Postgame Quotes - Wake Forest vs. Coastal Carolina
11/23/2016 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
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Postgame Quotes -- Nov. 23, 2016
Wake Forest 86, Coastal Carolina 74
Head Coach Danny Manning
Opening statement...
"I thought we started off the game with some pretty good things. We established a nice lead and then after that Coastal Carolina came in and imposed that they're real. They decided the energy level they were going to play with and the effort level they were going to play with and they dictated based on that alone. They played extremely hard and you have to take your hats off to them. Those guys have been on a pretty long road trip. They went out to Utah and played, Vegas and played, flew back here and got off the plane last night around 9 o'clock or so and to come out and play with that type of effort and energy is very impressive."
On Wake Forest's performance:
"When we had the lead, I thought we did some decent things. Once that lead started to evaporate, we didn't play the way that we needed to play to have any type of success."
On what Wake Forest can take away from tonight's game:
"We will celebrate Thanksgiving tomorrow. We'll be off and then we'll come back the next day and go twice. We will get prepared for our next game. I give Coastal Carolina a lot of credit. They battled, fought, scrapped and they did a lot of good things that we didn't match. Fifteen second chance points to our zero, offensive rebounds. Those stats will carry over throughout the course of the year and we need to figure out a way to do a much better of rebounding the basketball and we didn't do that tonight."
Coastal Carolina Head Coach Cliff Ellis
Opening statement...
"I really can't fault the effort of our basketball team. We've been on a grueling road trip, and we got off to a slow start. I'd like to attribute it to the [tired] legs somewhat, because we got good looks. At the same time, you've got to give credit to Wake Forest. This is a very good Wake Forest team. The thing that I see differently from when we played them last year is the 3-point shot. They've got bigs [inside], but they can stretch you more. I think that showed - when we were making runs, they hit some big threes. They've got that inside-outside balance.
"They're going to win a lot of games. I think they'll be in the NCAA Tournament. They're one of those teams that can play for it - they've got that kind of team...Wake Forest knocked their free throws down, and that's the stat that's really the difference in the basketball game."
On getting back into the game after trailing 30-5...
"Well, the shots started falling. I think rebounding, and going zone, were the [keys] - and we started making shots. We got great looks early, we got great looks. It just wasn't going down - it was not going down. Once it started going, things started to even out...We made three runs. First run was before the half. We told them at halftime...let's get it under 10...The second run, we got it to four. Then here they come again...then we made another run, and then here they came. At the three-minute mark, we told our team you've got to start gambling and fouling, just take our chances. Our guys did everything we asked them to do, really."