NC State head coach Kevin Keatts met with the media after the Wolfpack’s 81-67 win over UT Martin last night. Below is a transcript of what he had to say.

Good game for us, and I’ll tell you why these are always the most nerve-wracking games that you play. You’re in finals and our guys are being pulled in 20 different ways and, obviously, for me it’s important that our guys finish up strong academically, and so academics takes all their first in everything, and so we’ve kind of had to had to work around academics. We’ve practiced in the morning time. We’ve had guys that had exams and all that other stuff.

I thought we ramped it up when we needed to. I thought DJ Horne was a big part of that spark, making some shots, got really hot and did some good things.

I was happy with DJ Burns, with 14 points & 12 rebounds. Now Craig told me this is a career high for him. I’m proud of him for that double-double, and then he had five blocks

I thought Dennis Parker Jr. really responded with 14 points and 10 rebound.

A good win for us. Good team. They’ll have a great chance to win their league. They did a good job early in
the game. Man, Cruz, I think he was trying out for the Lakers the way he was shooting the ball. He did a great job and we were there on most of those shots. He just made them.

I think, right now, we’re going into every game with a defensive mindset, and I’m not so sure I’m ready to switch them to an offensive mindset, because we’re defending. You look at these guys, no matter who they’ve played, they’ve at least scored 85 points a game, and I thought we did a good job holding them to 67.

Mohamed Diarra tonight was a little banged up, and I wanted to see if we didn’t need him. I wasn’t going to play him. He obviously went through practice yesterday. We went through shoot around this morning, and if I could give him today, and we’re going to be off tomorrow, I thought it would help him. Going into the game, if we needed him to play, I was going to play him. He was able to play, but I just wanted to give him another day of rest.

I don’t know if it’s the most depth I’ve had here, but it’s the most depth that we’ve had late in late December. We started off with a lot of depth on a couple of our teams, but you know through some little injuries and stuff like that, we didn’t, but I do like the fact that we can play a lot of guys. Guys are trying to figure it out. Like MJ is trying to figure it out. I’m trying to play him in two positions. He’s trying to figure out where to go. He started off hot, then he kind of fizzled out a little bit. He’s going to be really good, but right now he’s just running around. He has no clue what he’s doing, which is a good thing at times, but as he gets comfortable and more practice time, he’s going to be really good for us.

I hope he’s still disappointed (DJ Horne said he was disappointed with the way he’d been shooting the three), because if that’s the way he responded, you know he was good tonight, and he has shot the ball better in practice than he has in the game. I think part of his process, you know I love him to death, but he’s starting to learn how to play defense, and early in the season, he was one of those guys that was a little resistant to really get out it, and so I think when the game started it kind of effected him on the offensive end. I think he’s getting into more game shape
to be able to play that way.

Yeah, I do (think their non-conference schedule will prepare them for ACC play). I mean, I think you know, we had that four game stretch. I mean, that’s what you get in the ACC. None of those were at home. We played the Vegas trip and that was tough, and the travel was tough, and then you get back, you’re on West Coast time, you have to travel to Ole Miss, and then you’re on Central time I think, and you got to drive for an hour, then you get back, then you got to go to Boston College. That’s four high major teams on the road, away from home, that certainly can prepare you for it.

Dennis Parker Jr. just has to continue to play with energy. I can’t remember if it was yesterday or right after shoot around, but we had a little talk, and you know, Freshman go up and down, and they define their game on whether their shot is going in, and I said ‘You got to get back to flying around and just playing hard.’ I thought he responded. In our first four or five games he led us in deflections, and then the last game, he played 22 minutes, and had two deflections. You got to play better than that, and I thought he really responded and he’s going to be good, but right now, in order as a Freshman to make an impact, you got to just play hard. I thought he got back to doing that. I think for about a week, he kind of hit the wall, just a little bit. Now I would too, you know, I’m a Freshman, it’s my first exams, you know coaches are really demanding. But I thought he responded in a great way today.

I think we’re getting better, and it looks like we’re playing better together. For the last three games, I thought our offensive transition has been really good and that’s because we’re sharing the ball, we’re kicking the ball ahead. I think defensively, we’re starting to click a little bit more. We don’t have as many breakdowns as we had early in the season, and all of that’s a process. Our bench is becoming better. I think we had 33 points last game…16 tonight, so we’re getting better from the bench. If we’re truly going to say we got 9 or 10 guys, then all those guys have to develop and be able to play together.

He’s starting to get in a groove, and you know, the one thing that can always help you sitting on that bench…it will make you get a little bit motivated. I think LJ is starting to get motivated.

Look at our team. Tonight we didn’t have anybody that played over 31 minutes. That wasn’t the way it was last year. We needed Terquavion Smith and Jarkel Joiner to both play 35+ minutes to have a chance to be able to play.

Casey Morsell didn’t have a great game tonight, so other guys played well, which is really good for us, because we have a little bit more depth, other guys can step in and be able to play.

I mean this guy (DJ Horne) is taking an untraditional route to make it back to the ACC. I mean, he started off at Illinois State, worked his butt off, went to Arizona State, and it was only fair that he come back to NC State. He’s good. He’s a competitor. He’s the guy that reminds me of the two guys that we had last year. When you say go get a basket, DJ Horne goes and gets a basket. I’m glad he’s here starting to buy in defensively. He was a mess when he first got here. When we recruited him, we talked about it, but he didn’t know how hard he had to work, and now he’s working extremely hard, and it’s starting to pay off for him.