March 3, 2014

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Postgame Quotes – March 3, 2014
North Carolina 63, Notre Dame 61

Notre Dame Head Coach Mike Brey

Opening Statement
“I’m proud of our group, and I mean we put ourselves in position. A couple of key turnovers at times hurt us; they got to a couple of loose balls. But we defended well enough for them to score [63] points. They didn’t crush us on the backboards, we did our job there. Overall, we executed pretty well offensively. Just a couple of possessions under four minutes where we turned it over or maybe didn’t get the shot we really wanted to get. You’ve got to give Carolina credit; their defense was pretty good. Also, [Nate] Britt hit two big ones. We were kind of in a little diamond and one on [Marcus] Paige and wanted someone else to make a shot and we take our hat off to him because, I believe he made two of them, didn’t he? He made two big shots, and that was kind of the guy we wanted shooting.”

On the final possession
“Yeah, we wanted a ball screen and a read. We got a great ball screen at half court by Tom Knight, and just get there and you’ve got guys spotting up, and if they help, kick it for a three for the win. But the way Eric [Atkins] was getting to the basket, I think that was a pretty good read to get in there. We got him freed up at half court.”

On the struggles of the new road environment
“You know, I don’t know if it’s that. I don’t know if it would be that. Of course, you’re comfortable in the Big East road environment. At least your veterans are. They know, so there is some new territory. There have been some great road atmospheres that we have played in. This one was fabulous. I hadn’t been here in 20 years, and they do an unbelievable job here. Great fans. I would attribute it to lack of personnel sometimes.”

On the status of Garrick Sherman’s finger
“Yeah, we’ve got to rest that. It popped out twice against Pittsburgh, and he’s just not effective. So if we can get him a week of rest, I think we can calm that down before we go to Greensboro. Pat [Connaughton] also needs about five days now. I tell you what, that’s a man, because he was hurting today. And we gave him some Motrin and taped him up and he needs about four or five days to get himself together, and we need some rest. We need to get away from the game and get rest a little bit and then we’ll get back into practice mode later in the week and we’ll have a clean slate, as you move to Greensboro.”

On the defensive effort
“It was pretty good, wasn’t it? We were really good, in position, and a little bit of diamond and one helped us but our man to man gave us a chance to win it. You know, our man to man was pretty good at key times against Pittsburgh. So I think there is something to build on there where we dug in a little better defensively.”