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
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.
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.
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.
I'd like to start Moss, unless he says he doesn't want to start.
When you can start something from scratch and build it up to win a championship, that's something special.
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.
I was really happy for Adrian, especially after the game he had at South Carolina (no points, two turnovers in two minutes. It allowed our starters to get a little bit of a breather.
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.
We're not at all telling our guys when the shot is up, you need to block shots. We're more concerned about challenging shots and then being able to block out and rebound to start the break. That's where our focus has been.
I would love to start Moss. Unless he tells me he doesn't want to start, I would like to start Moss.
I probably won't start him. Lee is getting better and is progressing, but he probably won't start until he shows me that he can get through a full practice healthy.
I'm concerned a little bit that it may go through our team. If anybody does come back positive, we'll try to start them on some antibiotics. This is the time of year, but I don't use that as an excuse. . . . We all have to deal with challenges and different things that happen throughout the course of the year.
It has to start somewhere. That's what we are trying to build at Florida. It's never been done, never been sustained.
That's what we're trying to build here at Florida. That's what we're trying to create. It has to start somewhere.