Nov. 23, 2012

LOGAN, Utah -

On how this week of practice has gone:

"Not bad. Every day is different, but we had a really good workout Thanksgiving morning. I feel like we're making progress, but we'll see. As I've said for awhile now, we're just trying to get better. It hasn't been too bad. The guys have been coming out to practice and are starting to take some ownership of the team, which is really important. Anytime you do this for a living, you realize that you get to January and February and the players take over in terms of what's expected day-in and day-out. For the first time we're starting to see a little bit of ownership which is good. We'll see how we play against a good Weber State team. It's always interesting when we play each other, because there are a lot of similarities. That makes for an interesting match-up."

On preparing for Weber State's style of play and guarding their three-point shooting:

"That's an emphasis anytime you play Weber State. They can get it going in transition, they always look to shoot the three a lot. When you look at our last game, we gave up three's in a variety of different ways, against zone, against man, when we were pressing. We've got to do a better job of that, no question. That's something we've emphasized in practice this week. Whether we're ready to better defend against the three or not, we'll see, but we sure have tried to work on it."

On Weber State's three-point shooting:

"That's something they really look to do. They push it hard on the break and get a lot from the fast breaks. They're not hesitant at all to look to shoot them. When you look at the game last year, (Scott) Bamforth went 7-for-9 from three we were down by a large margin at half and actually played much better in the second half and cut into the deficit. He kind of blew it open in the first half. He shot us out and shot from deep. He's definitely got the ability to shoot the ball from deep. They've got good shooters and that's something every system always hopes to have, something we always try to have in our system. Randy's (Rahe) done a good job of recruiting guys who can shoot the ball."

On Weber State's standout players:

"(Davion) Berry is Damian Lillard's cousin and they've got him on transfer from a non-DI one school. He was an All-American there, and because of Lillard's great experience in Ogden and at Weber State, they were able to send him out last year. He's leading them in scoring, is really athletic, he can shoot it and make plays, he's just a really good wing. You look at him and say he's a good player. Then there's the freshman big kid that Randy has told me about (Bolomboy). He's really excited about him. He's athletic, 6-9 so he's big. Probably the best thing he does right now is rebound the ball, but he's going to continue to get better in all phases of the game. He's a good-looking freshman, I know that much."

On USU's high rebound numbers with a double-digit positive rebounding margin this season:

"I don't know that we can continue to be double digits in rebounding, but that has been something we've been really pleased with. That was a huge emphasis going into the Saint Mary's game. We were successful with that even though we missed a lot of shots. That gave us the chance to get the rebounds. I watched a bit of the Saint Mary's game last night and then looked at their stats this morning and they had plus-12 boards. They beat a team (Drexel) that's favored to win the Colonial League. That's something we've emphasized every day in practice. When we've had our real good teams, that's been a strength of ours, rebounding the ball. It will be a real plus if this team can be a good rebounding team. When you look at the three phases of the game: offense, defense and rebounding, the rebounding is probably our best phase. We've got to get better in the other phases and I think we will as we go along."

On seeing Randy Rahe's success after having him as an assistant:

"You know, I was thinking about that this morning. Most of all there's a sense of pride when you realize that you've got guys out there who are going to become head coaches. Believe it or not, I actually remember when I was an assistant. Every assistant coach aspires to be a head coach. When you can have guys become head coaches and do such a good job, there's a lot of warm feelings there. Randy and I are close. We talk a lot. We don't talk as much leading up to the game and then we talk more after the game. We're a little bit guarded though, until after the game. It's easier to play somebody once a year and somebody who's not in your league. He's always so gracious and has given me a lot of credit, but really as I've said the last few years, he's his own man. They do a lot of things differently than us and he's just done a fabulous job down there. I know Weber State loves him to death. I wish we didn't have to play, that's a hard thing, but I'm awfully proud of him and what he's accomplished."

On guys being fired up for in-state games:

"I think they're fired up to play. Some of them don't understand this in-state thing yet, that comes from playing in a few of those games. A lot of our guys haven't played in them, but I think just the fact that we haven't played for a week and we've had a lot of practice days, I think they're excited to get back out there. We had a real crisp practice yesterday and hopefully we do again today. In-state games are always a big thing for me, being from the state of Utah and I hope they are to our guys. The veterans definitely understand them a little more than the new guys."

-USU-