Steve Alford Quotes (125 Quotes)

We try to take the financial aspects out of the injury,

We appreciate the hard work and efforts that Rich and Greg have extended on behalf of this program over the past seven years. With 46 wins in the last two seasons and six straight winning seasons, they have contributed to a lot of the successes we have enjoyed. In my longterm commitment toward the future, I wanted to move Brian to director of basketball operations and felt these moves were necessary for the continued progress of the program.

We still control our own destiny. It's just that our margin of error is lessened. If we go 30, there are no ifs, ands or buts.

It's not an easy time, it's not an easy day when that happens. It's just hard.

Adam's starting to learn what it takes (on defense).

Its something coach Knight used to always do. Its a long season. Its a grind. Back when I played, there were 18 (conference) games. It gets to be very long and can mentally really wear your team down.

Our first 10 minutes out of the locker room (in the second half) is something we can't do. We let out poor offense - we had seven turnovers in that stretch - affect our defense. If you have poor offense, you need to have nasty defense.

We've been in first place for almost six weeks. That's a heck of a stretch. We're 20-8 and 9-5 in the best conference in the country and we have two big home games left.

Just having to learn to play with the brace, that's probably the most cumbersome thing. He's going to have to wear it until mid-February.

That was the best he's cut all year and against a very tough defense, too. That was a complete effort out of Adam tonight.

We're going to have to continue that. We're going to have times when we don't score, we turn it over. And when that happens, the next possession we've got to do a very good job of getting the shot that we want.

For whatever reason that happens, you're more comfortable at home. It's a whole different mindset. Those teams that are able to go in those environments and perform well are the teams that ultimately win championships.

We just got dominated on the glass. I thought the center position was really in favor of them.

In a game like this, you really rely on your leadership.

There was a possibility that he could have played against Drake and Robert Morris, but we wanted to make sure he continued to heal properly.

I do think that's why Bru has a lot of good footwork today. He had guard footwork, and now he's kind of grown into those feet and become a power forward.

The second half, we just couldn't make a shot. And you've got to give credit to their defense. But you can't shoot 30 percent. We fouled too much the second half.

It's very difficult to win road games, but it's hard to win homes games (too). If, all of a sudden, you don't play well -- a game where you don't make shots or where you're not on top of your game defensively -- you really run the risk of losing regardless of where the game is being played ... This league is very demanding, very difficult.

When you end up getting into the profession, you end up learning how important that end is. This is a group of guys who have gotten older and matured through the Big Ten. ... They understand the benefits that go into defending.

If we don't play well, we'll get beat. We're just not good enough to have an average to below-average night and expect to win.

It's two very pivotal home games for us. But if we're fortunate enough to get them, it's been one heck of a regular season and we try to get some momentum going into the Big Ten tournament.

That's why we're the No. 1 league in the country. It's obvious. We respect everyone, and we have to play well. ... We're down to five games, but a lot can change. Teams near the top could be in the middle. Two weeks from now we might be talking about teams at the bottom no longer being at the bottom.

We're 7-2 in the nine games since that came up. That tells everybody where our focus has been.

I'll give him a little bit of leniency. But that's not a pass I want him to make.

The eighth guy was a walk-on. The majority of minutes were played by seven guys.