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
against beat carolina challenge emotion face facet game good great home kids last performed played points season second south start team time totally win
This will be our second time to face South Carolina this season. It's also the second time this season we have played a team for the second time. They played with great emotion the last time we played each other. We got off to a good start early, but they were the better team that night. It was a six-point win for them, but they had us down 15 points at one point. This game will be a challenge for us. They have competitive kids and they totally out performed us. They beat us in every facet of the game. The challenge to our team is to take it one game to the next. Our last time against them is over. Our last home game is over.
good guys playing points score
It was good to see us score so many points without those guys playing so much.
conference game good guys playing points score starters team tennessee
Our starters didn't play a lot of minutes, and it was good to see us score as many points as we did with those guys not playing. For our team right now, playing this midweek game before getting back into the (Southeastern) conference at Tennessee (Saturday) was good for us.
board field half left percent points second shooting shot three turned
I thought we left a lot of points on the board in the first half, because we had 11 turnovers and we were shooting 52 or 53 percent from the field. Second half we only turned it over three times and we shot 52 percent from the field and that's why we had a 52-point half.
battling game kept kids playing points truly win
Our kids just kept battling and playing hard. I mean, to win a championship game and not even get to 50 points is truly remarkable.
anyone five four guys points team
I don't know if we're going to be a team that has anyone that's going to get 18, 19 or 20 points a game. What we have to do is be a team that has four or five guys averaging 10 to 15 points a game.
derive guys kids locker pleasure points room scoring talking watching
I derive a lot of pleasure watching these kids play. We don't have guys in the locker room talking about not scoring enough points or not getting enough shots. They play the right way. They really do.
chris dealing game grab kids points richard score start team willing
These kids are throwbacks. It's very, very refreshing. You're dealing with different, different kids. Does Chris Richard want to start and score 35 points every game and grab 15 rebounds? Yes. But they're willing to put the team before themselves.
felt gave half offensive outside rebounds score second tried
We tried to make them score outside their offense. We gave up 10 offensive rebounds in the first half, but in the second half I felt like their frontcourt was fatigued.
assistance function fund kids notice players recently short student suit
We just recently had a function where we had to go into the student assistance fund to get players some clothes. Some of our kids come from backgrounds where getting a suit on short notice is difficult.
attack mix
We just wanted to continually attack and mix up our defenses.
attack continue defend extra game guys mix pass tried year
We just tried to continue to attack and mix up our defenses. I told our guys this game would come down to the same things we've been doing all year - unselfishness, making the extra pass and being able to defend and rebound.
built deep good run
We weren't good enough. We weren't built to make a deep run in the tournament.
felt fortunate locker playing room tied
We were playing for survival. I felt fortunate just going into the locker room being tied at halftime.