Ben Howland
Ben Howland
Benjamin Clark Howlandis an American college basketball coach for the Mississippi State Bulldogs and former player. He served as the head men's basketball coach at Northern Arizona University from 1994 to 1999, the University of Pittsburgh from 1999 to 2003, and the University of California, Los Angelesfrom 2003 to 2013. Howland became the first men's coach in modern college basketball history to be fired shortly after winning an outright power-conference title. He is one of the few NCAA Division I...
ProfessionCoach
Date of Birth28 May 1957
CityLebanon, OR
Florida has a great offensive team. It really is going to be a big challenge for us to be able to try to defend such skilled players and good passers. Everybody can shoot it.
My biggest thing with him is he would never take any time off. He was sneaking in the gym. We got beat by West Virginia and all of a sudden he's back in the gym that night shooting for two hours. It's actually counter-productive when you wear your body out that much. It's like a marathon runner getting ready to run a marathon by running five marathons the day before he's going to run the marathon.
Typically if we get out-boarded by nine and shoot 5-of-13 from the foul line and allow someone to shoot 61 percent in the first half, we are not going to win. We gutted it out, found a way.
To shoot 3 for 19 from the threes and still win the game is a testament to our defense and rebounding.
We will be shooting a lot of free throws this week at Pauley Pavilion.
We were really sensitive to him shooting threes.
It was a great win. I'm excited for our team. In the first half we forced 13 turnovers. Our defense was so active. It was misleading. Arizona shot 58 percent. It's astounding they can shoot 58 percent and lose. Usually, you win when you shoot a percentage like that.
They're obviously a great shooting team. Any time you shoot 39 percent on the year from three as a team, that's outstanding.
I'm the foul shooting coach, so blame me. We'll get better. I promise.
We feel very, very fortunate to move on to the next round.
We hit some tough shots. It was a night of tough shots.
It was another outstanding job defensively. In the second half, we did a much better job of getting to the line and getting fouled.
The very best players are my kind of players.
Florida was terrific. Credit Billy Donovan. They were really well coached. They did an excellent job handling our pressure.