Mike Francis Quotes (10 Quotes)

When the players found out that this team (the Cougars) was a straight man-to-man team, they were licking their chops. We felt like that is our style of play anyway. That's the first time we faced man-to-man all season. We like to get out and run and make things happen and we did that tonight.

In terms of team unity, this was my strongest team ever. They really bought into to what we were preaching and their commitment to team work paid off in the end for us.

Anthony's been major for us right now. He's getting better and better every time we go out. We just have to get him the ball more.

The guys really responded to what we've been preaching. We're very proud of them. We told them that they would need to step up their intensity late in the season and they responded.

That motto was born out of telling the kids that we (the coaches) can talk about X's and O's all day, but they have to make their mind up that they want to get it done. I can't always call the plays that are going to work. Sometimes the kids have to take it upon themselves. No matter what it takes, no matter what we have to do, just get it done.

Coaches are trying to take the big guys away from the game with zone defenses. That's why athletes are more balanced now. There's a lot of guys that can beat you off the dribble, step outside if they need to and make things happen.

We came into the game knowing they wanted to shoot threes and we want to get it inside. That was their biggest concern Us scoring inside. Both times we played them previously, we scored 28 and 30 points inside. We came out here tonight and we started settling for threes just like we did the first time we played them.

Rodney played one hell of a game. This was the best game he played against us in this whole series. The major difference tonight was he came to play. The two previous games combined he had 11 points.

When a team plays that kind of a zone against you, they're trying to take away your athleticism and make you stand around. We wanted Miguel to penetrate and get into the gaps. He did a good job of that in the second half. He really, really stepped up.

I don't think there's been a dominating big man in the league for the last two years.