Allan Ray Quotations

When I was on that floor and couldn't see anything, that was one of the first things I was thinking about, I'd probably be blind. I thought I was. I couldn't see anything. Everything was burning. Pretty much, my life just flashed in front of me.

We are here to take care of business.

The real good teams and the real great teams find a way to win.

Like coach always says, 'We play to be the best team at the end of the year.' At the end of the year, you can look back at all the accomplishments that you made. For right now, we're just going out there game-by-game. We're not trying to get all caught up in everything that's going around us.

Most teams would go, 'Oh, man!' and have their heads down. We just looked at it like it's just another obstacle we have to overcome.

Monmouth is a great defensive team or they wouldn't be here. This is the NCAA Tournament and there are a lot of great teams here. We kept our composure. We knew there were times when we weren't going to be able to score, but that's when we relied on our defense to keep us in the game.

Noah is an animal. That dude has some energy.

I was supposed to be in front of him. That was my fault.

I was pretty comfortable out there. My vision was good the past few days, so I just came in and I felt pretty good.

If they try and play us big, one of the main things we're going to have to do is defend and get out there and rebound. That's one of the focal points this year is rebounding more than anything.

I felt it pop. That's why I was concerned.

I faced odds when glaucoma took the bat out of my hands. But I didn't give in or feel sorry for myself. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: 'It may be cloudy in my right eye, but the sun is shining very brightly in my left eye.'

I got a lot of good looks. A lot of them were in and out. It just wasn't falling for me today.

We've been through so much, and I think that's why we're so tight and close together as a team. We're like a family because of all we've been through.

We thought when we came here that we were going to be in the tournament every year. But I'm kind of glad how things worked out because we went through so much and worked so hard to get where we're at now ... It wasn't an easy road for us. Nothing was handed to us. We had to deal with many different issues and that makes it even sweeter.

He was just real angry, telling me I've got to take more shots when I'm open because I might not get them later in the game.

He just said not to worry because it could be something little.

He jumped up there before me and I couldn't get there right away. My hand got caught up in his arm and the ref called the foul.

I think we fed off our defense a little more in the second half, and we got into a flow offensively as a result.

It got to a point where coach didn't want me and Randy to guard each other any more. He had to move us on to different guys. It's just so intense, the guards going at each other in practice. It's just brutal.

Jeff Pierce, our trainer, gave this to me and it really keeps things tight. It takes away a lot of the pain.

Surprisingly, it's not that hard to block things out. You just go up there confident, with a clear head.

That comes with experience. We've been through this. We know we can come back if we put our mind to it.

My off-the-field heroes, the people who gave me the values to live by and who inspired me with their hard work and unselfish dedication to their family, were my mom, Catherine, and my dad, William.

My vision is back to 100 percent. I'm ready to go out and play.

Like I've said before, teams are coming after us. That's why we've been in so many of these close games. Every team that plays us comes with their best.

Like Randy said, this is going to hurt for a while.

It definitely wasn't a goal for us. We didn't sit back and say we wanted to win the Big 5 championship. It's just something that comes.

It didn't surprise me. I thought I shot pretty well in practice. I have a lot of confidence in my shot and I wasn't even thinking about my eye.

I think Kyle does a great job of finding the guys who know how to score.

That was my mistake. I was supposed to be in front of Rudy at the time and I let him catch it behind me and that was why I picked up the foul. That was definitely my fault.

We realized it as soon as the game was over. We ran into the locker room yelling, 'Big East champs!' That was such a good feeling.

We?ll get a little rest in the next couple of weeks,

We were just like, 'Man, listen, the No. 1 team is out and it could easily happen to us. We don't want to be the ones going home. We worked too hard for it.

We definitely both like to run down the court. It's not like BC, where they like to slow the game down. It's definitely going to be up and down. That's the style of play that we like to play.

We didn't sit back and start thinking we were going to lose. We talked in the huddle, and everybody said that we just had to stay calm and not panic. We knew they would make a run. Once you panic, bad things happen.

Congress wants to keep "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance. Washington politicians are united in their faith. Most worship the same reelection.

Mexico is divided over the results of its presidential election. The U.S.had offered to send in a task force to help determine the outcome, but unfortunately the Supreme Court is currently not in session.

I had some great role models along the way. My on-field heroes were the great Ernie Banks, Billy Williams, and Willie Mays. I wanted to be like them on the field, and I am so damn proud to join them in the Hall of Fame.

Coach wants me to shoot, and he tells me never to lose my aggressiveness. That's most important.

We had a chance to see a lot of different styles of play and you had to adapt to the different style each team plays. That?s going to help us come tournament time because the game in the Pac-10 is different from the Big East and we know how to adapt to the different styles. I?m glad I had that opportunity.

The great teams find a way to win.

We knew we never should have been in that position last year anyway for the game to be decided on that call.

We lead in different ways. I think the team does a great job in following us. There have been times where the team has picked us up, too, and I think that's most important, that everyone is together on the team. That's what me and Randy do the most, make sure that everyone is together.

We're two different teams right now. You really can't look back.

There are not too many games you're going to win having 22 turnovers.

We're never worried about off nights because we've got guys who can fill it up.

We're trying not to get caught up in the rivalry.

We just weren't being as aggressive on defense and we normally are. We needed to turn it up in the second half.

With all the media attention and all that's going on, I don't want all the focus to be on me. I just want to say my eye's fine, there's nothing wrong with it, so please no more questions about it. I just want to focus on basketball.

When we jumped out on them early, we were all saying in our heads, 'We've got them exactly where we wanted them to be.' ... That was the best position you could have the No. 1 team in the country: 21-9 in the first half. We couldn't ask for anything more.

