Oliver Purnell Quotes (89 Quotes)

We're going to have to win multiple games, that's for sure. You have to win a couple of games to get people's attention and get on the board.

It's tough because we dropped a gut-wrenching game against Virginia Teach the other night, and any time you lose some tight games, or three or four in a row, confidence becomes an issue. But the players came back to practice Thursday with some determined energy. Our message is that you can't fold up, and I hope they're internalizing it. It's an important mindset that if we work at it we can get over the hump here.

We stopped turning the ball over in the second half, which made it more difficult for them to score. I thought our guys did a good job of managing the clock and spacing the floor in the second half.

If we guard, don't turn the ball over and make a few free throws, we win.

I think we will probably be in the NIT. It's disappointing we didn't make a run at winning (the ACC) tournament.

This kind of win (over Virginia) is just like a tough loss, in a way, that you don't want to celebrate it too long or have a hangover from it because now we've got to go on the road to Virginia Tech. All you've got to do is look, outside the top couple of teams, at the teams' records in this league and it's very difficult to win on the road.

There is disappointment and frustration any time you go out early in your conference tournament, a tournament we felt good about doing very well in. But we still have an opportunity to play for an outstanding championship.

Everybody will beat up on one another. The team that stays away from the losing streak, takes care of their home court and gets a couple (wins) on the road will be successful. You'll qualify (for postseason play) with your resume, and there's a lot of time to do that.

As I look around the league and the scores the last two weeks, it's just clear that there's not a lot of difference between the teams. Just one or two (freshmen) stepping up would make a critical difference.

They shot 57 percent in the first half and in the second half, every big basket that they had to have, we had a defensive breakdown. I don't think we were mentally or physically sharp tonight and as a result Elon, a club that's been kind of laying in wait ... coming in fresh, shoots the ball well and gets out of here with a win.

There's no question that they are living up to preseason accolades about how good they could be. But at the same time, they're playing a lot of close games, like everybody else in the league.

He was very realistic with me, clear about what's going on, and he certainly educated us on what we'd be facing. He clearly understood how tough it was.

After the South Carolina game I thought we had a chance to have a really special team. I thought we had a chance to really leapfrog forward.

I thought he did a great job of moving without the ball. And we did a good job of finding him. And he knocked them down.

I wanted to play baseball. That was probably my best sport, but I wasn't allowed to play Little League baseball.

Good question. I think everybody in the league is wondering about that right now. Those three guards have been outstanding for three years.

Oh, no question at all. Here in Clemson, people know me, but if I go to a place, a different city where no one knows me, when I'm out to dinner I'm sometimes waited on by a person who has a certain attitude.

It's one of those nights - and you have one every two or three years - where the basket just keeps getting smaller and smaller and you don't know where your next bucket is coming from.

NC State lost the other night, but it was kind of a classic setup out of the league, they just played Duke, in the middle of the ACC season at home, and they probably just took things for granted a little bit probably. You can be rest assured that on Sunday we'll see NC State at their best.

I hate to sound like a broken record, but this team's been pretty resilient all year long. Not once have they backed up after a tough loss.

We were not mentally sharp or physically sharp, but you have to give Ernie and his crew a lot of credit. We've got to put this behind us because we've got the ACC in front of us.

On your home court, you want to be able to grab the game by the throat and put pressure on them. Instead the pressure wound up being on us. We weren't eager, we weren't sharp, and at the end the basket got awful small for us.

I'd love to see us be in a close game with them on their home court. And getting a win would be a much-needed boost for us, a great jump-start to finish out the year.

We relaxed there just a bit and he made an off-balance tremendous shot.

Although we're not a good free-throw-shooting team, I felt this was the first time it cost us a game. Overall, we aren't good shooters. That's why we struggle at the foul line.

We got sucked in off the 3-point shooter when the only thing that can beat you -- the only thing that can tie the game -- is a 3-pointer. It's inexcusable to give up a 3 there.

The fact that we don't have to travel is certainly an advantage for us and gives us an opportunity to be well-rested and well prepared.

I don't think we played our best basketball. But I thought we played well in stretches, and that allows us to advance.

Our full-court pressure defense in the first half obviously yielded a lot of dividends for us. It's a big part of what we do.

I'll say it We can make the argument that we're playing as well as anybody in the league right now.

You never get over that kind of loss, but we had to. The guys just never wavered. I realized after the first five games this was a special team.

It would've been nice to get that N.C. State game (a two-overtime loss), but we didn't get it done in any of the three. It has put us in a struggling state.

For the first time all year it cost us in this ballgame. Bad habits tend to pop up when the pressure's on. Overall, we're not good shooters, and that's why we have to be a good defensive team.

Momentum in sports is a powerful force. One could make the argument that we're playing better than any team coming in so I'll make that argument.

It would have been very easy to let some of the frustration that we had the other night against Miami carry over, but we didn't. We're a team that has to fight for 15 rounds, and I think our players understood that today.

Nobody felt sorry for Virginia Tech when they were 0-6, and nobody's gonna feel sorry for us that we lost four in a row. It's important to understand that it's a man's league and we've gotta keep working.

I don't like it (not fouling) because it hasn't worked, but you saw we had trouble rebounding on free throws. That really cost us in this game.

We've learned a painful lesson here today. That is if you lose focus on the defensive end of the floor, teams can catch you, particularly a team that was as cold shooting as we were.

It's disappointing that we didn't make a run at winning the tournament. I felt like if we could advance, anything could happen. So that is disappointing. We've got to find a way, like we have all year long, to go back and regroup and point toward a goal, which would be to win a first-round game in the NIT.

I wouldn't say there's no trouble because I think there is frustration and disappointment at going out early in your conference tournament. But this has been a resilient team all year long. We'll be ready to go (tonight).

I tell the kids, if you bring your defense and your offense goes cold, the defense will keep you in the game.

We had been talking about his future with the program this summer. Cheyenne is a talented young man. I wish him all the best as he looks to reach his aspirations in the classroom and on the court.

This is certainly one of those measuring stick-type games. Our plan is to not allow Duke to be at its best. When they're at their best, they probably beat any team in the country.

That's probably something to be proud of. It's an accomplishment and we'll take any accomplishment we can get.

We should get a bid if we do that -- whether we will or not I don't know. There are certainly more than four ACC teams in the top 64 in the country. To say the ACC has only four teams in the top 64 is laughable.

I don't think we want to erase it. It definitely says to our team that we have a real challenge ahead of us. We want to use it for scouting purposes. We don't want to erase any part of the season.

The racism is systemic in those places where it remains.

The story of the game was our inability to make shots.

He's had one of the best college careers in college basketball history. You're talking about the ACC, a premier league in the country. He's breaking scoring records, the all-time leading scoring record. The teams he's played on have won. Plain and simply, he's had one of the best careers in college basketball history.

Obviously, it's a disappointing loss for our team. Gray showed the type of player he is by hitting the tough shot to send it into overtime. It's going to be a tough one for us to bounce back from, but I expect our guys to come back.