University of Kentucky Basketball Media Conference
Sunday, January 8, 2017
John Calipari
Q. You don’t get a big game from Malik, and yet you win convincingly?
JOHN CALIPARI: Well, Malik played pretty well, I thought. You know, 15-8. I mean that’s — oh, you mean Malik Monk. Oh, that kid. Here’s what I said after. De’Aaron Fox is ridiculous. He’s been doing extra work. He’s been coming to practice early, not by choice, and he has really been working and it showed in the game. I said to the guys. What do you want to say to him? Do this every night, man. Play this way. This is who you are.
I thought our defense was good. I thought Derek Willis was outstanding, getting better defensively, getting better rebounding the ball. Then I said after, look, Malik, it’s really hard playing your hometown team. It’s just hard. How you played, you played good. You got a tough foul, and it was on him, and it was a foul. He had no discipline. He went and got a second one in the first half.
But I said, look, we took Tony Barbie home when I was at UMass. Tony was a heck of a player. He went 1 for 12 at Purdue. It’s hard to play those kind of games. You can say it’s not hard, but it’s really hard. He did good, though.
Q. Cal, what did you say to your guys when you went out on the floor after that late foul on Bam and huddled them all up?
JOHN CALIPARI: No, my thing is, look, games are going to get heated. They’re going to get testy. The and we do not respond. That’s how we are. And these kids are so young, their first reaction is they get bumped or pushed and they want to push back. You can’t. You put your arms up and you walk away. It was a great lesson.
Look, Arkansas is a terrific team. They’re 25 in the RPI. They’ve played well. They have a great record. 12-3 now. And they’re a physical team, and so are we, and it got a little testy, but that’s what it is. These guys all like those guys. Like Malik knows them all. He didn’t have any issue with anybody on that team.
So we shot the ball pretty well. Didn’t shoot it well from the three, but Derek did, which was good for us. Derek and Michael.
Q. Cal, after the first pushing and shoving match, did you like the way that your guys responded after that? It seemed like they had a little bit more energy.
JOHN CALIPARI: Well, let me say this. My team won’t be bullied. This isn’t that kind of team. The issue is it gets you more focused, sharper, and more disciplined. That’s what good teams are. You’re not going to bully us into a loss. That’s not how these kids — you think about who is on this team. So they’ll fight back.
But, again, these are all teaching moments. I’ve got all freshmen and sophomores, teaching moments. You don’t respond that way. This is how you respond.
Q. How much better was Derek in staying in front of his man, and how much better was Isaiah?
JOHN CALIPARI: Okay, he’s so mad at me. When I said, you know, we’ve been working, making him shoot it higher. So what happened to his first two shots? They got blocked. And I said, you get another shot blocked, I’m taking you out. So now he shot them high. He missed them. But we rebounded them and dunked them. Then he made two, shooting them high.
Oh, he can do it, but, you know, he’s just arguing with me like he can’t. My thing, and I said to these guys in practice today. You get master something, my job is to make you uncomfortable. And Isaiah’s case, he’s making free throws, he’s making threes. He’s playing better with the ball. He’s rebounding. Now you are going to shoot the ball higher on lay-ups. I’m not telling you to shoot it different. Just shoot it higher, and he did. It drove him crazy, because we rebounded every one of his misses and he made two. So, it ended up playing out, and we’ll just continue to work on it.
Q. You mentioned Willis a little bit, and you talked about his defensive and rebounding effort was getting to his shooting?
JOHN CALIPARI: Well, here’s the other thing we’ve done with he and Wenyen. They’re with Kenny and the big guys when we’re doing all the pick-and-roll and rotating and scheming defensively bigs. I’m bringing them down with the guards and letting them do all the shooting stuff. So they’re getting even more shots in.
I think it’s helping both he and Wenyen. Now, Wenyen missed the shot in the corner, which is fine. Then he got the shot at the top, and what did he choose to do? Walk, drive it. Why didn’t you shoot it? Because he missed the last one. Well, you can’t play that way. You miss both of those and maybe miss them badly, you do what Brad did, and you get in the gym tonight. Tonight you go back in the gym by yourself and you’re there till one o’clock in the morning and you’re working on shooting. That’s how you get better.
You owe the team to be disciplined enough to do what you’re supposed to do. Do your job. His job is to shoot that ball. We created a good shot for him. Your job is to shoot it. We can’t make it. Get in the gym at night and work on it. He blocked shots today. He rebounded better. Wenyen’s getting better. Derek’s getting better. Isaac’s getting better. I love what I saw with Sasha in the couple minutes he was in there, going after balls and making free throws and doing what he was doing.
Q. You spoke a lot earlier this season about guys getting themselves to the foul line. Are you starting to see that kind of pay off?
