Utah 77 – ASU 85 | Postgame Press Conference – Carlson becomes the Utes all-time leader in Blocks
Question well first of all congrats to Arizona State uh Bobby Hurley his guys did a great job tonight you know those guys have uh had a tough stretch here coming into tonight and give them a lot of credit they uh fought hard I thought they they were aggressor tonight um so
Give them a lot of credit to coming and win on the road it’s been hard to win on the road and we’ve been really good at home um until quite frankly tonight so it’s a humbling game and uh we got humbled tonight and quite Franklin this home stand played thought really really
Well the other night and uh you know one possession one point the other night and you know tonight ends up being three three to four possession however you want to look at it and that can be you know living really good and and going
Two and0 and and but we we did the other you know we went the other way to go 0 and2 so we didn’t get it done everything that we want is still out there we got to keep our heads up and got to keep pushing got to keep competing got to
Keep fighting uh I thought we you know didn’t guard to the level that that we needed to guard tonight um we’ve been getting a lot better on that end of the floor but um wasn’t the case I just thought they were aggressive and got to their spots consistently that our into
The floor um too many you know with 13 turnovers which is a lot better than last time uh it’s a solid number they did score 21 points I think they had eight points I believe directly off our turnovers and you can’t allow you know a lot of times their best offense is their
Defense and you just can’t allow our offense to be their best offense and and then we miss a lot of shots quite frankly in that second half we had a we had some lot of clean looks that just just didn’t fall in and sometimes that happens and I’m not a guy that usually
Says something like that but I thought we did have a lot of clean ones tonight got to make our free throws it’s starting to become a little bit of a uh a habit of saying that you know and I just think there’s a lot of things with
That so got to be better I thought we had proud of Brandon you know obviously a long game the other day we’re not going to use that as an excuse or anything of the sort uh you got to be able to bounce back and you got to be
Able to show character and resiliency physically emotionally mentally a lot goes into it but was really proud of how he played on both ends of the floor um and obviously letters with 27 had 11 rebounds as well thought CBA gave us a lot of um uh had a couple turnovers but
Just will points like just going and get offens rebound he gets five of them and just kind of will himself to try to get us going and get us that Mojo but um we just at the end of the day weren’t good enough tonight outs of sorry outside of Brandon obviously your
Team kind of struggled like you said to to shoot was there any is there any reason you can point to from that other than just shot in Fall you think I I think when you play Arizona State they they are um they’re very athletic um they scramble they just you
Don’t always know what’s going to happen with them defensively like sometimes one thing that’s going to happen if you get the ball in the paint they’re going to run like three guys at you or four um they’re a little bit all over with some different things so you got to be
Players you you just got to be able to make the right play whatever it is and sometimes they get you rushed although I thought we had some really clean looks that just didn’t fall and so sometimes that happens basketball is Game of Rhythm and timing on the offensive end
And um and so and they do a good job of throwing a out of rhythm and timing right um I thought we handled their press well uh they didn’t press nearly as much as we’ve handled presses very well all year um we were prepared for it
Um but we’ve done a really good job with that so sometimes you have those nights you know I want to be a team that consistently gets can get the ball into the paint whether it’s post touches transition offensive rebounds dribble penetration and then make the right
Decision um with that you know we shoot 29 threes obviously some of those came in the last two minutes I don’t like to be a team that just you know shoots 30 essentially you know 29 over 67 shots from the three I’m not usually a big fan
Of that uh unless they’re really clean one so um but I did think we had some really clean looks that just didn’t fall Arizona State kind of May came in made the game shy how do you think your players responded to that physicality normally we’re a pretty
Physical team um I thought they like I said at the opening statement I felt like they were the aggressor and we have a saying in our program the aggressor always wins and I firmly believe that in every sport and you know you got to have a an aggressive mindset and a physicality and
Uh I didn’t think we match that consistently tonight I think some guys did but we as a team I felt like they were just downhill on us a lot The Zone got him standing for a while and it slowed us down and kind of we gained
