McCaffery, Miles transcripts

Transcripts from both Nebraska Coach Tim Miles and Iowa Coach Fran McCaffery following Sunday's 74-46 Iowa victory at Pinnacle Bank Arena in Lincoln, Neb.

Nebraska Coach Tim Miles

On if the effort was acceptable

'No. You never want to throw your players under the bus, but that was just beyond disappointing. That's not what we represent. When I was at Southwest Minnesota State as the coach, to pay for shoes at the Renaissance Festival in Minnesota for a weekend to pick up trash. If I had the option, I would do that tonight, tomorrow and the next day to pay back the fans for their tickets. Our fans have been so supportive and great, and we get 15,000 people out there to go non-compete mode. I thought we showed a softness, a lack of leadership and a lack of willingness to listen to leadership. It's unacceptable. You have to have a great amount of pride to compete when things aren't going well, and we just didn't show any pride. I was looking at the stats, and they don't matter. The game plan doesn't matter. When you come out and kind of half-ass it, a team like Iowa remembers how we knocked them out of the NCAA tournament two years ago. They know what they're fighting for. They looked like a team with pride. They had poise. They had aggressiveness. And they really put on a clinic.

On if the team has chemistry issues

'They like each other. Do we have the right mix of players playing together? Obviously not. Because I haven't been able to put the right groups out that consistently perform well on both offense and defense. I think this is the first time we've allowed 50 percent for an opponent in 38 games. The next closest in the Big Ten is 14. We had this unbelievable streak of excellent defense and that tells you everything. We were just awful today.”

On Iowa's game plan

'I just thought Iowa was really good. I thought they were sound and aggressive. I thought they were aggressive on offense. I thought they had a similar game plan like the last time on how they treated Terran (Petteway). We shot 2-18 from the three point line. So driving lines weren't necessarily available. We played some zone then. And we just didn't attack anything well. By the time we attacked zone, we just didn't play anything well.”

Iowa Men's Basketball Head Coach Fran McCaffery

On how important it was to hit the first few shots of the game

'I think anytime you go on the road in an environment like this you want to make some shots early - no question. It felt good.”

On taking timeout with seven to go in first half, NU on 9-3 run, then Iowa closes out the half at 21-2 run, what did he say?

'I wish I could tell you, something incredibly intelligent or inspirational, but really it was nothing more than emphasizing some of the things that we did early, that we planned to do in this game. Kind of get back to the game plan and relax a little bit. You know they are going to come. They are a good team, with an excellent coach - they are going to keep coming. So you have to weather that storm by playing intelligently, not ‘oh, they scored, so now we have to score in four seconds.' It is not how it works. Keep doing the things you set out to do.”

On if anything has changed with the team in the last week or so

'I think everyone overanalyzes things like that. The one thing that I always say and you guys probably think I am just saying it - is I am respectful of the teams that beat us. Oh we lose two games and everyone is saying that those were two bad losses ... We lost to Minnesota and played them pretty good, they have pretty good players and a good coach. Then, same thing, we lost on the road to Northwestern. They played great. Chris had them ready, so you go to the next one, you try to play better and win the next one. Same thing here, that is what this league is, a lot of leagues have two or three teams at the bottom that you can beat up on, this is not that league. It never will be. You have to have a lot of guys playing well and stay healthy. You have to defend, I think when it is all said and done, when this game ended, the reason why it did the way it did was because of our defense rather than our offense.”

On the team playing the way it did at the end of first half, as a coach - does he sit back and marvel

'Sure you do. I told them that. Every coach tries to get their team to play like that. We have played like that, and we have not played like that - so has every other team. But when it all comes together like that and they are playing unselfishly and playing defense, I think as a coach that is the best feeling, when your team is playing like that. The challenge then is trying to get them to play like that all the time.”

On Mike Gesell's performance

'Recognizing the difference from when we are going to ‘quick shoot' the ball or have a long possession, based on what has happened in the last 40 seconds. I thought Mike did a good job there.”

On (Shavon) Shields, if they guarded him differently

'We certainly guarded him better - I think we did that. I think he is a guy, he gets to the rim to a variety of ways, he has dribble moves, he has size and length. He's got a great floater and a great midrange game. He has not shot the ball well from 3, so that changes things a little bit on the way you guard him. I thought what we were able to do is we were able to get people in when he started to get going and not give him the space he typically takes advantage of.”

On long road trip, winning 4 of their last 7 road games, sign of improved toughness?

'I think so. We are an experienced team, we should be able to go on the road and execute and follow the game plan and not get too rattled by the surroundings. I think we try as best we can as coaches to prepare them not only for what they are walking into on the court and then in this building or whatever building. It comes down the them containing their emotions. For the most part we maintained our composure.”

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