OU-West Virginia Postgame Quotes

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Head Coach Lon Kruger
Opening comment:
“A good win. I thought West Virginia did some things defensively to sort of knock us out of our rhythm in the first half. We adjusted to it as the game went on and obviously played better and finished really strong. I'm proud of the guys. It was a night when it wasn't real smooth but they kept playing and kept battling and figured out a way to win a ball game. When you do that in the Big 12 you feel pretty good. Cam (Clark) finished the way he did -- a great career here. To have him have a double-double in the last home game and to make big shots when we needed them very badly, those are good memories there. Buddy (Hield), of course in a critical time there in the second half, got down some 3's that created the separation that we played with for the rest of the game. We needed that from both of them. We have another tough one on Saturday.”

On getting production from different players from game to game:
“Je'lon (Hornbeak) comes in and he just continues to play better. I thought he and Jordan (Woodard) did a good job of giving us direction all night. D.J. (Bennett) came in there when Ryan (Spangler) picked up the foul, and had a little rest in the second half, and finished it out fine. So like you said, different guys on different nights. It is great to see that. That has kind of been the trademark of this group. They lean on each other and trust each other and they keep getting better.”

On D.J. Bennett:
“I thought D.J. was huge when he went into the game. He maybe blocked just a couple, but he affected some others and made them change shots a little bit. I think his length at the rim was really important. I thought Isaiah (Cousins), when he went back in the second half, really created some things off of the dribble. Those two guys right there kind of spurred us, in addition to Buddy and Cam making shots.”

On Je'lon Hornbeak:
“Je'lon has been a little bit more like we expected coming out of last year. You know, he fought that injury and I think he has been getting healthier all the time. The last four or five ball games he is playing with the confidence that we need from him and we expect him to keep getting better. He is doing a great job."

On defending Juwan Staten:
“We just tried to extend a little bit on him, but you have to be careful because he can go by you so quickly. He made shots and shot layups. We would rather he make shots and not give up layups, but he's tough. We did some good things in some other areas defensively, but that kind of freed Staten up a little bit and he is a very good player.”

Senior Guard Cameron Clark:
On playing well in his final home game:
“It was good. We got the win, so that's all I'm really focused on. My teammates and coaches helped me go out there and just be aggressive. I'm just glad I could play with them in my last home game of my career.”

On whether he was nervous about the direction of the game early in the second half:
“I wasn't really nervous, we just needed to do a better job on defense and I think we did that. Guys like Buddy, he made big shots. I made a few big shots, we got the win, and that's what we needed to do.”

Sophomore Guard Buddy Hield:
On how to bounce back after missing some 3-pointers:
“The coaching staff and the players keep on letting me shoot, and it helps my confidence level when they trust me shooting the basketball. I just got a good look and was able to knock it down, and I just got in a rhythm afterwards.”

“I felt it coming. I was focused and locked in, and I just took my time with every shot. I came down, and Isaiah [Cousins] made a great play for me and I made a nice shot. Coach kept trusting me and I made a nice shot, and I helped my team win the basketball game.”

On getting into a groove:
“All I need is one to go down, and I feel like I can make all of them afterwards. That's the confidence I have. My coach and the coaching staff and the players, once they see one go in, they know I'm going to shoot the next one regardless. Whether I have an open look, or whether it's a tough shot, I'm going to try to make the next one no matter what.”

West Virginia Head Coach Bob Huggins
On whether or not the game got away after Buddy Hield's scoring burst in the second half:
“I thought we knew who he was. Some of our guys must not have known who he was.

On why Hield was able to make four 3's in four minutes after West Virginia did a good job on him early:
“It looked to me like he was wide open. We did not try to contest him very much.”

On his team making four free throws on the night:
“I don't think its being called the way it was being called earlier in the year, and I don't think that is a bad thing. Before, the freedom of movement thing was enforced very heavily. It is not being enforced as much now. But that really has nothing to do with it. We just didn't do a very good job.”

On what caused Juwan Staten to slow down offensively late in the game:
“I think part of it is that he got tired. He has had the ball in his hands all year and he was kicking the ball out there to Gary (Browne), so I think he was tired. I think at one time he played more minutes than anyone in the country. I think he got a little tired.”

