Marquette News, Pittsburgh News, Ray Mernagh

‘BUZZ-SPEAK’ ON PITT/MARQUETTE

You have heard of coach-speak…but following Pitt‘s 89-81 win over Marquette in a BIG EAST conference match-up, Golden Eagle coach Buzz Williams spent time with the media breaking down the action in his candid and unique way.

The win was the 18th straight for the Panthers at the Peterson Events Center, a building where they have won 49 of thier last 50 and are 143-11 all-time since the facility opened.

Marquette has a short turnaround as they will host No. 14 Notre Dame back at the Bradley Center tonight in a conference match-up.

Enjoy…

Buzz Williams: “Alright I’ll answer any questions you have we’re kind of in a hurry we play in 41 hours.”

On Pitt at home: “No I think all the respect should go to the players and the coaches that have been a part of that record. I do think the ambiance with all the students in the lower bowl is great I think it’s a great place to play. We lost my first year here by 15 and lost this year by 8 so the spread is not very good when we come here but I think it’s a great setup.”

On Pitt getting open looks from three: “We could never run them off their routes, you know they play kind of like the Steelers play, they run a play every dead ball, they run a play after every made basket, after every timeout. That’s what they’re gonna do and no matter what you do to off-center that they’re eventually gonna get the ball back to 12 or number 1 in the logo and their gonna run a play and we never ran them off their line. They were averaging 6.3 three’s made per game and today they scored ten so if you can score 30% of your points from three your gonna have a hard time beating anybody like that.”

Note - Yes, Williams referred to players by jersey number, not name in the presser. For reference, Ashton Gibbs is #12 for Pitt and Travon Woodall is #1.

Crowder’s 2nd foul and if it hurt or stemmed momentum: “We shouldn’t be so dependant on one player who’s playing in his third Big East game but we are and for him to pick up his 2nd foul with 7:52 to go (in the first half), you know playing 8 minutes without him, it changes our team so he played 12 in first half so that means he played 16 in the second half. We outscored them in the second halff and we were fouling the last 3 1/2 minutes so even if my opinion didn’t count statistically you could look at it and understand the value that he gives to us.”

On finishing with just two turnovers in the game and if he’d known that going in if he’d think his fate would be better here: “Yeah if that was the only statistic I knew I would take it. They do such a great job on the glass I wouldn’t have thought we’d beat them on the offensive glass. They are averaging 46.9% of the shots they miss turn into an offensive rebound, obviously that’s first in the country, but I thought we did a good job O rebounding. They outrebounded us because they made 6 out of every 10 that they shot so if that was the only thing you could tell me I would be happy with it I thought we did fine relative to us getting a shot.”

On the play of Dwight Buycks: “I thought he was okay, I don’t think he’s 100%, if you just look at his numbers he played good he didn’t do a great job on 12 (Gibbs). 12 made four three’s in the first half and we split it up we let Junior get two of ‘em and Buycks got to guard him for two of ‘em. And the whole thing was three of the four were on the same play.”

On Pitt’s patience: “I don’t know the exact number of minutes returning you can look at it but they start three seniors and two juniors — all five of them are really good players they have great poise. You know 11 (Dante Taylor) comes in for 52 (Gary McGhee) they look different, their haircuts different, but their really good. 42 (Talib Zanna) started the first twelve games and 42 and 35 (Nasir Robinson) [are] their not the same exact player but they have the same exact production. 1 comes in and shifts 12 over and then 22 (Brad Wanamaker) or 5 (Gilbert Brown) can move, you know they played small ball a lot in the first half. I just think that they have great poise, they’re extremely well coached and I think they’ve been through the rigors of what this is and they have an understanding of what it’s about.”

Does Pitt shoot better than normal Pitt teams he’s seen: “Hmm, that’s a good question. I don’t remember the exact numbers you know Dixon (Jermaine) was accalimed as a shooter and I know he’s the only guy we played against that’s not playing this year. As the season went on statistically, 24 wasn’t the same shooter that 12 is this year or 1 or 5. 5′s (Brown) playing at an unbelievable clip from behind the arc and so I don’t remember my first year here when we played here what I do remember is we were up two at the 12-minute media timeout in the 2nd half and we ended up losing by 15 because they threw it to Blair everytime. Probably, they probably are, to answer your question, they probably are a better shooting team.

On whether having Buycks back helps at the point: When you look at our team, you know, we don’t really go by positions. If you can dribble, your to the left and if you cant dribble your to the right. So Jimmy’s in the middle, Jimmy’s on the line. When you remove Buycks you have Junior can dribble, DJ can dribble, Jimmy it kind of forces Jimmy to the left when Buycks is out and Vander can dribble. So when you remove one of those dribble guys, just like any other team, it definitely impacts your depth. And you know he was playing, I think, 28 1/2 or 29 minutes a game and he played 11 (Dane Miller) at Rutgers so I just got mad at Junior because 12 (Gibbs) hit his third three and I think that was in a sequence of about six possessions, so I got mad at him so Junior didn’t play quite as much as he deserved to play.”

Perfect world question on Buycks not being a traditional point and how impressive it is for him to do that: “Yeah, I would kind of disagree. You know when you look at how we play I think you have to have a quarterback, the way Pitt plays, because they run more plays than anyone in the country. We don’t and so you need to be able to pass, dribble and shoot for us and the point is probably gonna have a little bit more of a basketball IQ relative to what we’re doing but I don’t want a guy, let’s run your team run a play guy, I want a guy that you gotta guard him and I’m not coaching Jamie’s team but I don’t know that 12′s a run-your-team point guard either I think he’s more of a combo and I think Buycks has turned into a 2 turned into a 1 and even today he played 32 minutes and I would say 8 of them were at the 2, so I think that allows you to shift and move a little bit but I think he’s done really good I wouldn’t trade Buycks for anybody. I love what his story’s about and he’s getting close to the end of his story relative to Marquette but what he was the first day I met him and who he is today…couldn’t be more proud of him.”

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