Some momentum there and then they did a good job of flashing some guys and got two or three kind of easy B kind of floaters you know at The Rim but uh certainly they are their aggressor tonight on Thursday night you obviously said it was going to be a tough turn
Around just with the triple overtime was there in your eyes is there any residual from that or is this just comp well I mean I’m not gonna I’m never goingon to make excuses you know I just you know that’s why you have a team um I think
You show sometimes who you are in in tough times and I always I truly believe tough times don’t last tough people do um big believer in that and we just weren’t as as connected as we needed to be tonight and we just weren’t as tough
As we need to tonight um and I just thought you know they all played us they all competed us a month left in season how do you feel like your team’s NCA resum yeah I don’t look at that stuff I just know we got to lock in and this is a little bit
Cliche is and I understand this but I just worry about the next opponent and worry about our team being the very best that we can be on a day-to-day basis every day in practice every day in film every day in the waight room let’s be at
Our very best and and if we are then good things will happen I know we’re in still in a good position this is a tough loss obviously in aot for a lot of respects Conference standings you know we’ve been so good at home and we let
You know uh and we lose both um but we have seven regular season games left we’re guaranteed one game in the conference tournament so we know we have eight competitions left at a minimum hopefully a lot more U but we just got to lock into the present and be where
Our feet are at you mentioned Conference standings uh in the blank of an eye six and seven at conference play a couple weeks ago you know does it ever Amaze you how this conference beats itself up well it’s it’s League Play you know and and um
Certainly in the Pack 12 but I I think that’s the case in in most leagues and you know so in division one basketball and I don’t know the exact stat I just you know most games are decided by eight points or less so that’s like tonight
Eight points on on the button right it’s a three to four possession game that can go either way and you got to be able to seize those moments and make those plays right uh when they’re matter and and it’s so it’s just so many teams that are
So even right and any and in this league this year and we said this at the get-go I felt like the back half of the league was much better than it’s been the last two years some teams are really starting to figure it out now and that’s you know
When you have a bunch of trans some teams have a ton of new transfers new faces sometimes it takes a little longer to figure that out but um nothing really surprises me anymore specifically in this conference obviously as a coach you’re gonna have a million things that you
Want to look at and kind of focus on what what is kind of your immediate thing that you feel like needs to address going into next week yeah you know that’s a great question um I’ve always felt like you know like on a night like tonight you know the other
Night we did some really really good things not so much the second 10 minutes of the first half but other than that we did showed a lot of courage and a lot of heart um and played with some real like sense of urgency and and maybe even a little bit of
Desperation um which isn’t a bad thing and um didn’t always have that today you know we’ll see when I watch some film but I always look at it like you know it’s a fine line where you you really got to push guys and put you know will them to things that maybe
They’ve never done before so we got to we got to push that way but you also got to be able to take a step back and say okay you know if it feels like we have eight problems like we got to cut it cut our problems in half it feels like we
Have six real issues right now cut your problems in half let’s really hone into these two or three things our team s tends to respond and like things we really lock into we usually fix those things quickly but we also sometimes then revert to Old bad habits on the other stuff that we
Don’t really lock into and that’s been a little bit of an issue for us um so we got to be able to find consistency and just you know be together but certainly we weren’t at ourselves and credit to Arizona State but there’s some things we did tonight that just seemed a bit out
Of character starting with positive I mean how does it feel to be the alltime block leader here at Utah I mean it’s pretty cool but a little taken away from you know with the loss and everything but you know it’s cool it’s a you know it’s something I’ve definitely you know
Been working for and looking forward towards this season so you know it’s great to kind of have my you know my name on top of that that list now it’s it’s really cool things got a little Shippy out there how do you guys feel like you responded to Arizona State’s physicality
Tonight um I think we had moments and stretches where we were good and other where we just had lapses and we just just needed to be better physically defensively for us I think we had to wait too many um uh opportunities where they just drove right by us and we
