Up next in 10
Wake Forest coach Steve Forbes at weekly ACC coaches press conference ahead of #UNC game Tuesday
Jan 20, 2025
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he's been a big Key to Our Success um
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you know he's doing a really good job of
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not only running our basketball team but
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also defensively he's very disruptive if
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you look at our uh you know our league
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numbers which really truthfully that's
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all I study now I don't study the
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overall because it's how you're playing
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now and that's pretty indicative of
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League Play you know he's got he's got
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13 steals too he's leading our leag
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leading our team in that uh he's almost
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got a two to1 assist turnover ratio
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um so he's doing a really good job of of
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getting our um our team organized and uh
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on offense and getting the ball to the
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right people's hands at the right times
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and defensively he's making some things
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happen uh struggled a little bit
0:47
Saturday
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defensively um it was very physical game
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as you know with Mike's teams they
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screen uh really physical and so he got
0:56
behind the play a lot and so we went
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with a little bit bigger lineup uh later
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in the game but uh to his credit he's U
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he's really played well and he's been a
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a really good
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teammate thank
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you uh go next to cam cam lemons go
1:13
ahead cam he the I guess second obvious
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question for you you know what did you
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see out Omaha in some of minutes I know
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you mentioned during post game he thank
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what's kind of an update on
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him yeah Omaha's out um for probably uh
1:30
7 to 10 days um he sprained his ankle in
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the game uh unrelated to his uh foot
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injury everything's fine with as far as
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the construction of what happened to his
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foot in the surgery there a two
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surgeries afterwards just very uh
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unfortunate bad luck um you know I shot
1:50
that first three I thought it was going
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in uh it was a good ball um you know if
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you look at his numbers as our and I've
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got all the Analytics of that any
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anybody could have on every lineup that
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we've had um but when he's in the game
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you know defensively we're we're we're
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pretty good I mean he's I'm trying to
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find him here I don't I can't see it but
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I think it's really uh yeah it's
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drastically low uh when when he's in the
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game U defensively just hasn't had a lot
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of uh you know a lot of possessions this
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year so you know I think he's I was
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happy to get him in there it was more
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just uh you know him um getting his feet
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under him you know he hasn't played but
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uh you know he'll play more and more
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when he's on the court um uh
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defensively our uh the points per
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possession is like
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086 and so um that's pretty low because
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we're point you know we're about uh 97
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so he affects the game pretty
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effectively on on defense but
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unfortunately he's going to be out for a
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little bit but we we'll GL hope to get
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him back here
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soon uh go to Kip
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Coons yeah hi Steve you have an
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interesting week ahead of you home games
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with uh North Carolina and Duke and it
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it shapes up to be kind of a a pivotal
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week for you especially you know local
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bragging rights but the conference race
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and and where you guys are positioned
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how how have you how do you approach
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this week
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well you know Kip um I've always
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approached approached it one game at a
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time I think some teams are different
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than others can they handle that they
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let things creep into their mind that
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doesn't really have any bearing on the
3:42
game in front of them I think you know
3:44
this team is really really locked in uh
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I said that after the game against
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Virginia Tech I could tell going into
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the game that we were going to play well
3:53
just by their approach um I think it' be
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the same thing on Tuesday against
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Carolina uh one of the advantages of
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having a national holiday today is we've
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had a little more prep time because we
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don't have class and so we were able to
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go in the morning a little bit and we'll
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go in the afternoon and and so we'll be
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able to go tomorrow a little bit before
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we play on a quicker turnaround and so
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um I think they're just going to handle
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it like we handle it as a staff is just
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what's the fir what's the next game in
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front of them and every game is big now
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every game's big for everybody in in in
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the country nothing's been decided Ed um
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at any level and so we just have to
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continue to play at the level that we're
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playing and maybe play better hopefully
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play better and and finish this thing
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out you do have to like the fact that
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both these games are on your floor
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though of course you always want to play
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you know if you want to give a choice
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play at home you know we've turned um
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the Joel into a very hard place to play
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that's a credit to our our players and
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our our fans um we I don't know our
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record is I know it's out there
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somewhere it's pretty good you know the
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last four years uh in in this building
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but you know I always tell them about
