Dec. 11, 2010
Recap | Final Stats | Notes | Photo Gallery 1 | Photo Gallery 2
San Diego State Head Coach Steve Fisher
Opening Statement:
"In the first half, I leaned over to (assistant coach) Mark Fisher and told him that they are on their A-plus game. I think that we wore them down with our athleticism and size, and that is what you have to be able to do. I obviously would like to have a 20-point halftime lead, but we still have to go out and compete hard. I told them at halftime that the difference between competing and really competing at your best is just that much. That's what we were doing until about two minutes left in the half when we had a spurt, and next thing you know we're up six at halftime. We finished with a flurry and had a good feeling about ourselves going into the half."
On the play of Malcolm Thomas:
"Hopefully he'll have more games like tonight. He was unstoppable in the first half. I told the team after the game, Malcolm had 18 points at half, but he did not get selfish in the second half. When we took him out, he didn't mope around and say `why can't I get 30?' At the end of the game in the last two minutes, everyone did this, but Malcolm and Tim Shelton in particular were up waving the towel and cheering for the guys who were in there. It was a team-first fashion that it so very important. "
On the team's defensive play:
"I thought we did a good job, especially in the second half. In the first half, San Diego made some shots that we were pretty good defensively on them. In the second half, we were a little closer with that high hand and contesting the perimeter shot, and we didn't give them anything inside."
San Diego State Senior Guard D.J. Gay
On the Aztecs' success in the second half of games this season:
"That's kind of been the story of our season lately. Whether we get off to a slow start or a fast start, our second half has been our powerhouse. Usually most of our runs come in the second half as you saw at California and when we played in Ohio. It was a great turnout tonight, and like I said, the second half seems to be our half."
On the 10-0 start to the 2010-11 season:
"You couldn't ask for more. We haven't lost a game, we are selling out (Viejas Arena). I knew things changed when I walked to the arena tonight and I saw somebody out with a sign that said "I need tickets." I knew that we are doing something special here. We are enjoying this ride, and it's going to be a good one.
On not getting complacent:
"You have to take it one game at a time. It's never good to settle, because that's how teams tend to lose. So we have to just take things one game at a time and work on the things we need to work on. Not to look ahead, but we have three ranked teams in our league; we play some good teams and we have to be at our top-notch once (MWC play) comes."
San Diego State Senior Forward Malcolm Thomas
On his 8-for-9 night at the free throw line:
"It's just something I continue to work on in practice. I came in here early and worked on it before the game. It just felt good today. I'm trying to fix my form a little bit, get better at it, but I'll continue working. I want to be 9-for-9 next time."
On D.J.'s big start to the second half:
"D.J., in the locker room he asked everybody if we were all okay, because our energy was low. I told him `Hey, you are going to have to lead us' and he just came out on fire. He really led us today, he was the captain today."
San Diego Head Coach Bill Grier
Opening statement:
"I thought the first half was as good as we've been all year in terms of being competitive. We outrebounded in the first half and everyone did a good job of getting bodies on guys. I thought the pace was perfect for us, but you knew a run was coming. They just broke off with that shot at the end of the first half. I think we've done a good job in our zone in the first half. In the second half we didn't really do anything different. We just didn't do as good of a job. They hit some big shots and I thought that kind of got their heads up. They're a team that makes big runs off of those kind of plays. You watch every game that they've played, they go out from the get-go. Then there's all of a sudden that one run that they make because of their length or athleticism defensively or how good they are in transition. When they did that, it really deflated us. We lost our sense of competitive toughness. We struggled to score in the second half. We missed some easy shots."
On SDSU:
"I've said this all summer to people, if they get the right match-up (in the NCAA tournament) they will go deep into the tournament because of their ability to shoot the ball around the perimeter, their athleticism, and the way they can play the game off the glass. They're impressive."