Todd Tripp Quotations

We struggled on offense, but we kept playing defense and kept getting stops. I thought we controlled the boards and our defense was good tonight.

We felt like we gave the game to them the last time we played. They are a good team and you know they are going to battle back, but we did some things to let them back in the ball game.

Maybe for the first time all year, I thought we looked a little tired. We were deeper than they were, I thought, but our kids were so scared of getting cut and beat backdoor, they weren't coming up and trying to get a count on them.

I felt it hurt when Fischer didn't play. The last two games we haven't been able to finish.

I felt like our pressure really hurt them. They traveled a few times and threw the ball away. I felt like our kids were everywhere.

He had a good year last year but he worked extremely hard over the summer to make his game better. Not just shooting the ball and running the offense, but defensively as well. He worked at it and everyone could see that. Everyone could see the changes and knew that he was a lot better.

Our kids aren't going to back down from anybody. They'll come out fighting, ready to play. We'll scrap and get on the floor for loose balls. We're going to guard you. If you beat us, you played a pretty good game.

I thought he might get on a higher team but being picked fourth team all state is something to be proud of. Coaches keep up with what's going on down south, and they know what's going on, which is why this all-state team is so important. It seems to get the most respect. I just wish more people had been able to see him play.

That was big for us. He had a couple of nice assists and he showed a lot of guts.

I wasn't very pleased with our play tonight. (The Trojans) played extremely hard in the first half but we picked it up in the second half. If we don't come to play a lot harder in the next two weeks, it will be a short two weeks.

We can't complain. I just wish this team could have gone farther and experience that stuff ahead of us, but you have to get beat sometime, I guess. Our fans were great. They showed up tonight and that was good to see. I just hope they realize what kind of year we had. This was a really good year and I'm proud of them.

We got beat by poor shooting. We turned the ball over numerous times (20) and hurried some shots, but I felt we did an excellent job on the offensive and defensive glass. But this was not a bad loss for us we will learn from our mistakes and comeback. We got beat by a good team tonight.

We were sleepwalking through three quarters. We've been battling some sickness here lately but we're not going to use that as an excuse. The guys showed guts in the fourth quarter.

You know, he's been playing like that for us all year. People say 'Why doesn't he start?' It's so nice to grab him off the bench and bring him on the floor. He does things for us and he's comfortable with that role.

We'll get after it in practice next week. It's regional time. We'll see what happens.

We wanted them to rush some of their 3-point shots. We wanted to close out on their shooters and get our hands up and make them shoot with our hands in their face.

We've got to work on our shooting when we get back to practice.

This was more important than the tournament. This goes throughout the whole season and means we've played good basketball the whole way. A team can get hot in the tournament for a few days, like we did this year, but this is even better.

This was a tough game to get up for tonight. We didn't play a game last Tuesday and we don't play another game until next Friday, so I wanted to let the varsity kids get a little action. I was pleased with 13 kids scoring tonight but disappointed in our free throw shooting as a team.

We tried to make them shoot the ball and they shot the ball. I didn't think (Ackley) could shoot like that and he knocked two shots down to get things started.

We did a better job of running things than we did against Benton. And Herrin's defense was pretty good it was better than Benton's.

The one bright spot I was pleased with was our free throw shooting. We were 20-for-25 from the line.

That's not like Brandon, he usually doesn't shoot like that. But sometimes you have those games.

This is an athletic, strong kid who will just get better at the next level. I think his best days are ahead of him.

A lot of teams we've played have had trouble guarding him. He can take a lot of people to the hole but he just hasn't been hitting free throws lately. I think a lot of that was in his head and he stepped up and hit them tonight.

They gave him a technical and I really don't know why, to tell you the truth. I don't think (the referee) could explain it very well either. He said he slapped the floor, but as a referee you have to know the kids are playing the game and get frustrated. (Hood) didn't say anything to the ref. I thought it was a terrible call.

They're like us in that they're not real big overall, but they play hard like we do. They just try to play the basics of basketball and that's what we do. We'll have two teams that fight until the end.

It's a joy to be around these kids and a joy to coach these kids. I hate to see the seniors go.

That's pretty good for us. We had dipped to below 60 percent for the season before tonight.

The big thing will be rebounding. We've keyed on that every game. We have to rebound. And we can't let Graham go off and have a big game. He's going to score, he's too good to hold down, but we just can't let him go crazy.

Oh, that was big. I heard the smack from where I was. That was big for him and it was big for our team.

The kids had goals and that was one of the goals. We wanted to be undefeated at home.

The key to our team is getting everyone to contribute like they did tonight. It definitely showed. We didn't play our best but it was enough and Herrin, for having a 2-22 record, is a tough team. We're happy to get this win.

I just felt like we have in the last seven games, now eight, that our bench had a lot to do with (our winning). We can run kids in and out out there.

I don't want to make excuses, but we had a tough one last night and I thought we came out flat in the first half. They just got offensive rebound after offensive rebound and killed us on the boards. In the second half, I thought we did a lot better job getting to the boards.