UNC's Hubert Davis on NC State: "They Know How to Pressure You"
No. 7 North Carolina head coach Hubert Davis met with the media following the Tar Heels' 67-54 win over NC State Wednesday evening.
NOTE: Click on the video in the player above to watch Davis’ press conference. A selected transcript is provided below.
Opening Statement
This game was another collectively great effort on the players. I told them after the last game that they are not playing good defense; they are playing elite defense. They are taking the challenge of winning their individual one on one matchups, staying on script in terms of what we have talked about in preparation for each game, boxing out in the rebounds as this if the fourth straight game that we have outrebounded an opponent, and identifying what allows us to be really good when we rebound and are defending. On the offensive end, in the second half we played offense at our pace. NC State is so good defensively and know how to pressure you. I kept repeating to the players, “Don’t let their pressure or defense dictate and decide when we play on the offensive end.” I felt like, in the first half, they sped us up, and in the second half, I felt like we were playing at our pace, were able to shoot better, make enough free throws to be able to extend the lead.
On frustrating D.J. Burns and D.J. Horne in the second half...
They are two of the better players in the country. I don’t know how you defend D.J. Burns. He is just so gifted, and it’s just a dilemma every time down the floor. Do you guard him one on one, or do you double team? He is such a gifted passer, so we tried to mix things up and not give him a steady diet so that he knows that he’s going to pass out of the double team, or he knows that nobody is coming. One of the things we did was throw different combinations and things. One of the things we talked about with the guards was giving D.J. Horne the same type of attention we had on players on other ACC teams because he [Horne] is at the level. I felt like our guards did a really good job climbing into him and making each one of his shots difficult as well.