Arizona has its second 5-game win streak in Big 12 play, this current one the byproduct of two emotional road wins in the past four days. The Wildcats are 5-1 on the road in the league and, aside from a bad final five minutes at Texas Tech have looked incredibly poised away from home.
“Our theme for the week was habits and what an opportunity to test your habits in a hostile environment,” UA coach Tommy Lloyd said after the 85-74 win at BYU. “Are you gonna get rattled? Are you gonna lose focus on the game plan or who you are when the crowd gets going or they make a shot, or the ref makes a call, and what an opportunity to practice your habits. And we were able to do that today in an amazing atmosphere.”
Our game recap can be found here. Below is what Lloyd, guard Caleb Love and center Henri Veesaar said afterward:
Lloyd on Arizona’s play of late: “They’re playing so much better than I’m coaching now, it’s not even close, and that’s when you know you got a good team. I’m really proud of these guys for how they’ve responded, but we got film coming up, and we got a big game on Saturday, so there’s no let up.”
On playing at BYU: “It’s an honor and privilege to compete here. I’ve played here a lot of times, and you always cherish the opportunity to play in a place like this. Fortunately, I’ve been with Gonzaga and Arizona, so when I come here, the game’s meant something, and the fans have always been amazing and it’s always been something we look forward to.”
On Jaden Bradley: “Jaden is becoming the consummate point guard. He understands winning. We were working on it early, and he’s such a compliant player, and person, it was just finding that balance of how aggressive do you need to be early, versus running your team. And I think he’s really settled into a sweet spot where he’s just running the team, and he just literally makes the right play every single time.I told him he’s a way better point guard than I am a coach, and thank you for that.”
On his message to the team at halftime: “I said guys, it’s 41-41. We played a hell of a half, in a hell of an environment. There was no switch to flip, let’s just go out possession by possession and win the game. I didn’t have to talk to JB and pull him aside and say hey, be more aggressive, not like that, because he knows what to do to win. And when you have that as a coach, what a luxury.”
On defending BYU down the stretch: “Honestly, we stuck with our plan. We knew that they were going to run a bunch of ATOs and kind of counters to actions and stuff like that. In a 2-day scouting report, you’re kind of first time playing against a coach and a new team in a new conference. You don’t have all the tells or tendencies. You just have to rely on the players. And I was watching out there some of the actions and counters they were running from our end, and literally our guys were solving it on their own, and which was amazing. They just didn’t get a lot of great shots and maybe they had a few okay ones, they missed them, and we were able to get the rebound.”
On not calling a timeout when BYU retook the lead in 2nd half: “I trust my guys. I don’t ever want to be the first guy to call a timeout. It’s kind of the old Phil Jackson thing, right? Like, you will if you have to. I mean, you got to swallow your pride sometimes. But I trust these guys to figure out. To me, what’s more powerful than a time out is a response. I think they made a big 3, and then I think Caleb made a big 3. That’s way more powerful than me calling a timeout, and I’ve always believed in that. I just trust that. I had my timeouts in my mind all night when I was gonna kind of implement them, but it seemed like we just didn’t need them. And I kind of felt good about the rhythm of the game. I didn’t want to make the game disjointed, because I liked the feel of how it was going.”
On keeping the emotions in check: “One of the things we’ve really been working on, and because our guys are susceptible like anybody, is celebrations to your team and to your fans are way more powerful than to the other bench or to your opponent or talking trash. And it’s a fine line, because if the game is an emotional game, and what we watch on TV. So I give Caleb a million percent credit because I knew exactly what he was doing. He looked right at our bench, he said everybody calm down. We’re fine. And when you have a player like that sending that message, rather than celebrating for his own gratitude or his own feelings to the fans, that’s when you know you got something. So I’m really proud of the progress these guys have made in that area. Because you know what, we’ve had a few incidents this year where maybe it hasn’t gone the way we would like some of those celebrations. So that was a huge step for our team today.”
On going 36 of 39 from the line on road trip: “I thought we were going to be a great free throw shooting all along. Some days you’re not, but I think I thought overall we would average out fine, and I think that’s what we’re showing.”
On Bradley’s free throws: “A lot of those came during the one-and-one, and when you have a veteran guard and you’re going up four to six, six to eight. I mean, those are massive free throws, because if you miss the first one, it’s an empty possession. If you make your one-and-one, when you’re trying to, I don’t know if close out of game is the right word, but manage a game, it’s so important, and for him to do that was was really big.”
Love on the Marriott Center: “It was a great environment. It was fun to play in. We just had to come in and embrace it. Stay steady during the chaos of the game. Stay poised, just stick to the game plan. We made plays down the stretch on both ends of the floor to put ourselves ahead of the curve. They were throwing punches, but we were throwing ours too. We made plays. Guys stuck to the plan. We rebounded the ball great. We was moving the ball, sharing the ball as well, and we got good shots and good looks.”
On his shhh motion after the go-ahead 3: “I wasn’t really going to the crowd, I was telling my teammates we were good. Like I said, in the chaos of the game you want to stay poised, and my energy was going to the team.”
Veesaar on his play inside: “I feel like we just had good ball movement as a team, like the guards gave me great pocket passes, great passes, so they made my job really easy. I had mostly just layups and dunks.”
On the environment: “BYU has a great crowd, the fans were going crazy even before the game started, so that gave us a lot of energy, like being the villain.”