Kevin Keatts’ Postgame Press Conference After NC State’s Loss to Texas: TRANSCRIPT

NC State Head Coach Kevin Keatts met with the media for his postgame press conference after the Wolfpack lost 59-63 to Texas in the ACC/SEC Challenge tonight. You can read the transcript below.

What a hard fought battle tonight against Texas, a really good Texas team. It felt like one of those late February ACC games where both teams were playing extremely hard and really wanted it. It was a defensive battle.

I thought if you look at us on the night, we did some really good things. I thought at the end of the game, we had a couple of careless turnovers. We missed a very crucial block out.

Obviously the main thing that stands out is we’ve got to make our free throws. We went 6 for 14. At the end when it’s a one possession game.

Certainly love our guys fight.

We don’t take more victories in this program. We just don’t. But at the end of the day, we do have a lot of things that we can build on.

Started the big lineup. We did some good things with that. But I was very happy to see Dontrez (Styles) come off the bench and really put the ball in the hole.

We didn’t have everyone play well, but we had some guys that made some plays down the stretch. In a one possession game, we can’t go 6 for 14 from the free throw line.

Michael O’Connell didn’t shoot the ball well, and had turnovers in critical situations.

Michael’s been the leader.

He didn’t play great tonight. I don’t worry about him. I know he’ll be fine.

He had some moments where he just didn’t play well.

Last play of the game

We wanted to bring Jayden Taylor off of some stagger screens to turn the corner to get to the rim if we could. Didn’t want to settle for a three. If we didn’t, the second option was to pin in for Dontrez coming off to get a shot off.

I thought Jayden did a good job. He drove the ball, and honestly, I thought it was contact in the restricted area.

I mean, we’ve always been taught that if there is contact in the restricted area, you’ve got a chance to go to the free throw line. We didn’t.

What was the game plan to guard Tre Johnson and what were some of your impressions of watching him play?

Well, I mean, Tre’s good.

Obviously we weren’t going to stop him from taking shots. He ended up with 18 points. Our game plan was to make him take a lot of shots to get his points.

You’re not going to stop a scorer from scoring, but we wanted him to shoot not a great percentage. I thought there were two plays in the game that he really made late in the game that showed how good he was.

In transition, he pulled up and made a big three on the right wing. And then JT was guarding him, and I thought he made a big three with him right there in his face. He’s a good basketball player.

I don’t know if he’s going to be there for very long.

Out rebounded Texas in the first half, and then they won by a pretty big margin in the second. What do you think was the difference?

They beat us to a couple of 50/50 balls.

In the first half we did a really good job. I came into this game focusing on not giving up offensive rebounds at halftime. We’ve done a great job.

I thought in the second half they beat us to some loose basketballs. I thought we made a better effort to block out. There were long rebounds that we didn’t get.

I thought #2, Weaver, had a huge offensive rebound for an and-one, not an and-one, but sent it to the free throw line. I thought that was a big play in the game.

Players after the game in the locker room were saying ‘we’re a good team, we just need to do a little bit.’ Was that kind of what you told them?

If I didn’t tell you the score of the game, you just picked up the stats, you wouldn’t know who won the game. I thought we did really do some good things. I thought our defense was really good.

I thought we answered some runs that Texas had. I thought it was a back and forth game. It really literally came down to who had the last possession.

You can lose a game and still get some things out of it, and I think our guys will take something from it. Obviously, the things at the end of the game we’ve got to clean up.

We can’t miss our free throws. We can’t miss a block out. Can’t turn the ball over.

Especially in a game that was back and forth. This was a back and forth game. This was a tight game the entire time.

You didn’t know who was going to win the game to probably the last minute of the game.

Do you concern yourself with NET Rankings at this point in the season?

I’m not, I’m not caught up in that ranking.

This is the first one. That thing’s going to change so many times before the end of the season.

You have lost three in a row now. Is there one big thing that you want to see changed or adjusted to kind of get this team where it really needs to be?

Well, I think we lost to three really good teams. Our focus will still be on making the right decisions. Our focus will also be on continuing to work on not giving up offensive rebounds.

I’ve said this from day one with this team. We can’t have a couple guys have bad games. When you look at it, we’ve had a couple.

In those three losses, we’ve had one or two guys who didn’t play well, and we’ve got to figure out what do we do with one or two guys that don’t play well.

Bigger lineup

Texas has got great size. I wanted to match up with those guys, do a good job with that part of it.

I also wanted Dontrez to see the game start. I felt like he was pressing a little bit when we were in San Diego at the beginning of the game. I also liked the way our bigs practiced together.

It was the first time we spent a couple days of getting those guys reps together. I liked what I saw. Certainly some of this is going to be dictated about who we play against and how well we can grow, but we’ve got a lot of growth in us. I think this team’s got a really good chance.

You lose the two games in San Diego by 11. All of them hurt, but this one stings because it’s one of those one possession games.

We’ll go back. We’ll watch film.

We’ll show, ‘hey, how can we be better down the stretch.’ And if we can, I think we’ll clean up some of this stuff.

Are you starting to see some guys kind of play better with each other compared to others in the rotation?

Yeah, I am.

I am seeing some guys improve in a lot of areas. Marcus (Hill) got playing. Dontrez got playing.

We had a couple of other guys that didn’t play well. So now we’ve got to figure out how to, on certain nights, to get everybody on the same page.

The fans

I’m proud of our fans, and I will encourage them to stick behind this team.

It’s a 9:15 game, and you can give a lot of excuses at 9:15…I got kids…I got to work the next day.

I’m proud of our fans for showing up and our students for showing up. We’re going to need them moving forward. The unfortunate thing about it, we don’t have a long time.

We’ve got to turn around and play against Florida State on Saturday, which is an ACC game. So we’ve got to figure it out. I would say kudos to the guys who are fans who showed up.

I really appreciate that not only did they show up, you could hear them in the building. You could feel them. So it was really good.

You told us in the offseason that you were really confident in Brandon (Huntley-Hatfield), Marcus and Trez. Looking at their numbers, some people might not have thought they were good gets. Is this kind of what you expected from them? Nights like tonight where they’re contributing a combined 43 points?

Yeah, I thought they were good.

Listen, we’ve done a pretty good job in recruiting. We go out and identify some guys that we think fit our pieces. I thought those three guys you named really played well tonight.

Obviously, we’ve just got to grow on it. We’ve got to shake it off. Like I told you before, the crazy thing about it, it’s really a thin line between winning the game and losing the game and how you feel and how you approach the next game.

In our situation, we’ve got to shake it off. We’ve got to get better. I think we’re going to play with Florida State.