Billy Donovan
Billy Donovan
William John Donovan, Jr.is an American professional basketball coach who is currently the head coach of the Oklahoma City Thunder of the National Basketball Association. He previously spent 19 seasons at the University of Florida, where his Florida Gators men's basketball teams won two NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Championships in 2006 and 2007. Donovan has more wins than any other coach in the history of the Florida basketball program, and he coached the Gators to more NCAA tournament appearances,...
ProfessionCoach
Date of Birth30 May 1965
CityRockville Centre, NY
lost passion played
When we lost to Manhattan, we were banged up. That's not making excuses. I just didn't like the passion we played with in that tournament.
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When we lost three in a row, I said it's good for our team because it is helping them figure out how to win. They didn't understand a missed block out, a broken defensive assignment, giving up 3-point shots could cause us to lose.
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We've had some good quality wins on the road at Providence and Miami, but our guys still feel like they have an enormous amount to prove. The mindset of our basketball team is we feel like going against Georgia is a lot to prove.
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We'll have to deal with being ranked one, two or three in the country. These are the kids I would love to deal with those challenges with.
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To start this tournament over again, I may not be sitting up here. It is a one-shot game, one-shot deal. Sometimes the best teams don't always advance on in the NCAA Tournament. This team, starting the season, I felt had all the team makeup (to go far). They were unselfish and they wanted to win.
deal game issues needed people step
We all deal with issues and challenges. This is a game where we needed different people to step up.
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Tonight, we won because of our defense and they didn't shoot the ball particularly well. I would say it was a combination, that we did at times challenge their shots, and there were maybe also some shots they just didn't knock down.
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Tonight was about consecutive stops, and we guarded the 3-point line. If you want to look back and go to a key thing of why we lost three games in a row, check the 3-point line ... that's why we lost.
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Tonight happened to be one of his nights. We become a very difficult team when he shoots like that.
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To me, he's involved in every aspect of their offense. He can score off the dribble and he's gotten better at finding his own shot. And he's probably as good as any point guard in this league in terms of knowing when to shoot, when not to shoot, when to go inside and when to pull it out.
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The reason he shot it so far to the left was he never really got his left arm up and he shot it across his body. This is going to be another one to two weeks before he's back to probably feeling healthy. I would think that he would be available against South Carolina. How many minutes? What type of role? Will he be able to get back to his shooting form? I'm hopeful, but I'm not counting on that.
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There is not a big difference between the one or two (seeds) and the five or six (seeds). I don't think anybody would be surprised with anybody beating anybody.
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Those three losses, to be honest, I felt pretty encouraged. I just didn't want our guys to get down. I wanted them to see 'Hey listen, this is what we're giving up, and we're losing in overtime and losing by 2 to 3 points. Imagine if we shore this up, how good we can be.' That was kind of the message I tried to give them during that time.
basketball experience felt games starting team win
This team, starting the season, I felt had all the team makeup. Unselfishness. They wanted to learn, they wanted to work, they wanted to get better. I didn't know if we'd have the experience to win basketball games or enough basketball games because we'd never been there before.