If you’ve already read my game story in the previous blog post or in the paper or elsewhere on the website, here are some more quotes from the Hokies and the two coaches:

Erick Green on the game: “I take a lot of encouragement from it. I’ve got full faith in these guys and they stepped up and played a heckuva game, we all did. We showed growth. We can play with anybody, it just depends how we come out and play. And we had them, we had them. But you’ve got to give all the credit to NC State, they had a heckuva game — Scott Wood, Brown, Leslie, Howell, they all played a heckuva game.”

Green on State’s 14-0 run: “That killed us.”

Green on his 2nd half: “I just want to make plays for my teammates or for myself. Everybody’s trying to double me and I hit a wide open Will, a wide open Marshall a few times. Guys are getting wide open looks. … The coach wants the ball in my hands to make a play and I love it. They try to wear we out and wear me down, but I’m in great shape. … I love the challenge that all five guys got to try to guard me.”

Jarell Eddie on his performance: “To see the ball go in in the game situations, hopefully it gets me back on track. I just needed to get back in the gym. I needed to get back in the lab and get my shots up, get extra shots up, just see the ball go through the hoop.”

Eddie on not starting again: “I’m not worried about Will starting, he’s earned the position. I wasn’t playing well so Coach put him in the lineup, and that’s good. I was really happy for him. I definitely wanted to be able to make plays for the team and that’s what I was able to do.”

Eddie on his big stickback: “It was a deisgned play. We told Erick to miss it to the right side of the rim and that’s what he did ad I was able to make the layup. … We have a guy that’s lined up on the right move to the left, he sprints to the left side, so the guys blocking him out go to the left for him and I just come in from the 3-point line. … I’m really happy I was able to make big plays to force it to overtime, just not happy that we didn’t win the game.”

Eddie on his miss with about a minute left in regulation: “I thought I was fouled. … It looked bad but I thought I was fouled.”

Eddie on the game: “We don’t want moral victories but it’s good that we was able to play well today. We’re still getting better. … We’re still growing. Hopefully we can blossom at the right time.”

Marshall Wood on the stickback play: “We ran it really early in a practice … We never thought we was going to have to use it.”

Wood on his performance: “I’ve just been working out in practice every day and just working on my game individually.”

James Johnson: “My  guys did a great job of battling and fighting through adversity and coming out ready to play, executed the game plan. Had some guys step up tonight and make some plays. I was really pleased with that. Pleased with the way this team is relentless, they’re working hard. .. We just haven’t been able to finish games and it’s another one tonight. …. Chance to win the ballgame and was not able to finish.”

Johnson on the stickback: “There’s times where we allot practice time for what we call late game situations. We’ve gone throough it a couple times … We drew it up and the guys did a great job executing it. ..  They’ve been very coachable all year long, listening in the huddles. They came out and executed it…. We still had to get back on defense, there was still time on the clock, and they did a good job not fouling and getting the stop there to force the overtime. …. We haven’t been able to do a whole lot in practice. These guys are playing a lot of minutes, I don’t have a deep bench. I’ve got to be smart with how much time I practice and what we do in practice…. but we had practiced it before, but not lately.”

Johnson on Eddie’s game: “That was big for him individually and for his confidence and it was big for our team. We need him. We cannot continue to survive or try to be in ballgames with Erick Green scoring 30 points a game. We’ve got to have some help. For him to be able to keep his head in the game, … he didn’t start did not play a lot of minutes and then when he was called on, his opportunity came, he was able to step up. He was not in a mental funk. He wsa able to step right into the game and make plays.”

Johnson on the lack of free throws: “One of .. the keys to the game was attack them inside. I thought we could score on them inside, whether it be with the post feed, whether it be on the dribble drive and we just didn’t have enough guys getting to the basket and making plays. We had Erick Green getting in there. Jarell Eddie is a 3-point shooter, Will Johnston is a 3-point shooter. Cadarian Raines is 3 for 11 tonight. We just didn’t put them in enough opportunities to get to the free throw line.”

Johnson on Marshall Wood: “Outstanding from Wood for a freshman to be able to play in a hostile environment against a very good team with NBA prospects on the front line …. He’s finally getting his legs back, he’s finally getting his confidence. … We missed him the six weeks he was out. … CJ Leslie’s a load. ….  and we’re out there with a freshman. …. Early on we were kind of bodying up on CJ a little bit more than I’d like, and he’s very quick in his moves. … We made the adjustment with Marshall, and kind of gave him space a little bit and moved his feet and used his length. … As the game went on he learned how to guard. … He held his own late.”

