Jim Calhoun Guys Quotations

Rashad wanted to be so good tonight, and of all guys who I thought wanted the limelight at home, it's really unfortunate he didn't have the kind of game he's capable of having. He's a terrific basketball player ... the best sixth man in college basketball.

Over the last 15 years, the type of players we've had here, the fortune to be successful, we've had the bull's-eye. Now there's the added bull's-eye of a new league, being No. 1. They just pile up. That's exactly where you want to be. You want to be playing from the top. I hear guys say they like to be the underdog. But there's a reason you're the underdog. I'd like to be playing from the top any time I can.

It feels good so many guys contributed. We, the coaching staff, to some degree, have become so reliant on Rudy and he didn't have a particularly good evening and that happens to great players and will continue to happen.

They shocked us into such a state that I witnessed our poorest offensive effort in my 20 years at Connecticut. Albany gave us everything they had. I hugged (Albany coach) Will Brown after the game and I don't know Will Brown. I told him that, 'Your guys are special.' And they were.

Albany gave us every single thing they had. I hugged Coach Brown, who I don't even know, and said to him very simply, 'You guys are special.' And they were special.

I don't know if these guys could have gone another minute.

I don't think we shot well (38.7 percent), but I think we played well and yet it took us 30 minutes to shake them, maybe 35 minutes to shake them. That's just by their tenacity and how hard they played. Providence has a young team. The three guys who I think played really well for us happened to be seniors and that makes a difference in college basketball.

I've talked to the kids about the difficult situation they've given me, in the sense I think all of our guys can play.

Their big guys stood up and knocked our guys off the block. Our guys took it, accepted it, and weren't really much of a factor.

Their big guys dominated us. Last night when I went to bed or this morning when I woke up, I would never have thought that would have happened. Maybe a wash, but certainly not that.

They find a way to win. A lot of the things that happened against Washington were plays that players make. Guys who refuse to lose a basketball game, guys who are down by five with 30 seconds to go but don?t believe they?re going to lose. And that, as a coach, you don?t teach. Maybe you try to set the mood that we?re still here, but you can?t set the mood if you don?t have winners with you.

You have living proof of his maturity. There are so many times when guys feel like lashing back out at people. Since he felt he was the one who made the mistake, there was no sense lashing out at anybody. ... How he handled it showed me that he was more than ready.

They run very good offense. If you're not on top of your game, they've got guys on this year's team that can make plays. I think our kids are going to have to pick it up a level.

The college game is controlled by guards, has been and will be. You guys are going to try to name all the great big men who have carried their teams to Final Fours recently. You're not going to come up with any. You're going to come up with teams that are dominated by good inside play and terrific guard play. In the college game, guys that control the ball control the game.

We may have guys close to or equal, but no one's been better, ever, at making clutch shots. He's made bigger 3's than any player I've ever had. When it comes down to crunch time, he makes shots. It seems to me the bigger the shot, the better chance he's going to make it.

We're going to need some help from some of the guys that are struggling. Josh (Boone) is struggling a little bit. Certainly Denham (Brown) is struggling a lot. We're going to need those guys' offense to help us.

What Louisville needed late in the game was experience. That's what we had, some guys coming down the stretch who know what to do. We turned our defense up in the last 4 1/2 minutes of the game, we took care of the ball, took good shots and made good decisions. This was a grind-it-out game.

I can still see Calvin Murphy getting 62 points, and I can still see flashbacks from the pictures of Wilt getting 100, ... You go from the biggest to the smallest. The wonders of the game, from the guys playing pickup to the kids shooting in Indiana to the inner city kid who finds a way out through the sport of basketball - and I don't mean necessarily to the NBA - are embodied in this game. It doesn't take wealth or pure size. It takes heart, repetition, talent. All that stuff is embodied in the game. When I walk through that building, it's embodied there.

These are two giant tests. I told our guys at a team meeting that we're 22-1 and 9-1, but we still have more tests. We've got to keep proving it and proving it.

It's one of the few games where you're going to have legitimate guys who can both put 20 on the board, double-figure rebound, both affect the other team's offense by being a defensive presence inside. Either one of these guys can really alter the game.

I'll tell my guys simply Michigan State and Carolina. I think they will get the message.