On Eron Harris' slow offensive night:
“They really crowded him and tried to keep him from catching it. They switched everything with him. Lon (Kruger) is a good coach. There are 30 tapes out there, so when you have guys that listen when you talk to them about tendencies you ough to be able to guard them, or do a better job, anyway. He got frustrated and in foul trouble. My fight was, should I have put him back in the first half earlier? But then if he picks up three (fouls), then I'm an idiot and we don't have any chance to win. But when you sit there that long it is hard.”

On the defensive lapses West Virginia had:
“Well, I said on the radio that, and I don't mean this in a bad way, but Kevin Noreen does not run as well as everyone else does. He is just not as good of an athlete. If he can get back, why can't the rest of them get back? He doesn't have a problem, not that he doesn't make mistakes, but he gets back. So, if he gets back why can't the rest of us get back? (Assistant Coach Ron Everhart) did a good job of saying, 'We have got to find Buddy (Hield), we have got to find him.' And I thought for a while we did, and then we just had those breakdowns. The truth of the matter is there is one guy who gave up 11 consecutive points. Which probably means I'm a bad coach, I should have got his (butt) out of there sooner, probably.”

On relying on jump shots:
“I thought we had them, we just didn't make them. Remi (Dibo) had good looks but didn't make them.”

On the growth of Devin Williams:
“We recruited Devin thinking that he could be a premier rebounder. I heard a term the other day that I really liked. It said that we cannot play 'sticky ball.' We got too many guys that play sticky ball. The ball sticks in their hands. They were talking about that we were a good team if we stopped playing sticky ball and we are a whole lot better team if we don't play sticky ball. You can only catch it and pivot about 12 times before it is a violation. At some point in time maybe you ought to think about passing it to some of your teammates.”

West Virginia Freshman Forward Devin Williams
On the team's 3-point defense:
“At the beginning of the half, the second half, I thought as a group, we were guarding it well. We held them under 40 percent, but at the beginning of the second half they were just getting to the line and then Buddy Hield hits three in a row and that changed the game. That took away our energy and I don't think we bounced back from that.”

On trying to make adjustments after Hield's 3-pointers:
“We talked about it in the first game; when we miss shots, they're a really good transition team and this time when we missed shots, they capitalized on it. They found Buddy Hield in his sweet spots; I think he hit three 3's in the corner, so we failed in the transition.”

West Virginia Junior Guard Gary Browne
On the team's offensive struggles:
“At some point it seemed like no one was making shots but Juwan. We weren't making shots and they were making shots; sometimes they were wide open. We can't let that happen. Sometimes we can't make shots, but we can't let them score the ball like that. We need to make sure we get a lot of stops, which we didn't do.”

On the defense allowing Oklahoma to get open shots:
“I think it was just us not going hard. We need to be sure we have five guys going all at the same time; we can't have three or two guys going hard. But at the same time, they did a pretty good job with Eron [Harris], didn't let him score and then they did a good job with Juwan as well. We need to make sure things like that don't happen.”

West Virginia Junior Guard Juwan Staten
On the team's inability to build on its second-half three-point lead:
“We let Hield get open; I think he hit about three 3's in a row and that was pretty much it right there. We fought hard to come back, had the game right where we wanted and then we gave up about 11 points straight. That did it for us and from then on we were trailing.”

On the team's lapse of defense at the 3-point line:
“It seems like we say the same thing every game, we've been saying the same thing all year. It's our defense. We've been getting better all year but there's just something about the game. People get around, lights come on and as a team we get in quicksand. We don't get to open players or players that we know are capable of shooting the ball. It seems like those are the ones that are always open. Players that don't make shots, we're guarding. It doesn't really make sense but that's what we're doing.”

On Oklahoma's defense on him in the second half:
“In the second half, they definitely paid more attention to me. They collapsed on my drives a little bit more. We were able to get the ball down low a lot; we just weren't able to convert on layups and open shots. It was just ball game from that point. Defending on one end and not making the most of the offensive opportunities we get on the offensive end; we're going to lose the game.”