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
Tennessee has been hardened by all those losses in the past, and now Bruce has brought in hope.
Every minute of it. I'm thrilled, I really am. Hopefully with the job he's done, it will bode well for (assistants) Anthony Grant and Donnie Jones and other coaches who have been here.
That's the one thing we don't know. That's the big question right now is this something that gets prolonged into the end of February, the beginning of March. Right now, we're hopeful that it's not going to be that situation.
I was hopeful going into second half. I thought maybe they were starting to get a little worn down. We were hopeful maybe their shots wouldn't go in and maybe they wouldn't rebound as well.
It's one of those things I can hope will get better and he can get back to playing because it's very obvious watching him play that he's not as reckless and daring and playing like he's capable of. I don't know if there's a level of uncertainty if he plants or runs or jumps or if the pain is so severe he just can't do what he's supposed to do.
It's teams like George Mason that give so many people hope in their lives, just seeing what great things can be accomplished.
Everybody's role on the team is a lot different than a year ago. For us, right now, it's really a one-game tournament. We've got to play to the best of our ability on Friday and hopefully advance and be able to play on Saturday.
It's hard when you lose. We have highly competitive guys. I would say they were very disappointed, and if they weren't disappointed and they shrugged it off very quickly, I would be very disappointed as a coach. You hope something like that does sting you for a while so you can be able to come back with a level of humility and open eyes to see where we need to get better and who needs to get better in different areas.
There is a point where somebody's going to do something and there's going to be a major problem. I hope it doesn't happen.
There might be some truth to (more pressure playing close to home). Kids say, 'There's so many people there I want to do so well,' so that can happen. If you're out in San Diego you're just kind of playing. (But) I don't think these guys will feel that way -- I hope they don't.
This is going to be the most time that we have had off to get ready for an opponent since December. I am hopeful that during that time that we can continue to improve and turn the focus on ourselves.
Someone told me his comments after the game was he put blame on himself. That's wrong. If anything I hold myself more accountable than I would hold him. The only thing I told him in that situation is not get ahead of himself and say, I probably should have called time out. That's probably what we needed to do. But hopefully next time he'll be able to learn.
If that happened, I'd be really disappointed in our team. We're playing against a team that really out-performed us a couple of weeks ago in Columbia. The final score says 6 points, but we were down by 15 in the second half, we were dominated in the game. I would hope our guys would be excited about having the opportunity to compete again and play again.
As a coach, all you're trying to do is feed them stuff that's going to help them grow faster. You hope that they take their vegetables, and they grow up healthy and they understand. And some of them do and, you know what, it certain situations they have.