Pitt head coach Jeff Capel met with the media following Pitt’s 71-60 win over Georgia Tech on Saturday. Here is a complete rundown on everything Capel had to say in his postgame press conference.
Capel: Proud of my time. This was a heck of a win for us and the end of a energy cycle this week to play such a tough game at Duke on Wednesday. Very, very physical game and to come down here to get off the mat and to be really tough and to do some really good things. We don’t take winning for granted, especially on the road. It’s very hard to win period. It’s very hard to win on the road and we were playing a team that I think is a good team. I think they are better than their record, but Josh has continued to get them to play really hard throughout. They really did a great job in the first, Georgia Tech did on offensive rebounds. I think they got four or five 3s off of offensive rebounds. We’ve got to do a better job there. I think we were a little bit better in the second half. We only gave up six offensive rebounds.
Nike Sibande was great. Most importantly he was a great teammate and I thought that’s why he played very well. And a guy I thought player very well and it doesn’t show up as far as numbers was Federiko. I thought his defense in helping us, of protecting our basket and helping us on these ball screens, DHOs (dribble handoffs) and stopping the ball was tremendous. So really proud of my group, to have three road wins in this league is a pretty big-time thing.
Were you more pleased with the overall rebounding effort this game than maybe you were against Duke?
Capel: I was pleased in the second half, not in the first half. They had eight offensive rebounds in the first half. I wasn’t pleased with how we did, I thought we did we did a little bit better in the second half. Not where we need to be, but we took a step in the right direction.
Cummings came out in the first half with foul trouble. What is there to be say about his effort cleaning things up defensively in the second half?
Capel: It’s not cleaning anything up, he didn’t foul. He played with four for the rest of the game. He did a really good job. He got a couple of tough calls, but we need him on the court. But I thought guys stepped up. I thought Nate in the first half was really, really good. I thought Guillermo came in and gave us really good minutes. Everyone that touched the court really affected this game.
You played much better in the paint and outscored them there. Was that an area of focus, just getting better looks at the basket?
Capel: And we still probably missed about six layups. That’s the thing, we have to do a better job there. The thing we wanted to do, we knew that they switched defenses up and we also knew sometimes with their ball screen coverage they switched. If you watched our game against Duke, that may be what you would think to do. That’s what Duke did in the second half. I thought against Duke we got stagnant and we just tried to go one on one. Today we moved the basketball a little bit better. We drove off of it to go make plays instead of driving it just to score and I thought that’s why we were able to get some things. We got second and third penetration.
In the first half Coleman got 11 points, what did you do defensively to shut him down the rest of the game?
Capel: I think in the first half if I remember right, two and maybe all three of his threes came on offensive rebounds and kick-outs and so I thought we did a little bit better job in the second half with that because he made them. He wasn’t shooting a great percentage and our awareness for him picked up a little bit in the second half and we were able to get to him and contest the shots a little bit more.
You mentioned Fede’s play in things that don’t show up in the stat sheet, do you think he needs more touches on the offensive end?
Capel: We can do a better job and we talked about that at the halftime that if they’re switching to get him down in the post, especially against a smaller guy. The other thing we can do is if he has a smaller guy then we should be able to rebound. That’s an area where we have to continue to work and to fine tune and to get better there.
It seemed you were able to give them problems finding open looks inside on the arc, can you comment on just what you guys did?
Capel: I thought a big part of that was Federiko. I just thought his ability to defend the ball screen, the DHOs, to veer off and to get there and use his length. We didn’t get bumped off as much. On guys drive we played against dead pivot where they’re moving around and things like that. We did a better job of bodying up and not getting beat clean also on drives. We did a much better job on that.
You said Nike did a really great job of being a teammate, can you elaborate on that further?
Capel: Our guys have been really good teammates all year and he was selfless. He was just making plays and it’s one of the coolest things I’ve seen, probably since I’ve been a coach. In the second half I was going to start him. I said it at halftime and he came up to me and he said, ‘No, start Greg’. Like that’s what I mean about being selfless. He was so into us winning and to be a good teammate and I thought that’s why he played really well.
What are some of the thing Elliott has been doing to work on that shot?
Capel: He’s got to keep shooting. We believe in him. He’s a good player. He can’t put his head down and he can’t have bad body language. You’ve just got to keep going and keep being a great teammate.
When Georgia Tech was in man-to-man, did you feel like your quickness take advantage of that?
Capel: Well again, I think they’re quick, long, and athletic. The thing we tried to do was once we knew they were switching ball screens we really tried to attack that, spread the floor, and now we felt like we had a little bit of an advantage with one of our guys on Howard and we really tried to take advantage of that with driving and kicking and not necessarily for that guy to score but to create something and to drive and penetrate and draw help and then make decisions there.
I know you issued a statement on it, but wanted to see if you had any further comment on Hugley being out?
Capel: Nope.
In terms of getting to the hole, you seemed to draw a lot more fouls. Was there an emphasis on that as the second half progressed there?
Capel: Yea and really all game. We knew when they went man, sometimes they play drop coverage in ball screens, sometimes they switched. Against Notre Dame they played man the whole game and switched every ball screen. Sometimes they’d blitz it, which they did a little bit in the second half. We really wanted just to take advantage of that.
You obviously have a long way to go, but you are one win away from matching you ACC win total from a year ago. Can you big picture of what you guys have done so far?
Capel: Well we’ve done a good job. Like I mentioned earlier, to have three road wins in this league, that’s something we don’t take for granted and we don’t take lightly. We beaten some good teams. We have to keep getting better. I think we have a ceiling to keep getting better and we have to keep working, having the right attitude, and like we’ve talked about all year, just be a really good teammate. Just be all about the team, all about winning, and play the right way. We’ve done that for the most part, really all year, and that something that we have to continue to do.