Johnson on the team hearing people talk about VT being a one-man team: “We’ve got guys that understand they’ve got to play better. …. It’s a team game. We’re not playing singles tennis here. It’s a team game.”

Johnson on Green’s big turnover: “Fatigue set in on him. … He missed the front end of the one and one and then turned it over late in the game. I thought fatigue set in on him…. He’s got to play those type of minutes for us to have a chance to beat a good team like this on the road.”

Johnson on State’s 14-0 run: “We weren’t as patient on offense as I would like ….. We’re up seven, I’d like for us to be patient, move the defense a little bit and try to get the ball in the right guy’s hands. … Scott Wood, … he’s a gamer. … We didn’t do the job we needed to do defensively in that 14-0 (run). … The difference in the game was us not being able to get stops during that 14-0 run. … To be up 7 and to let a team go on a 14-0 run, we can’t afford that. We just don’t have enough firepower.”

Johnson on the team: “If this team had quit and they didn’t believe, you wouldn’t have seen that effort out there. … They are fighting and clawing and scratching. … It just needs to show up in the win column and it’s not.”

Mark Gottfried: “Virginia Tech played awfully well. … They stepped up and made big shots, tough shots. They made shots when they had to make them.”

Gottfried on the stickback: “They executed what they wanted to do perfectly….. I want to watch the tape and find out how we ended up not boxing somebody out on a foul shot there, that certainly was our fault. But they made a nice play and the ball bounced perfectly for them to do it.”

Gottfried on Lorenzo Brown guarding Green: “I don’t think he’s 100 percent yet. … During timeouts, I can see him holding his ankle. …. He tried to make it as tough on Erick as he could to score and sheesh, Erick made some tough, tough shots.”

Gottfried with more on Green: “When you’ve got a point guard that scores like that, the first thing is he’s got the ball in his hands all the time. He’s got it in the break and if you don’t get to him quick he’s going to make you pay quickly…. Today, they got in such a great rhythm shooting the 3. Both Eddie and Wood are making 3s and now they make it hard to switch it or double a ball screen….. Green is just a great offensive player. He’s gotten better since last year. That’s why he’s leading the nation in scoring. He’s tough to guard.”

Gottfried on the 14-0 run: “We guarded them better and we got defensive rebounds. And offensively we really executed, got the ball inside. …. The two things on the defensive end that hurt us (overall) and probably didn’t hurt us in that little stretch was guarding the ball screens at the top of the key — they did a great job of pick and pop, stretching us out …. and then we got some rebounds.”

Gottfried on Marshall Wood: “We were just so concerned with Green. 2 or 3 times he came off a ball screen and we had 2 guys running to Green and we didn’t communicate very well. … But he steps up and makes them.”

Gottfried on fouling Green with the 3-point lead late in regulation: “They were in such a good groove at the 3 point line and they had so much confidence from the 3 point line, it’s part of the reason I wanted to foul when we were up three. I’ve played that both ways, I’ve played it where we just played it out and tried to take away a 3 point shot, but boy, they were in a rhythm and shooting the 3 so well, that’s not something I wanted to put them in a situation where they had an opportunity to do that. ….. It’s a feel. I think if you’re playing against a team that maybe the 3 point shot isn’t that big a part of it or there’s only one guy (you don’t foul), but they had 2 or 3, really 4 3-point shooters on the floor. …. One thing with Green, too, on his 3 point shot, when he leans back he kicks a leg up pretty good too. So the first thought is  you can’t foul a 3 point shooter. What I’d like to have happened ….. is really get it down to about 4 or 3 seconds left. Now you can’t always orchestrate that. He got it and brought it (up court) full speed, so we ended up with 5, which really didn’t make a difference anyway because they got the rebound. I’ve done it both ways, I’ve watched it a hundred times, there’s not a right answer. That ball bounced right off the rim perfectly for those guys and they did an excellent job. But if they weren’t in such a great groove I probably wouldn’t have fouled.”

Gottfried on all of State’s free throws: “We had leads in both regulation and  in the end of the game, so some of the fouls, you’re fouling when you’re down. And I thought we did a good job of going to the rim and getting the ball inside. We do that a lot of nights. We’re trying to get to the rim.”