Didn’t wall up I think we had they had way too many shots at their end that we needed to contest more um but I think it’s just a learning point for us and now we got to just grow from this Brandon what I mean I know you kind
Of touched right there but like where where did things go wrong for you guys tonight I would say I mean you could say we we missed some we missed some easy shots that we had like we had a lot of good clean looks that we just didn’t
Make um so that helps it helps to change the game a lot but as well I think mainly is just defensively um we just didn’t do a good job of just being able to play one-on-one defense um you know Arizona is a good team a really good
Team at doing ISO ball and I think we needed to be um better at just being able to guard our guy uh your coach has a really wonderful way of making sense of basketball called them the aggressor tonight and really stood firmly that if you’re not the
Aggressor you’re not going to win do you kind of agree with his assessment that way yeah I I would agree for sure that I think we always talk about the toughest team wins um and you got to come in with the mindset with you know we we want to
Play with the toughness and aggressiveness that that when we are done with that game no matter win or lose that that team doesn’t want to play us again because we were so tough and physical and um I think we we were not that tonight and so um you know they
Definitely you know I think they out rebounded us and um you know I think last time we had a big margin of out rebounding them at their place and so that it just kind of shows right there that we weren’t you know really ready to go on that
Standpoint where do the free throw problems kind of lie like how do you fix that where do you think that kind of fits with what your team’s experiencing right now I think it’s just a mental thing I think people we just got to step to the line myself really included um
You just got to step up and just know that we we’ve put in the time that we we make these free throws in practice everyone shoots a very high percentage in practice I think it’s just in the game it’s a it’s got to be a mental
Thing I think free throws um is a very it’s a very mental uh aspect of the game of you know you walk up and you just have the confidence and the uh knock them down and so we just got to you know we have to have guys just step up in the
Moment myself included as a as a leader on this team I mean you’re going to be tasked with kind of helping overc these two losses where do you think the team needs to turn to right now so you don’t let these games spiral you’ve obviously been a part of
Those types of games how do where do you kind of go right now no you got to stay together first of all I think this is where teams I’m not saying our team is like this but teams in general can start you know turning on each other and then
At this point just be like Oh I’m going to get my stats now our season’s kind of coming to an end but we still have everything we want in front of us we just got to go you know take it on the road it’s going to be kind of the hard
Way now um but we have to go you know really fight these next few games stay together and really focus on ourselves I think at at points like this teams and guys can get focused on the wrong things of standings and Conference and your record and everything but we just got to
Just got to take it you know we have seven regular uh conference games left one uh uh Tournament game and you just got to really focus on ourselves and take those games one at a time and just worry about that any other questions for Brandon Brandon uh obviously as you
Mentioned you still have several games left you’ve been with this program since it was not doing so well you’ve kind of watched it build up and in the process you’ve build a legacy both here and in the Pack 12 just kind of now that things are on the downward slope what does it
Mean to you to have that Legacy kind of cemented and knowing that there’s still a little bit more left to not only paint your own legacy but this like or the legacy of this particular TV yeah I mean it’s it’s been you know amazing to be a
Part of you know this this program part of the Pack 12 um and yeah like you said I’ve been on some teams that you know I’ve had more down years um and so this is just uh you know like this is just it’s our last you know last go around in
The Pack 12 and as a team uh it’s just I don’t know there’s a lot of thoughts right now um but you know it’s just kind of crazy when you think for for myself right now I only have two games left in the Huntsman Center um and that’s really crazy to think about
Of you know you don’t you don’t want to end on a a loss here and but yeah we got seven more games and so on this kind of the ending the season right now we really just got to have a a competitive mindset
Hear from Head Coach Craig Smith and Branden Carlson after the Runnin’ Utes fall short against ASU. Branden Carlson becomes Utah’s all-time leader in blocked shots with 220 and counting.
