Kevin Keatts: "For Us, It Means a Little Bit More"

NC State head coach Kevin Keatts met with the media following the Wolfpack's 84-74 overtime win over Florida State Saturday evening.

NOTE: Click on the video in the player above to watch Keatts’ press conference.

Opening Statement

What a great game and a great win. Obviously for us, it means a little bit more. We had dropped three games against three really good teams. We were at home, and then obviously, it's our first ACC game early in December. I thought our guys came out, responded, and answered the bell. We were resilient. Towards the end, we got down five with about three minutes to go in regulation, and we fought back. I thought we did some really good things. We didn't particularly shoot it well from the free-throw line, but I thought Marcus Hill, in overtime, made four big free throws. I thought Dontrez Styles was tremendous. In the second half, he made play after play. We got connected. This team needed an early win together. We hadn't had one, this particular group, and we needed a nice win together. We got one. Florida State’s good. I realized after the game they had won 14 straight overtime games, and we were able to break that today. I didn't know that, but it's good.

On Styles’ second-half play…

He was good in the second half of the Texas game. What I've asked these guys is give me some consistency. I want guys to be consistent. The toughest thing for a coach is to come into a game and not know what you're getting from a player, so we wanted consistency. He's had a good couple of days of practice, and I thought he was huge. He made plays after plays.

On what the Wolfpack was able to do after Malique Ewin fouled out…

They switch one through five, and it's tough. They really take your post guys out. I thought Ewin did a tremendous job. He was scoring the basketball. He was rebounding the basketball. I thought, when he fouled out of the game, they lost a little bit of that rebounding and scoring inside, and they became more of a perimeter team.

On letting Jamir Watkins shoot while limiting the rest of the Seminoles from the perimeter…

I like that philosophy, but he got to the line way too much. I mean, he's strong. He’s physical. We talked about taking his right-hand drives. We talked about being second off the floor. We went for his pump fake. Dontrez holds him at the end of the game. The guy makes his free throws, but he's as tough a matchup as you're going to see in this league because he can play inside-out. What we really wanted to go into the game and make sure we didn't let him score it both ways. We've done a great job on our early season of defending the three-point line — I think we may even be number one in the country defending the three-point line — and we didn't want to give it to him both ways, so we did a good job there.

On matching Florida State in rebounding given the Seminoles’ size advantage…

I was concerned. Even Ewin, in their last game against LSU, had 11 offensive rebounds himself. We talked about that. The two things that I didn't like is we didn't do a good job in our last game in transition, and we didn't do a good job blocking out. We made an effort tonight that we want to hit somebody and not give up 14, 15 offensive rebounds. It means a lot. It means we're growing.

On Breon Pass and Styles making big shots to beat the shot clock…

What do you mean? We designed those plays! No, I thought they were huge. I mean, Breon's two in the first half were really good, and Dontrez beat the clock. When you get we can shoot the basketball — obviously, we haven't shot it great as a team — but we do have some guys that can make some shots. I thought both of those guys made great shots today in the shot clock.

On Styles improving from the trip to San Diego to now…

I didn't even know we took him to San Diego. Did he go to San Diego? Was he there? No, he's worked hard. Players don't like to look bad. Let's talk about Marcus, too. Both of those guys in San Diego, they were 3-for-12, and both of those guys, the last two games, have been really good for us.

On his message to the team at the media timeout when the Seminoles were ahead by five…

I wanted us to stay solid. I thought we did some bonehead stuff; we switched out, and we didn't switch to the inside. We gave up some easy baskets. The great thing about when you've got a new bunch is they are a new bunch, and so you can learn a lot of things. We needed a win where we made some mistakes, where we came back, and that way, we can grow. I think this is a biggest thing that could have happened for us because we've had more adversity than we've have success, and just winning this game will really help.

On the biggest difference between winning this game and losing versus Texas…

We made plays. If you go back to the Texas game, we gave up six offensive rebounds in the last six minutes of the game. We made plays. We got stops when we needed to have stops, and that's the thin line between [winning and losing]. We made our free throws down the stretch. Even before Marcus made his, we made a couple of them. The little things that impact the game are defending, making free throws, and blocking out, and I thought we did. We handled that much better than we did against Texas.

On Brandon Huntley-Hatfield’s limited court time…

It wasn't an inspiration thing. We have a major standard in this program, and Brandon, unfortunately, was a little late to practice yesterday. We don't care who you are; you’ve got to punch the clock. That wasn't a message. He was late.

On Ben Middlebrooks taking a charge…

I thought it was great. Some of you guys are plus-minus guys. I'm really not, but I'm going to be one today, Ben was plus-25. You’ll look at the stat sheet, and you'll say, “Man, he only scored four points and only had four rebounds," but the things he did on the court were really well. He did a lot of good things. I thought he did a good job on the defensive end, and what a great charge he took.

On inspiring Styles after his foul led to overtime…

I wanted him to play. We ran a play at the end of the game, and I thought he did a great job of ripping and driving it. I thought there was some contact. Obviously, there wasn’t. He was down on himself because he fouled at the end of the game, and then obviously they go to the free-throw line. I was like, “All right, I'm going to give you a chance to make up for it." He drove, and I thought he made a good play. It just didn't go in.