Dan Monson Quotes (54 Quotes)

What's impressive to me is how (Illinois) plugged into their roles and identity of that basketball team. What is our identity What end of the court Who is doing it How are we going to win games.

That was the first time any of us saw Vince back. His timing and his energy and his confidence were back. We went into this year knowing we were going to have to ride him, but he was kind of a broken horse.

I felt this team was very together today and had a great attitude and approach. I told them the good news is we're only down 10.

For whatever reason we were obviously in some foul trouble. I don't want to talk about the fouls anymore.

I thought our seniors' focus and desire was excellent. They put it on the line today, but it just wasn't enough.

We're the only one in the league playing consistent. It's consistently not good enough.

Our defense has been feeding off effort and attitude. We had three guys on the same page before, but not five.

We've had some seniors that have had tough years. I know this year wasn't how it was envisioned to this point. But as I told them in the locker room after the game, this was a senior moment.

It was a one-play game, four or five different times, and we just didn't get it done. We just need to get some wins to build some confidence. Our guys are just really hurting right now.

They came in and got into an offensive rhythm. Games like these aren't won or lost at the end against great teams. You can't let a team go on a run and expect to win.

You want every senior go out like the seniors did last year having the best year of their career. But that's not reality. It's not going to work that way for everybody. But I think Moe's attitude has been fantastic.

These are tough for coaches when you near the end with a team you enjoy coaching. I think they fought today. It was going to be a tough game for either (Jeff) Horner or Vince to lose. They both put on such great offensive performances.

Winning streaks are impressive because it's a model of consistency. Streaks mean you haven't let your guard down and you've taken care of business when everyone knows what a difficult task that is.

We got caught in the middle some and they made us pay.

I called a couple other things in those time outs, both times. It's what Vince wanted, and again, I was trying to go to the best player.

This is a situation for our team to have to grow, unfortunately. Hopefully we can be a better basketball team for him when he gets back.

We knew we'd have some damage control.

We had to go with a lot of different lineups and had a lot of different issues because, for whatever reason, we were obviously in some foul trouble.

Players come and go, but kids learn how to win and they pass that down to the bench. Until somebody defeats Wisconsin, Illinois or Michigan State I don't think you can say that team is better because they've never proven it.

If we somehow could win a couple, our last 10 would be a very good record against top 20 teams. We have to keep grinding because that's what the Big Ten is about. We're playing against teams that beat us the first time, and we're trying to show we've improved by getting some of these guys on the way out.

They've had different paths to travel and it's been a little different every year is different. But as they try to create a legacy, I'm hoping that they can build off of this last month of what they've brought to this program.

It's a big opportunity, because to get to the NCAA tournament you have to beat some teams that are going. We don't have any margin for error left. We've used it all up. But I think we've gotten ourselves in this position, because we haven't worried about that.

Last year's team, you didn't know if we were going to win or lose, but you knew we were going to fight. We have some different ways to score now, but do we have the same type of personality

I don't know if we have to win the Big Ten tournament, but that probably depends on who we play and how far we go. We have to worry about Saturday first.

I thought we did a lot of good things to get a win. But you have to make free throws. And when you have a chance on the road, and we had many, you need to learn how to grab it by the throat and finish it.

I don't anticipate having him in the near future. But as I told him, we're nearly two months away from playing games, and a lot can happen in two months.

Every team begins the year with the goal of going to the NCAA tournament. Until somebody takes that dream away, you pursue it. The reality is, we're a long way off from being in the NCAA tournament. For us to do that is a pipe dream. But if we were to win our last four, we're 8-8 in the best conference in the country. We'd have an opportunity.

We had to go on the road and dig some games out. In certain areas, we gave ourselves an opportunity. But the bottom line is the area that we said we had to control to win we didn't. That was taking away the three from them.

Tucker's so hard to help on and those are the guys that we were trying to help from. We knew they'd get some, but you can't do both. ... We got caught in the middle a lot and those guys made us pay.

I thought our bench was a huge lift. That's becoming a good basketball team ' every game you got different guys stepping up.

Saturday was disheartening because I felt like our guys didn't believe at the end of the game against Michigan. One good thing is, we're not worried about who we're playing. It's tough going to Illinois. But I think we showed at Iowa that if we can get ourselves together, we can play.

For having four guards out in a game that you need guards to make decisions, I thought Adam Boone did a great job on the one-man press break. I was proud of our guys, taking the game plan and implementing it. It wasn't for as long as I wanted, but at least coach Williams had to break a sweat for a while.

People remember you as you leave a program not in the middle of it or how you came in. And I think that's something they're all trying to focus on.

I think people look at recruiting and they don't realize you've got to go back four years ago to get this senior class. Sanctions don't hit you the first year. They hit you down the road. Unfortunately, that's what has happened, to a degree, to this program. I don't want to put it all on that.

I think we've got a little bit of an identity right now that we didn't have in the beginning of the season. Back then, we didn't know how to win. I think we have guys right now that understand what they need to do. Now we have some semblance of a team. It took a while for our guys to figure it out. That put us in a whole, but we're better now.

We just couldn't play Horton the same way we did the first two times. We challenged Vince early in the week, and just giving a potent point guard a different look was important to us.

Vince missed a left-handed lay-in and all of a sudden we looked like a team that didn't have confidence. I'm really, really disappointed that we broke down defensively.

It was going to be a tough game for either Horner or Vince to lose because both of those guys had such great offensive performances. Iowa just outplayed us over the last 10 minutes. They did a good job of getting us stretched out and slipped in for some lay-ups that really hurt.

When you have a chance on the road, and we had many, you've got to finish it. Right now, (we're) a team that didn't take it by the throat and finish it when they had an opportunity.

We have to get some shots to go in. We haven't shot 40 percent yet in five league games. That's pretty difficult to weather.

You don't win games with being just good basketball players. You need toughness. You need heart. You need some feel for the game that isn't in the box score.

I think he played very aggressive. Their inside guys I thought were huge. They were more physical and more aggressive than we were.

Zach's very limited as a basketball player. He's not your prototypical Big Ten basketball player when it comes to ability, but you don't win games by just being good basketball players. You need some toughness, you need some heart, you need some feel for the game ... and he gives you those things.

Your theory is true, to a degree. The great teams are the ones that keep improving when they're having success. It's easier to handle failure than success.

He did a great job of telling them, 'Hey, this program is not where we want it to be. But we're not making a change. And we're going into next year with this coaching staff.' It was fortunate, just for our peace of mind, that Joel was with us on the trip.

I think they kind of left it to him. From my understanding was he was able to do that last week, but he wanted to wear it another week just to make sure.

Against a team as great as they are, you have few opportunities to take control. We didn't take advantage of the opportunities we had.

We had enough offense to win this basketball game. We just didn't have enough defense.

We couldn't play them the same way we did the first two times. It just wouldn't work. We needed something to change that, and we challenged Vince earlier in the week.

I think 8-8 (in the Big Ten) would get you in. We would have to go 7-2, which is extremely difficult. One game doesn't fix you. Can we go out and duplicate that nine more times