January 15, 1999
Head Coach Tubby Smith Quotes
On UK’s Scott Padgett and Wayne Turner
“One good thing about the Tennessee game was that Scott Padgett got his1,000th point, and that is quite an honor. He’s done a lot for thisuniversity and he has contributed a lot to this basketball program. Wayneonly needs only 33 points to get in that club, and I want to congratulatethose young men.”
On the Tennessee game
“After watching the tape, I thought it could have gone either way. We hadour chance at the end, but we just couldn’t get the ball to drop.”
On Ole Miss, which is coming off a loss to Auburn
“We have to get ready now for a good Ole Miss team that is playing verywell. They are coming off a tough loss against Auburn, but Auburn isplaying great. It’s good for our conference that Auburn is undefeated. Theyare getting a lot of recognition, which they deserve. Cliff Ellis has donea fantastic job there, and Rod Barnes has done a great job at Ole Miss.They are doing the things Rob Evans was doing last year. I’ve been asimpressed with this team as any team they’ve had at Ole Miss.”
On the Ole Miss game
“Tad Smith Coliseum is a tough place to play. We’ve got to play a muchbetter game than we did against Tennessee. We have to do a better job ofhandling pressure, and another thing we have to do is contain Keith Carter.He’s having an excellent year. He’s a big part of their offense and hereally makes them go. I’ve also been impressed with Michael White and JasonHarris as far as their ability to run the team.”
On UK’s Heshimu Evans, slump
“Heshimu will work his way through it. We may change our lineup to get morequickness on the court, but that is the extent of it. To Heshimu’s credit,he has had to make that big-time adjustment of going to the two-guard spot.Now he’s far away from the basket, and he’s looking at more shots fromthree-point range than shots close to the basket. We need to get him insidemore.”
“Heshimu is having to adjust and react to what people are giving him andwhat they are taking away from him. Two-guard is not something you justbecome. Now that teams are trying to get us in a half-court game, that kindof neutralizes his athleticism. The other night against Tennessee, wedidn’t have that many opportunities to press, and that can create a problemfor us.”
On UK’s shooting
“Scott [Padgett] has shown the ability to knock down the outside shot withconsistency. But teams have shown that they can keep the ball away fromhim, so he has to get better at moving without the ball. Ryan Hogan hasalso shown the ability to shoot from outside. We need to see who isshooting well at that particular time and get them in the game. That’ssomething we didn,t do well against Tennessee.”
On UK’s versatility
“I like the versatility of our team, and we,ve got to play to ourstrengths. We can’t lock ourselves into one mode. Last year, we could playquick or physical. We can still do that this year, we just have a lot moreinexperienced people trying to do it. It’s just a matter of working throughit and bringing these guys along.”
On Rahim Lockhart
“He reminds me of Heshimu, with the way he can battle inside and hisaggressiveness and toughness. Those types of playersmobile, athleticcentersgive us problems.”
On making adjustments
“You have to make adjustments, team by team. No two teams are alike and notwo games are alike. You have to adjust game-by-game, half-by-half,moment-by-moment. The toughest thing has been putting the puzzle together,and a lot of that had to do with not having everyone at the beginning ofthe year, and not having all the pieces. That can lead to confusion on whocan do what. The tough thing for our players is communicating and carryingout our game plan to its fullest. The game plan is changing so frequently,and I think the guys are still not sure what their roles are.”
On substitutions
“If a player makes a mental mistake or a mental breakdown on the defensiveend, you have to get him out of the game immediately. He’s not into thegame and he’s not ready to play. But if it’s just a shot not going in, Imight make some comment on what he should do to adjust his shot. But Iwould never take someone out for just missing a shot, unless he rushed theshot or it was a bad shot at that time.”
Player Quotes
#42 Jamaal Magloire – Junior/Center
On the starting lineup…
“Coach Smith knows what he’s doing and I respect any decision he makes.It’s not about who starts, it’s about who finishes. We have a lot to proveand we need to go into the Ole Miss game focused and ready to work hard.”
“The Tennessee game was just a low-scoring game. We didn’t execute welloffensively and we didn’t make up for it on defense. We didn’t rebound andwe didn’t make some key shots. We have to come together and improve as ateam. We all have roles on this team that we have to fulfill, but we needto pick each other up and play together.”
#5 Wayne Turner – Senior/Guard
“I think it’s my job as the point guard to keep the offense running smooth. If guys aren’t scoring like they can, I need to tell them to stayconfident and keep taking the open shots because they’re going to falleventually. If some of the guys get too low, I need to help get them backinto the flow of the game.”
“We need a lot more movement on defense. We need to stay fundamentallysound and make sharp passes and our decision making needs to be a lotbetter. We can’t panic if someone gets in our face. If we play hard andset good screens, the offense will take care of itself.”
#11 Saul Smith – Sophomore/Guard
“Teams are going to come in and play their ‘A’ game against us. That’sgoing to happen every time we put on the Kentucky uniforms. We have abulls eye on our backs because we’re the defending national champions andeveryone wants to beat us. Every team is going to be emotionally andphysically ready to play us and we have to realize that and play hard everygame.”
“Confidence is a big thing when you’re struggling offensively. You have tostick in there and keep shooting and believe that every shot is going to goin. That’s the mentality of a shooter and a scorer. You have to believethat the next shot is going to go in.”
#33 Michael Bradley – Sophomore/Center
“We made some mistakes we shouldn’t have against Tennessee. We just needto put that in the past and focus on Mississippi. We have to play hard andget better and correct some of the mistakes we made in the Tennessee game.”
“We’re still trying to get the right chemistry. It’s a little late in theseason for that, but we’re still sort of feeling each other out and tryingto get on track. We just need to pick it up as a team and be more physical.”
#34 Scott Padgett – Senior/Forward
“We had a good practice yesterday. I was surprised we lost to Tennessee. Wedon’t ever expect to lose. There are young guys coming in who still thinkwe should win every game. In order to stop things like that, we have to getit done in practice.”
“It definitely takes a lot of work to adjust to a new position like Heshimuhas. I think he’s very capable of doing it. He’s in a little slump rightnow, but he’ll get out of it.”
“Our job is to go out every game and play our best. Whether Heshimu isstarting or not, we can’t worry about that. If we’re playing well, thelineup shouldn’t matter. How we start the game, with our lineup, isn’t thatimportant. We have to play hard no matter who is in the game.”
#40 Jules Camara – Freshman/Forward
“Everybody has played so hard, but we have to play all of our games hardfor 40 minutes. We need to take care of the ball a lot better.”
“I look forward to playing hard every game. It depends on how I show thatI’m ready to play and how I do in practice. It’s hard for freshmen to comeout and play, especially at Kentucky. I’m still learning how to be focusedon the game. “
“Kentucky isn’t very different from Virginia. The change for me has beenthe attention that I get as a basketball player. People want autographswhen I’m out in public and you get a lot of exposure here. I miss myfamily, but I like it here. Everybody on the team and around us is greathere.”