JOHN CALIPARI: Well, let me say this: I can’t begin to tell you how many foul shots we’ve shot here through what you guys would call Camp Cal. There’s been, you know, they’re shooting a ton of free throws, and they’ll start shooting them better. Now shooting free throws takes time. So you can either go two times in a day plus class, plus tutors, or you’ve got to give up something.
For us, we didn’t practice free throws a whole lot. We didn’t have time. We didn’t practice situational basketball before Christmas. We didn’t have time. Now we get to where we have the time. We’re zeroing in on defensively how we’re playing. We’re playing with more discipline. We’re shooting more free throws. You know, we’re back in the weight room doing stuff.
But tomorrow’s the last day. So tomorrow they’ll weight train and watch tape. We’ll come back and walk through in the evening, and we’re going to have a celebratory dinner. Camp Cal’s over, because we practice and then we go to Vandy on Monday.
Q. You guys have won the first three in the league by big margins. Why shouldn’t we think you’re just that much better than the rest of the league?
JOHN CALIPARI: I don’t think that’s true, but, you know, I’m just worried about saying how good can we get? How good can we be? And we’re not there yet, I can tell you.
Every time we tried to steal a ball today it ended up in a basket, a three-point play or a three. Why did you do it? We don’t play that way. It’s just a lack of discipline. We’ve got to continue. We’ve got to play a full game where we’re not taking chances, that we can block, we can stay in front.
Today about five times we jumped on the side of a guy. Well, why would you do that? So he drives right down the lane. Again, we’ll watch it on tape, but, you know, it’s asking a lot of freshmen. But you decided to come here, so this is what it is.
Q. What is it that seems to make De’Aaron? Some nights he’s great at the foul line, some nights he struggles. Is it something that you’ve picked up on?
JOHN CALIPARI: Great question for him. Is he coming out? Oh, that should be your first question.
Q. What do you think?
JOHN CALIPARI: Say is it because the coach gets on you? Do you think it’s the coach? That’s how you should answer the question. He may say it is the coach (laughing). Believe me, he’s probably thinking that too.
Q. How much improvement would you say your team made from the start of camp to the end? And how much harder is it to get a lot better once class is resumed and you’re restricted?
JOHN CALIPARI: Well, what I did in ’14-’15 when we were 38-0, we took one day a week off, and then we took another day and did individual work, weight training. Or if a guy played a lot of minutes, needed whatever treatments and stuff, so we would play two games a week, practice three days a week, take a day off, and then take another day as an individual workday. I may do that with this team. I don’t know yet. But that would be Wednesday completely off and Sunday would be their individual workday.
I’ve done that with some teams, you know, if I think they’re getting better and they need more individual attention than just practicing. But I’ll play that by ear.
Kentucky Players
#3, Bam Adebayo, Freshman, Forward
On being inspired by Arkansas’ physical play …
“We’re like brothers so we take up for each other. It brings us closer because nobody is going to come between us. We just fought harder. “
On Arkansas trying to agitate the team …
“They were just playing physical. I mean it was just ticky-tacky stuff. We kept level heads and we came out with the W.”
On De’Aaron Fox’s performance tonight …
“They started pressing him and we were like, why would you press Fox? So, after that he just started shooting layups and you’re not going to tell him to stop. We just started cheering him on and we said ‘Keep going.’ We all just looked at each other and smiled. We might smile, then after that we tell Fox to just go. We just say go.”
#0, De’Aaron Fox, Freshman, Guard
On picking up the slack in scoring with Malik Monk struggling to find his rhythm …
“I wouldn’t consider it slack. Even if he isn’t making shots, teams are still going to guard him. So, I guess it would be using him as a decoy. When things aren’t going his way and then it would turn into one-on-one with my defender and I think I won that battle a lot.”
On doing extra work with Coach Payne …
‘”You just have to see it. You have to see it to see me and Coach Payne’s relationship. I have been in the gym a lot more. I started making free throws again. I was efficient today and I think it was due to me practicing more. There is a lot of conditioning in those workouts, so today I was never tired and I think it showed.”
On why he’s good at the free-throw line and some days not…
“I don’t know. It has been a roller coaster this year. (I) just hope we’re going up more than we’re going down.”
On Derek Willis’ play making the offense flow …
“It’s ridiculous. He is another guy that can stretch the floor out. We know they’re going to guard Malik (Monk) and Isaiah (Briscoe) is making shots. It helps me out. It helps Bam (Adebayo) out if anything it helps Isaiah out, just driving the lanes and being able to kick for easy baskets. Not having to put my body on the line going up. I can just pass it to Derek knowing that he will making easy shots.”
#35, Derek Willis, Senior, Forward
On his defensive effort …
“There were a couple lapses, just like any game, that I had. I think at the beginning, during the first series, I missed some balls I could’ve gotten – rebounds. That kind of got on my nerves and I tried to pick it up defensively. I just hit some shots and asserted myself offensively.”