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this I always tell them it's not the
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it's not the crowd's job to get you
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going it's your job to get the crowd
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going and sometimes I think teams relax
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when they play at home thinking that
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it's just going to be that way and it's
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not and so um you know it' be our
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responsibility on on Tuesday to to get
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the crowd going uh to to have a great
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atmosphere by the way we
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play David
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T Steve when did you first dive head
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first into
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analytics and do you have someone on
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your staff assigned to almost strictly
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that's your
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job I don't know if I've ever dove into
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it Dave because I'm
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really I'm not a huge fan of it but I
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have to know it um I'm just trying to
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win by one point I know that doesn't do
6:01
well with analytics and the net and the
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kpi and the BPI I mean there's so many T
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T-Rex t- I don't know you know there's
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so many things that you have to be aware
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of or people want to be aware of I don't
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have time for it um yeah you know you
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know we we my staff looks heavily at
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that stuff as they prepare their
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scouting reports um you know Woodley and
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BJ Mack on the defensive side of it U
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coach Shay Jason Shay thomis cavalas on
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the offensive side of it um they they
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I'm sure they look at that stuff I get a
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HDI report um for every game um I get
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one after the game I get one on the
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lineups what worked what didn't work
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lineup wise plus minus what's the points
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per possession when you're on the court
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versus off the court on and on and on
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it's um it can be straight Overkill too
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um because there's still The Human Side
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of coaching and the intangibles and and
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um what you bring to the table as a
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player um you know just because you can
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read a um you know read a stat sheet an
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analytical sheet or talk about doesn't
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mean you can coach it and so it there's
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a lot of things involved that's one of
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them but it's not the only
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thing for decades it seems that Carolina
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has been such a big man
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Centric program and it's startling to
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look at the numbers now and see how they
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struggle to to rebound the ball I mean
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how different is this Carolina team to
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prepare for as some earlier teams that
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you competed
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against well go way back to when I was
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in Tennessee when they had hansboro and
7:48
Brandon
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Wright um when I first came into the
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league you know bot was probably a
7:55
freshman and they had Walker
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Kessler um they had some mother big kid
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that went to the NBA right away I can't
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remember his name um you know I've been
8:04
so used to seeing bot there it's a
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little different for us to see that but
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you have to concentrate on what they're
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really good at and that's transition you
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know they're um I mean they're obscene
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the numbers they're scoring in
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transition 49% of their offense is in
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transition I think they're fourth in the
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country according to our analytics 1.27
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points per possession in transition uh
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is devastating you know they score 21
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points a game in the in the league play
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in transition and then they're good off
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defensive team I mean they're
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outstanding halfcourt defensive team and
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they're only giv up0 87 in the half
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court and so um I think you got to
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concentrate more on that not that you
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know Washington or V luin those guys
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can't play they can but uh their
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strength is in their guards and they
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have not only good ones they have
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outstanding uh
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guards I've got time for one more
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question from from Conor O'Neal Steve
9:01
your ACC only three-point percentage is
9:04
like 35% which is obviously a lot
9:06
different than nonon has that improved
9:10
based on Tyler being in the lineup is it
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taking less of them is it better shot
9:14
quality on the ones they're taking
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what's gone into the Improvement there
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well that was a b and c I would give you
9:21
D all the above you know I mean yeah I
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think I think Tai being in there really
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helps I think the uh shot quality really
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helps you know we haven't taken a a ton
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of them uh we take them when we need to
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not just running down there and and
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jacking them up and so those things I
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think we can still get better and we
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will I I still think we can have better
9:47
movement um better spacing every team
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gives you a different kind of look
9:53
defensively so you have to figure it out
9:54
as the game goes along but um you know
9:57
look I told you in the fall we were fast
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and I thought we we could play fast and
10:02
shoot threes and we came out and played
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fast missed threes and turned it over
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and so that's not a very good recipe for
10:09
Success so we had to re-evaluate who we
10:12
were and how we played and to their
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credit um you know they've changed and
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um we'll continue on this path of
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winning
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basketball de thank you appreciate it
10:26
we'll see you next week all right look
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forward to it
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all right next up we've got Mark Madson
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from
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Cal if you have a question mark good
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morning um if you got a question for
10:39
Mark go ahead use the raise hand tool um
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if you