We just feed off each other. Sometimes Randy gets it going and everyone on the team knows that and we'll try to find him. Sometimes Mike (Nardi) gets it going and we find him. Sometimes I get it going and everyone finds me.

We knew about Monmouth, we knew they were a very good team. We definitely didn't underestimate them.

We feel we played well, especially defensively. We felt we played a great game.

We feel we played a great game. Not many teams can shoot 31 percent and win the game.

We hit a lot of shots early and once you hit shots early, you get a lot of confidence as a team.

Being a No. 1 seed is cool. And knowing you?re in the tournament sure beats not knowing.

Every shot was contested, you know? There were very few open looks. Florida did a great job of contesting our shots and made sure that we took tough shots.

I've practiced two times already and the practices were great. My vision is back 100 percent, and I'm ready to get back out there and just play.

It was tough coming down those steps for the last time.

Sometimes, you have to take the good with the bad. As long as the good outweighs the bad, then you're all right.

Definitely, we all talked about it. We knew how they came in here and beat us pretty heavily last year. We didn't want to let that happen again, so we just came out with a great mindset, great intensity and really focused on our game plan.

Coach wants us to be aggressive, especially at times like that. He expects us to make plays.

The brace was really good, it eliminated the pain. Even if I was on the bench I was still going to cheer the guys on. Just to play was very special.

As long as you get the win, that's the bottom line. It doesn't matter if it's by one point or two points, a win is a win.

That's why I was hanging my head. When it first happened I was like, 'You can't be serious, not another knee injury.' That's why I was so scared. We've had a lot of knee injuries on this team and I didn't want to be another one.

That's just what we do. That's how we play. That's our system. Until somebody decides to stop us guards, then we'll continue to do that. Once they do stop us or we have an off night, we have guys that we can go inside too. A lot of people don't think we have an inside game.

That shows you're one of the best teams, if not the best team in the league.

They matched everything we did. We made a run. They came out and stopped it. If we missed a wide-open shot, they came down to score. The transition, they got the stops when they needed to, and they grabbed the big rebounds at the times that they did.

They have a couple of great shooters, and we have to get out and contest their shots. And they have a big guy down low that is going to be a handful.

They remind me of us. They didn't quit. They kept fighting. They're a tough team.

It's just another game on our schedule. You can't put too much on this game.

It's just having the will to win. ...Just having faith in ourselves and believing in ourselves - that's what allowed us to pull it through.

It was fun for us. For Louisville to be hitting threes like that, it wasn't that fun. For us to be hitting it, it felt pretty good. Coming down on the other end and giving it up was kind of a bad feeling right there.

It was fun for us. For Louisville to be hitting 3s like that, it wasn't that fun. For us to be hitting it, it felt pretty good. Coming down on the other end and giving it up was kind of a bad feeling right there.

It was real hard, but it was a great learning experience. It taught us how to deal with adversity.

It was important to us to at least finish with the best record at 7-1,

For a freshman, that was a great play, just having the confidence to go up there and make a play like that at that time in the game. He went up and challenged him and made a great play.

It's always big when you beat the No. 1 team. It was awesome coming away with the win and seeing the crowd rush the floor.

It's always big when you beat a No. 1 team, especially at home.

It's pretty sore right now, but the doctor said it's going to be like that. You just have to do what's best. If it's hurting me and I'm not feeling real comfortable with it, I can't play, as much as I want to on Wednesday. I'm just going to take this day by day and see how it feels. If I feel I can go 100 percent, then I'm definitely going to play. If not, I'll just have to sit the game out.

That's one thing Coach stressed early in the season, that if we're going to play four guards, we better rebound.

That is most important with our program -- defend the rebound. When you go against Boston College, you have to keep them off the offensive glass. That's most important with us when we go against bigger teams.

(Syracuse) gave us a lot of open looks. When you give good players open looks, it's hard not to miss.

It's a much needed rest. We're definitely going to take advantage of it. We got a couple of guys banged up. That should definitely help us out going into the tournament with that much rest.

It was a great game. A good bounce-back game for us after losing to Canada yesterday. It showed how much pride we have in USA Basketball. After losing yesterday's game, coming out and being able to play hard today against Puerto Rico, that says a lot.

I wanted to play baseball ever since I was 5 years old.

It was just a little pushing and shoving and words were exchanged.

Once my vision came back and was clear and not blurry anymore, I knew I could come out and play.

Their defense did a great job on us. Every shot was contested. There were very few open looks.

Their defense also did a great job, I can't take anything away from them. Every shot was contested; there were very few real open looks. They did a great job contesting our shots and making sure we took tough shots.

I'm really just moving on. I've got this season to worry about now.

If I was seeing a little bit of daylight, I was letting it go.

I haven?t been on New York?s public transit system since I got my car four years ago. I drive everywhere.

In practice, I was shooting the ball pretty well and I was really confident with my shot. I didn't have a problem with the eye. I wasn't thinking about it. I came into today's game like it (the injury) didn't even happen.

I just stepped up to the line real confident. Coach puts the ball in my hands at the end of the game for a reason.

I just hope the MRI is in my favor.

Being No. 1 in the country would definitely be a great accomplishment for the school and the fans and everyone.

Honestly, to tell you the truth, it's not like a big sense of excitement right now. We're just here to take care of business.

I couldn?t find my shot in the trials, ... I couldn?t make anything. Playing defense in the one thing that Coach Wright has instilled in me. You?re going to have off day offensively, but you can never have an off day defensively.