was nothing that uglied it up tonight. For 30 minutes they were fantastic, and for 10 minutes we were much better. But overall, physically, they just wore us out.”
On Bryson’s early foul trouble and the rebounding margin:
“A guy getting in early foul trouble isn’t the 22 rebound difference. They were just so aggressive. Foul problems impacted us, but that wasn’t the reason for everything.”
On Paul Mbiya's minutes:
“We had foul problems and he’s big, so we thought he could buy us a little time. I thought Paul did fine. That’s not his role to go in and score or give numbers. He actually did at our place. Tonight we were just trying to piece it together.”
On Krivas defensively:
“I personally think he’s great defensively. He’s a real protector. He takes up space. He’s extremely intelligent, strong, physical, long obviously.
Today we didn’t get behind him. At our place we got behind him a few times because we were able to get paint touches off ball screens. His length and size make it hard to score over him, and he’s athletic enough that it’s hard to score around him.”
On how this Arizona team compares to others he has faced:
“The teams I coached against when I was at Illinois went to the national championship game. That was a pretty good team.
This team is different. This team is an inside out playing team. They get paint touches from their guards, but they can make enough twos to offset you making threes. We didn’t make any threes tonight, but I think that’s the difference. Maybe less individual perimeter scoring than some past teams, but far more strength and scoring inside.”
On the atmosphere at McKale Center:
“I thought it was great. The crowd was great. They love ball here.
I went on a walk this morning around campus and there’s no telling how many people stopped me to talk ball. One guy is getting ready to have a Channing Frye wine tasting deal. I said send me a bottle.
There were so many people that did that because I think they just love ball here, much like we do. I thought it was a really positive atmosphere. I didn’t think we did a great job of handling the crowd.”
On how Bryson’s fouls affected rotations:
“They were both good calls. It certainly impacted us. We don’t have the depth, and it forced Trey to play the four and that’s really not what he is. He’s more of a three that can play some four, much better when the other team plays four guards, and they obviously don’t.
I actually thought we got off to a great start. We got the shots we wanted early. We didn’t make them. You look up and we’re down eight right off the bat and then the dam burst, so to speak.
Guys hung in there. We showed some resiliency and toughness to make it a one possession game. But when you play from behind it takes more energy and you’ve got to really grind. They didn’t play as well when we were playing well.
Then Kachikov made that long three that hit every part of the rim. It was exactly what we wanted to do defensively, and after that it was lights out.”
On Burries' impact:
“He’s great. He’s a great combo guard. He can score. He’s physical. He’s fast. He gets downhill. I think he’s tricky.
We did a really poor job getting back in transition early on. If you let him see a bigger basket, that hurts you. But I think he’s a great player.”
On Darryn’s second half:
“You can say slow start and I’m not going to disagree, but was it a slow start because he missed shots or did he play poorly? I don’t think he played poorly. I just think he missed shots.
He got us back to where we were close and then we kind of went brain dead after that. I thought he was fine.
When the game was out of reach, it was time to start thinking about resting guys, to be honest with you.”