KEATTS: "I Was Happy To Get C.J. Bryce Back"
NC State head coach Kevin Keatts met with the media following the Wolfpack's 80-63 win over Miami Wednesday evening.
NOTE: Click the video in the player above to watch Keatts’ press conference.
“First of all, I love to say it: it was good to have a full team and a roster full of guys that can go in the game. I was happy to get C.J. Bryce back, not only because he is our leading scorer, but because it is just good to have him in the locker room. As he was going through his concussion protocol, it was tough to have him at games and even in the locker room. We were in need of some senior leadership, both on and off the court. One thing we had talked about was everyone being a star in their role. I am trying to get everyone to accept what their role is and play as aggressive as they can in that role. We need this any given night, because we don’t have that one player that can score 20 points. Every night someone different can lead us. I thought D.J. Funderburk was tremendous in his starting role. I wanted to reward him because he had played so great and had been doing such a good job. I thought Jericole Hellems did a great job and gave us a good lift, not putting his head down because he didn’t start. So many guys played well. I was very happy with Devon Daniels, especially in the way he was aggressive and got to the rim. We don’t talk a lot about him on the defensive end, but he played really well. We were able to press a little bit more tonight and played a little bit of man-to-man. I feel like that helped us guard the three-point line. A lot of times, teams don’t shoot well against us because we put a lot of pressure on them, and their legs are worn by the last four to five minutes of the game. We haven’t been able to do that on the three-point line lately, one of the reasons being because we haven’t been pressing. If you look at these guys, they were 3-16, and we turned them over 15 times, which I thought was a good takeaway from this game. We came into the game wanting to take away the ‘Big Three,’ or at least one of the ‘Big Three,’ and I thought we did that. When you look at Kameron McGusty, he only had two points. We knew that if all three of those guys played well, it would be a long night for us, but we did a good job of taking that away.”
“After he was cleared, I just let him play. It was probably bigger to him than anyone else in our locker room that he was able to take a big hit and get back up and not feel dizzy or woozy.”
“Before, we hadn’t really been able to stay calm and keep shooting. When our shots wouldn’t fall, we would begin to struggle on both ends of the court. Tonight, we matured a little bit because we relied on our defense even though our offense was scoring. In the last few games, when we weren’t scoring, we suffered and gave up too many easy baskets. We talked about building on that and the maturity of this team. It is tough on us, which I know a lot of coaches across the country can also say - I haven’t had this full team together for a majority of our losses. That is tough because then you start to wonder, ‘If I had my full team, would we have lost the game?’ We want to try to get these guys together, continue to build on tonight and continue to mature from it. That is what I want this group to do. The ACC comes at you really fast, forcing you to grow up fast.
“I think [Funderburk] is just playing to his potential. I’ll be honest with you - I never, and I used to tell the assistant coaches this all the time - like, man he is just not in great shape. I think he’s been in the gym, putting some extra reps in and getting in better shape. Early in the season I didn't think he could play full stretches. If you guys remember, he obviously didn’t play in the Georgia Tech game, but he missed a lot of time because he was suspended, and I didn’t let him be a part of the program, and I think that hurt his condition a little bit. I think it's now that he can play long stretches, and he's starting to get into better shape, and he's starting to play with confidence. He even hit a three. Is that his first three? First one in conference play, right? I think he was 0-6 in conference play, now he’s 1-8. Let me see what his assists are - ah man two turnovers - and a skyhook, was it a skyhook? You guys are funny today!”
“Yeah it is, and I would obviously love to have at least one more guy in the rotation. When we started this season, I was hoping we would have at least ten guys we could rotate in and out and be able to press the entire game and make it every time we scored. But I like what we have, and I like the nine guys, and if I can keep D.J. Funderburk at the four I think it will help our team a little bit more. With that being said, I think Danny Dixon will continue to get better. He’s getting healthy. We don’t talk about him a lot because he doesn’t play a lot of minutes, but he was also hurt, so I would be able to play him at the five I would use D.J. more as a five. So if I can get those guys, Danny, to become more serviceable and do some good things, and him and Manny play the five, I can use D.J. a little more at the four.”
“I think when they went small, I wanted D.J. - even though he is a guy that can switch all five screens - so they went kind of small and played [Sam] Waardenburg at the five, and so we went a little smaller with D.J. at the five and switch more screens, and it was more so I could get C.J. Bryce some extra minutes to be able to play and try to get some game action a little bit.”
“You will have to wait till Saturday. I’m not giving my secret away. “