Quotes From The Clemson-Appalachian State Men’s Basketball Game

Jan. 19, 2000

Clemson Head Coach Larry Shyatt

“Let’s compliment Appalachian State. I never felt we had the upper hand at any point in this game. We made a run to cut it to five in the second half, but by and large it was their defense and offensive execution that was the difference. They played with poise the entire game and should be commended.”

“They did an outstanding job defending Solomon. It seemed when we worked the ball inside they were able to collapse and deflect and force turnovers.”

“We have struggled in terms of turnovers without Edward Scott at the point. We have 43 turnovers the last two games with him on the bench after averaging about 13 a game the previous six games. We need all of our parts to be successful. We got a couple of minutes from Dustin, but he is still not 100 percent by any means.”

“I am happy with the improved free throw shooting and we got some good minutes from Walker Holt tonight.”

Appalachian State Head Coach Buzz Peterson

“Before coming into this game, I had been challenging the seniors for a long time. We have come so close to beating a top level conference team. This was our last opportunity to win. We lost by three last year to Georgia and we lost in double over-time to Georgia Tech and earlier this year to Pittsburgh. After losing to Wisconsin Green Bay, Tyson Carson called a team meeting. After that meeting we have been a different ball club. It is nothing the coaches have done, the seniors have stepped up. Our victory tonight was a team victory. We were worried about Solomon getting hot going into the game. Our goal was to keep him below his average. We also wanted to limit their second opportunities.”

Clemson Center Adam Allenspach

“We just have to play harder, tonight we didn’t play very hard and they wanted it more and they had it. We knew they were really good. We knew they were 5-0 in the league. I still think we took them for granted and we showed that. We have to get the guys to stop doing that and just go out there and play hard every game. Hopefully we will come out against Maryland and try to keep our pride and just keep playing hard.”

Clemson Guard Will Solomon

“I credit their defense because they played real good. Adam, our big man, was trying to get me the ball most of the time and he basically did a good job with it. We needed more guys to step up tonight. Myself, I didn’t step up and I feel bad. I just have to come out and play harder.”

“It is getting more frustrating because we are losing. We don’t have a full team to practice against, so we have to practice against the smaller guys and it is very frustrating for us.”

“Everyone on our team, we have good attitudes about each other. We try to keep each other up. Because we are a young team we are going to have to come together and play harder and practice harder.”