What Kenny Payne, Louisville Players Said After 71-68 Exhibition Loss vs. Kentucky Wesleyan

Opening Statement

“Hats off to Wesleyan. They did a great job. They came in here and they were more physical than us, obvious by the 47 to 33 rebounds. We seemed to just ball watch, which we talked about, and they seemed to atack the ball. At times, we looked like defensively we had it figured out, we just could not sustain it. This game is hard. Winning is hard. It takes a commitment by every person that has a jersey and every coach. I hope that we've learned from this because look, I'm trying to get them to buy into something that's difficult. At times, it's something they've never had to do before. It's not easy, and I need them to learn fast. I need my freshmen to learn fast. I need my veteran guys - JJ (Traynor), Emmanuel (Okorafor), Brandon (Huntley-Hatfield) - you can't finish a game with two rebounds and one rebound. You can't, you can't, not and have us have success as a team. You know, again, hats off to them. I mean, I look at it, the first 10 minutes of the game we forced 10 turnovers. The first 10, we forced 10 turnovers, and the rest of the game, they had four. What is that? We settled at times for 3’s. It is hard to live and die by 3’s. I teach paint touches. I want the ball in the paint. I would love to have the ball in the paint multiple times, because by getting it in the paint multiple times the 3’s will come in rhythm and not just setled 3’s. If there's one pass and a shot, or a ball screen and a shot, you're not creating offense for your teammates, and the offense becomes stagnant. We saw some of that today as well. We tried hard at times but again, it's not good enough. It's not good enough. Hopefully, we learn from this, all of us, coaches, myself, and players, because it's not acceptable to go out and the other team is more physical than you, played harder than you, played tougher than you as if you don’t understand what this is.

(On how disappointing the rebounding was as it relates to effort)

No question. You know, for me, I watched eight to 10 points, maybe more, where the shot was made by them, and our guys are watching, hoping the next guy got it, and they bum-rushed the ball and put it in the basket. Not acceptable. We work on rebounding. We talk about how important it is to finish off possessions. We get them to miss, and I don't know their second chance points and how many they had, but whatever it was, it was too many.

(On playing Dennis Evans and JJ Traynor more with lack of rebounding, no Emmanual Okorafor as well)

Well for me, the adjustment they made is they went sort of small. They went with their four man and played him at the five and put him on the perimeter, which sort of negates Dennis a litle bit, but again, between Brandon (Huntley-Hatfield), JJ, Kaleb (Glenn), we should be able to handle whatever somebody throws at us.

(On why Dennis Evans and Brandon Huntley-Hatfield were not more active and involved in the offense)

I just think we refuse to get paint touches at times. There are opportunities there, like for example, if the five man rebounds the ball, the four man in transition should run and post up. We shouldn't have to run offense. It should be simple. Throw it down, throw it ahead, throw the ball to the post and we play off that. When the ball goes up, a lot of the times tonight, the shot goes up and I'm watching my four and five make no effort to fight to get the rebound. I'm running post plays, and we decide to come off and shoot it. Attention to detail, knowing the play, knowing how to execute the play, playing with energy, all those things were not up to par. You know, a lot of that falls on me, but it also (falls on) getting them to understand exactly what I want, when I want it, how I want it. When we executed, we got good shots. Not saying they all the time went in, but we got good shots.

(On how to improve on the perimeter offensively, a lot of contested perimeter shots tonight)

The bigs didn't touch the ball a lot. So what was happening was, we were setting screens and the defenders going under the screen. We teach to force him to go over the screen. A few times we did it, for example, there was a play where we set a screen and then we re-screened and Ty-Laur (Johnson) got down the lane, drove down the lane, made a bounce pass to JJ (Traynor), JJ dunked the ball. We have to force people to chase over the top because by going under, especially when you're missing jump shots, you're playing into their hands. We have to do a beter job of screening.

(On disconnect, where it’s coming from, where to go from here)

The disconnect is understanding fully how hard that you got to practice, how hard you got to play, how desperate you have to be defensively. The disconnect is other teams are good. I knew going into this game that this was going to be a tough game. We needed it to be a tough game, because we need to know exactly how hard we got to play against good talent. You know that team played well against Saint Louis. There's a reason: they're a prety good team, and they've been together, and they play hard, and they understand what the coach is asking them to do. We are learning about ourselves. We don't have a ton of experience. The disconnect is again – are you really going to beat teams with your talent, or are you going to beat teams with the work ethic, with the toughness, with the fight? We can't beat teams with talent. We're never going to be the most talented team. Beat them with fight.

