Quotes

Jan. 1, 2005

Recap | Box Score | Notes | Photo Gallery

Kansas Head Coach Bill Self
On the game:
“It was an unbelievable game. It was a great atmosphere in the Fieldhouse, both teams were competing as hard as they could. I am so proud of our guys because I have been telling them we have to be tougher and play harder. We don’t always have to play well to win, if you are tough. I think these guys showed they were tough and played with a lot of courage today. I don’t know if I have ever been around too many game like this. Playing without an All-American and haveing nothing go right was a lot for us to overcome. We just kept battling, even with our young guys. The young guys need the experience and exposure they got in today’s game. Our defense was really good except for on Jarrett Jack. We did a great job on everyone else. A lot of guys stepped up and made some plays. We are not the most confident team, but to win a game like this will do wonders for us later in the season. We will draw from this game, as far as being down late in the game and toughing it out. “

On Keith Langford:
“He was supposed to get the ball at the end of the game. I could have called timeout, but I thought our team should just go play. We got out of his way in overtime and he made a play. He wasn’t going to pass the ball, he was going to be the one to take that shot.”

On the upcoming game against Texas A&M:
“We have to rest up so we are ready to play an unbeaten team in Texas A&M. Some people have said they haven’t played a tough non-conference schedule, but they still have confidence because of that. That’s the way you are supposed to do it. They’ll play as hard as Georgia Tech did. They will compete with us, so we will have to be ready.”

Freshman Forward Alex Galindo
On the game:
“It was a great game. They played well. We played tough at the end and got the win. The game came down to the toughest team winning. The atmosphere was great, but I was a little anxious at times. I still played well and helped my team win.”

On his free throws:
“I was a little down on myself. If I could have knocked down one or two, we wouldn’t have been down late in the game. I guess I have to practice more, but I will make them.”

On winning without Wayne Simien:
“It was great to be able to win without him because we start conference games. It is still a big journey, this is just the first step.”

Senior Guard Aaron Miles
On the game:
“Our whole team stepped up. Keith Langford and Alex Galindo stepped up and played big. Being down just gave us a little more adrenaline. I knew eventually we would get back in the game and make it competitive. We have tough people on this team and we didn’t want to give in.”

On becoming KU’s all-time assist leader:
“Since we won the game, it feels really good. Today I told coach Lee (Michael Lee’s dad) that I haven’t really thought about it that much. It didn’t hit me and it still hasn’t even hit me. I thank God for this accomplishment and I also thank my teammates from the last four years, so many guys like Drew Gooden, Kirk Hinrich, Jeff Boschee and everyone on this year’s team.”

Senior Guard Keith Langford
On what Coach Self said at halftime:
“He wasn’t panicking or anything. He just said that we were down by seven and we still had time in the game. We had confidence to pick this game apart piece by piece.”

On Jarrett Jack’s play:
“He was tough to defend, but we made the adjustments late in the second half because he was shooting over Aaron (Miles). Towards the end, I just tried to stay in front of him as much as I could. When he had the ball I tried to deny him. A couple of times down the stretch I read his moves and was able to steal the ball the third time. I tried to be smart about defending him and limiting him as much as I could.”

Georgia Tech Head Coach Paul Hewitt:
On Georgia Tech’s performance:
“It was a very hard fought game. They (Kansas) made more plays offensively down the stretch than we did. It is awfully disappointing to give out that type of effort and not come away with the win. We (Georgia Tech) could have played smarter. There were times early in the game where I thought we had an idea of what we wanted and didn’t want to do. (In the first half) we shot very well. The bottom line is that there were times at the end of the first half and the second half when we got out of character. We are too good of a basketball team to do that, especially when you give that much effort. When you give that kind of effort, you shouldn’t throw the game a away by taking tough shots.”

On Kansas:
“We knew that (Keith) Langford and (J. R.) Giddens were going to be looking for their offense. Certainly (Wayne) Simien makes them a better team, but we knew that there would be some sort of unknown quantity who would step up to make up for the loss of Simien. Kansas played tough down the stretch, even after we got up on them. Kansas toughed it out and got the win. They made some pretty tough shots.”

On Jarrett Jack:
“(Late in the game) we saw that Kansas was paying more attention to him so we wanted to go inside. When there were situations when theyshot clock was going down, we needed Jack to get the ball and try to do something with it. You can talk about Jarrett not getting his shot at times, but I would take a lay-up as opposed to a highly-contested shot in the lane any time.”

On Anthony McHenry fouling out:
“That certainly did a lot to our team. That was not the reason for us losing the game though. I thought that other players stepped up to make up for the loss of Anthony. I would have played Ra’Sean (Dickey) more, but I thought that Kansas was setting a lot of ball screens and that he may not be able to defend those as well.”

Junior Guard Jarrett Jack
On Kansas’ defense:
“Kansas really didn’t change anything late in the game. I didn’t really want to force the issue. I pretty much just took what the defense gave me. I thought we had some good looks at the basket, but some of them didn’t fall. I thought that Kansas would try and change their defense up and try to put bigger guys on me. I expected to see Michael Lee a lot. Coming into the game, I figured it would be a lot of different matchups for me.”

On Kansas’ performance:
“Kansas is probably the grittiest team we will play all year. They didn’t put their head down when we jumped out on them early. They stayed in and fought tough. You have to give credit to Coach Self. He (Self) kept their heads in the game. They fought back hard. They got thier hands on a lot of loose balls in the second half and they knocked down some big three-pointers which got them right back in the game.”

On the game:
“Keith Langford walked by me and told me that this game would be on ESPN Classic for a long time. This game was an opportunity to play in an overtime game on the road. Kansas probably has the best fans in the country, I have never been in a building with an atmosphere quite like this. We did a great job of battling for 40 minutes and overtime, but what can I say, (Langford) made a big shot.

Senior Forward Anthony McHenry
On Kansas’ performance:
“They fought for every loose ball. I feel like we (Georgia Tech) are also a gritty team and to see Kansas battling with us, it was pretty tough of them. We just came up short. Playing without (Wayne) Simien, you could tell they were even more hungry. Their big guys got to the glass hard and caused some loose balls that we had to fight for. Kansas played great.”

On fouling out:
“It was tough, but I had faith in my teammates and I thought that we were going to pull it out. We just got the short end of the stick this time.”