Steve McClain
Steve McClain
Steve McClainis the men's head basketball coach at the University of Illinois at Chicago. He had spent the previous five seasons on the staff of the Indiana Hoosiers men's basketball team...
calling fire
We'll see if I can fire him up on Wednesday, how about that? Are you calling him a kinder, gentler Ritchie?
earned played
They played well, and they earned their time.
afraid faces games group point trying win
They're just out there competing. They're challenging each other. This group isn't afraid to get in each other's faces and if you can't take that, you can't play. Justin's a senior. He's trying to win games on his way out. He makes that point to a lot of people.
ball credit fought knocked rely shoot shooting shot
They fought to the end. We had some breakdowns, but they also shot the ball about as well as they could shoot it. We were trapping, we were going with the idea that if they rely on shooting 3s we're all right, and they knocked them down. Give them credit for that.
holding lack people work
The big thing holding us back is the lack of rigs and the lack of people to work on them,
defense guarded hurt offensive stuff transition trouble
Offensive rebounding. They get 20 of them and really, that's what hurt us in the first half. We guarded their stuff well enough. We had some trouble with transition defense and we had trouble with rebounding the basketball.
basketball certainly character comments cowboy difficult emotional following great itself pride taken team
I was emotional after a difficult game, and I certainly shouldn't have said the things I said. I have always taken great pride in how our team handles itself following losses, as well as wins. My comments were out of character for what Cowboy basketball is all about.
ask clicks fight lost people point struggling team wait win work
People always ask you 'Have you lost your confidence?' We were struggling and (something) clicks at some point that makes a team go 'Now wait a minute. We're going to fight and we're going to work to try to win this game.' Something clicked.
care excited faith game guards kids settled stretch
Our kids got a little excited during that stretch of the game and didn't really take care of the ball. But I have a lot of faith in my guards and I think they settled down after that.
compared might people tapes watch
Our world's a little different because we can get so many tapes on people compared to high-school and junior-college. Every one of the teams, you might have about 14-15 tapes you've got to watch and know everything about them.
spread vegas
Give Vegas credit. They spread us out and executed.
challenge hope kicks
I hope he kicks his butt all night. That's a challenge -- he's going to have to come up to it.
guys ike justin move played rotation somebody step
If Justin can't play, one of those guys that hasn't played as much, such as Ike or Jarrod, will have to play minutes. Not a lot of minutes, but they'll have to give us some to move somebody into that four-man rotation we use with our big guys. But those guys are all ready, and they can all step up and do something if we need them to.
free game unfolds win
In the end we didn't make our free throws. If we make our free throws, the game unfolds all right for us. Those are the little things you have to do at the end to win a game like that.