(On Skyy Clark and Tre White starting together, overall thoughts)

I thought they looked okay together. I thought defensively, they were talking at times, especially in the first half. I thought we were really good defensively in spurts in the first half. I thought we got a litle laxed, or we understood how our bodies or our minds just sort of said like okay, let's hope. Let's not impose, let's hope. Let's hope they miss a shot, let's hope we get a steal, let's hope that me just gambling on the ball, I can get the steal. You can't, you have to be disciplined. You're playing good basketball players. Then, you know, for Tre, I love Tre White, and Tre White is going to be a great player. I love Skyy Clark, he’s going be a great player. But they are still learning about themselves, and this isn't a finished product. This is a work in process.

(On reaction to loss in locker room)

I think they feel down. I think that they’re learning. You know, they are learning that you have to play hard, you have to understand that other teams and other players, regardless of what division, Division II, Division I, they can play. Other guys can play. Their understanding about concepts, they're understanding about basketball offensively, they’re understanding about how they're learning on the fly what it means to have four dudes on the same page and then one to not react to it, we get burned. Or Dennis (Evans) lets a guy beat him off a ball screen baseline, the guard gets around, and they get a corner three at a critical time. Litle things mean a lot, and I think they're learning on the fly. They're learning that, yeah, we're a good shooting team. We're much beter than we shot today, tonight. We are, I know that. But I also know if you live by the three, and you live by jump shots, and you don't screen for each other, and the ball isn't moving, you're going to have moments where the ball is not going in the hole, and then the other team gets confidence.

(On defense, any specific goal or metric to monitor performance)

You know, I've always talked about kills, which is three stops in a row. The goal is to get eight or nine different kills. If you can do that consistently, you're a prety good defensive team. Again, I think we're learning that in order to be that type of team, you got to be vicious, you got to be focused, you got to be locked in, and you got to help each other. You have to really help each other. If one person lets down, somebody else is picking them up. The next person lets down, somebody else is picking them up, meaning that he makes up for his mistake. I thought there were times when you know, Skyy (Clark) got beat off the drive, and the guy went right down the lane and laid it up. Unacceptable. Unacceptable. One by Skyy to not to keep the ball in front, and Ty-Laur (Johnson), unacceptable. Unacceptable by nobody coming over to help. Unacceptable that they missed the shot and then they get a rebound and stick it back in. Unacceptable.

Guard Skyy Clark and Forward J.J. Traynor

(In regards to the defensive side of the court, Kentucky Wesleyan got 16 offensive rebounds. Was there a lot of discussion about the effort defensively to get those stops? What's the thought process for you guys with how that happened?)

Skyy Clark: There was a lot of talk about it, but talking only gets you so far. We have to actually go out and execute it. It's just something that we have to go back to the drawing board and work on in practice.

(Skyy, you were the leading scorer with 24 tonight. How much pressure does that put on you offensively to just be the leader out there?)

Skyy Clark: I think the whole team got a lot of great looks. A lot of shots weren't falling. There were a lot of shots that were in and out, but I was just trying to do whatever I could to help my team win. I think overall we got a lot of great looks tonight.

(You guys are the bigger, more athletic, talented team, but you got out-rebounded by 13. How do you explain that?)

Skyy Clark: Like I said, it’s just something we have to go back and practice and really put emphasis on. It starts in practice.

JJ Traynor: Just being out of position, or a lot more long rebounds since they were shooting a lot of threes. It felt like they were diving for them, and they were getting the loose balls. We weren’t getting them.

(How do you make sure a loss like this doesn't carry over into the regular season and make sure everybody's on the same track to have a successful season this year?)

JJ Traynor: It doesn't count thankfully, and it was good to get hit in the mouth early. We have a lot of freshmen with not as much experience so now they know what it is. We know what we need to work on and improve on. I feel like we guard prety well, but offensively, we didn't share the ball and we have to get those loose balls.

Skyy Clark: It’s just something to go back to the drawing board on and pull up the clips on film. It's something that we really need to harp on in practice, and we have to go even harder now.

(JJ, in the second half Ty-Laur (Johnson) drove away and got you a nice dump off for dunk. What do you think you guys need to do to get more efficiency in the post. Coach Payne talked about the fact that he preached paint touches, and that's something that we didn’t see a lot of today. What needs to happen for that to happen more consistently?)

JJ Traynor: Definitely our screening. I feel like I got a good angle on that screening and it opened up Ty-Laur to get down here. But the way they were playing the screens, they were so under. They were kind of forcing us to shoot. If we get a good angle and make the guard go over, our guard can atack the big and open things up. So we just need to work on getting those good screens and being ready when the guard delivers the pass