On what got him out of his shooting slump …
“I feel like all shooters go through a slump of some sort. That’s just where I was trying to play better defense and rebound and focus on that while I came out of it. Tonight I felt comfortable shooting. I’ve been doing different things – getting in the gym more, trying to get more shots up, and try not to fall back.”
On if he’s more relaxed when he’s in a rhythm shooting …
“It’s just getting into the flow of the game. I feel like I was so focused on playing defense and rebounding and trying to do those things right, which I’ve improved on a lot, that it takes from your offensive game a little bit. I was working a lot harder than I ever have on defense. I think it could’ve been a little bit of conditioning where my legs weren’t really used to it and it affected my shot or reverted back to old habits. It’s just being in the gym more and being more comfortable.”
Arkansas Head Coach Mike Anderson
Opening statement …
“First off, I thought before half, I thought it was a tremendous effort by our guys. Kentucky is a great team, we know that. Cal has probably one of his more talented teams here and I thought our guys fought toe to toe in the first half, but we all know the game is 40 minutes. We didn’t do our part in the second half. They continued to do what they do in the second half and the thing that glares out in my mind was I thought the game would be won in the paint. The true form it was between transition baskets they got in the second half and then the first half – they won in the paint, got offensive rebounds and then they shot 40 free throws. You shoot 40 free throws, you’re going to win a lot of games. I know they want to clean it up, but that’s just going to another level. It was a physical ballgame, and I know that. But, hats off to them. I thought (De’Aaron) Fox did a good job of controlling the game – and (Derek) Willis – the guy that keeps haunting us. Last year he haunted us at Bud Walton Arena, and tonight he haunted us as well. He’s one of those stretch guys – and it just seems like I go and watch games and he don’t shoot it like that – but when the Razorbacks show up, he lights it up. We’ll learn from it. We’ve got a team that is still learning how to play in an environment like this. You haven’t seen the best of the Razorbacks yet.”
On if he was happy with the way that his players contained Malik Monk …
“We lost the game. I’m not satisfied. We lost the game. This is Arkansas versus the University of Kentucky. This is not Arkansas versus Malik Monk. Monk is a hell of a player. We know that. I don’t think I would have recruited him since the ninth grade if I didn’t think he was a hell of a player, so let’s get past that. This is Arkansas versus Kentucky.”
On the play in the second half involving Jaylen Barford …
“I didn’t see what happened, but it caused the guy who was playing the best on our basketball team in foul trouble because they called a technical foul and then a personal foul, so I don’t know. I don’t know if something was said. I’ll have to look at the replay. It started off like maybe they called a charge. I think if cooler heads contained themselves then I think you say this is something you call a technical on both guys. We’ve got a hell of a game going on and the kid was playing well, so I haven’t seen it – but obviously I’m biased and I don’t agree with the call. It is what it is, and that had nothing to do with the outcome of the game. Kentucky is an outstanding team and they did what they needed to do. In the conference race, you’ve got to defend your home court and they did that.”
On the balance of Kentucky’s offensive attack …
“That’s what I’m saying – people want to talk about Monk. (Bam) Adebeyo, what about him? (Isaiah) Briscoe, in the second half I thought he was better. Like I said, Willis, Monk is a big part of it, so you pay attention to him and that’s part of the strategy. I don’t think people understand that. You pick on him and then other guys might get off. I hope you guys cover basketball enough to understand that. From that standpoint, that’s kudos to Cal. He got a couple fouls early on in the second half and we had to find out where he was, but I thought it allowed a lot of other guys to get to the offensive boards, and I thought they were a lot tougher going down the stretch than our guys.”
On Anton Beard’s lack of productivity compared to Arkansas’ last game …
“Well, I’m sure. He’s been in treatment ever since the last time we were at home. He’s playing on a lot of guts right now. He’s not 100 percent, but a lot of players aren’t 100 percent. He came in and gave us a lot of things on defense. We just seem a much calmer team when he’s on the floor. Obviously, we would have used some scoring and that’s what happened. We had a drought. We had a drought there in the second half and we just needed some scoring. Whether it would be him or whether it would be Dusty Hannahs. We asked (inaudible) to score inside and we missed some lay-ups. Trey Thompson had a couple going down the stretch, but at the end of the day consistency is what we are trying to find with these guys. It’s like with (Jaylen) Barford before half, he’s there, the second half it gets turned over and the foul trouble and it just kind of goes that way. With our team, we have to have certain guys play well and with Kentucky, I don’t think it was an off night, but (Monk) didn’t give you the points that he normally gives you. But it came from other guys. That’s why it’s called T-E-A-M.”
