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NCAA Tournament: First-Round Quoteables (Buffalo)

03/17/2017, 12:45pm EDT
By Matt Trabold

Matt Trabold (@TrabsMatt)
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BUFFALO, N.Y.: Eight teams played their first-round games in the NCAA Tournament yesterday at KeyBank Center. Here are the best post-game quotes from throughout the day:

Bucknell

Junior forward Nana Foulland on getting a pep talk from Jay Wright after their game: “It's an honor. He definitely sees we're a talented ball club. It's his alma mater. He's proud of us. It means a lot.”

Junior guard Stephen Brown on returning all five starters next year: “Just using this as fuel to come back next year and, from beginning to end to just fight every single game and every single practice. Now that we have a goal to come back, and get a win in the first round, I think we can use this and it's much of a confidence boost for all of the guys returning back next year.”

Notre Dame

Junior guard Matt Farrell on the team surviving a close first-round game: “We want to win, and we don’t care how we win, at all. We just want to win.”

Sophomore guard Rex Pflueger on gashing his head in the first half: “I got hit in the head and said, ‘Dang, I’m probably going to get a shiner.’ Then, I take my hand off and all the blood comes down. There goes that.”

Head coach Mike Brey on patching up Pflueger’s head gash: “We would have stitched any other of our guys, but since he's from L.A., and he's into Hollywood, we didn't want to mess his face up, so we glued his head up because he could be a movie star someday.”

Princeton

Sophomore guard Devin Cannady on his potential game-winning bucket: “I looked at the rim, and when the ball left my hand, I thought it was good. It didn't go in and that's what happens when you take those shots. It either does or doesn't. In this case, it didn't and the rest is...”

Senior forward Spencer Weisz on the respect the Ivy League has in NCAAs: “I think it shows. Every year, when the brackets come out, I'm sure people are always looking at the Ivy League - who's representing and what matchup they have because, at the end of the day, we feel we feel we can compete with anyone. It's a testament to our league, testament to the players.”

Head coach Mitch Henderson on how much he will miss seniors Weisz and Steven Cook: “I'm going to miss them all so much, and in particular, these two guys. Spencer has allowed us to play a certain way, and we're very difficult to guard. And then Steve, we were just in the locker room, and some of his teammates were saying some incredible things about him. He truly makes you want to be a better person when you're around him. He's an academic All-American, our first since 1998, and he certainly deserves every bit of that recognition.”

West Virginia

Senior forward Nathan Adrian on why he grew out his hair this season: “I had to grow it out at some point in time, so I figured I’d grow it while I still had it.”

RS freshman forward Lamont West on how he would grade that victory: “We just went out there wanting to play good defense. We wanted to pursue threes. I just feel like we executed, but we could have did better. So, I give our performance a seven out of ten.”

Head coach Bob Huggins on Tarik Phillip’s shooting at the charity stripe: “You know, Tarik went from being a poor free-throw shooter, and he's really put a lot of time in. I think he had a streak of maybe 28, 29 in a row, and then he missed a couple and then he's back on another streak. But Tarik puts an enormous amount of time in.”

Villanova

Sophomore forward Eric Paschall on stepping up when some key veterans struggled: “Honestly, I don’t think about it. I just have to do it for everybody here. Josh (Hart), Kris (Jenkins) and Darryl (Reynolds) are all great players. If they have bad nights, it shouldn’t matter.”

RS freshman guard Donte DiVincenzo on how he missed those two dunks: “I don't know. The first one I took off too far, I guess. The second one, I don't know what happened. I just didn't get a lot of lift. I tried to get it back off the steal.”

Head coach Jay Wright on DiVincenzo’s two missed dunk attempts: “I have no problem with that at all, none. He's one of our best dunkers. He took off too far on the first one and probably on the second one, he should have gone off one foot.”

Mount St. Mary’s

Sophomore guard Elijah Long on how great the Mountaineers’ fan section was: “The fan base has been really strong for us, and for them to come out to Buffalo and show support is amazing. We were 1-11 at the beginning of the season, and nobody believed in us. They stayed with us the whole time. That was big.”

Junior guard Junior Robinson on how they won’t back down from a big-time foe: “I mean, I feel like we shouldn't have to back down from anyone, after putting on a jersey, they play the game the same way we do. There's no backing down. Just come out and play hard and try to attack them any way we can.”

Head coach Jamion Christian on Jay Wright saying Christian out-coached him tonight: “That's very flattering. Jay Wright is one of those guys I look up to. If you're a young guy coaching, you have a lot of admiration for those who have done the job and done it well for a long time, especially when you dress as well as Jay does.”

Wisconsin

RS sophomore forward Ethan Happ on if the game deserved to be an 8/9 game: “Seeding once the ball goes up doesn’t mean anything really. There’s not much disparity in all 64 teams, especially now that we’re down to 32.”

Junior guard Jordan Hill on how long the first gameday of an NCAA Tournament can be: “We had like an 8:30 cold breakfast. I’m not sure what tomorrow will be, but we’ll probably stay in bed a little bit longer. Luckily for me since I’ve been here, we’ve had some pretty good seeds. We never had to play this late.”

Head coach Greg Gard on where tonight ranked in Bronson Koenig’s top games: “Well, I can probably remember his two turnovers or whatever he had. Oh, he had one. Okay? I've known him since he was a freshman in high school, recruited him for three years before he committed to us. So I've seen him do a lot of things. He's a heck of a player.”

Virginia Tech

RS senior guard Seth Allen on why he gave Zach LeDay a hug: “Because Zach's like my brother. We came in together and this is the last game we play together in college, so I just wanted to tell him I love him and that's it.”

RS senior guard Zach LeDay on his team's pride after a loss: “We went out there, we fought as hard as we could. I guess at the end of the day, they made more winning plays than us, but we're going to have pride no matter what. We just came up short.”

Head coach Buzz Williams on how much he’ll miss seniors Allen and LeDay: “You probably know this, I'm in the bottom percentile in saying hello. And whatever percentile you think I am in that regard, I'm worse in saying good-bye. I don't say hello to my wife when she calls me; I don't say good-bye to my wife. That's the way I've always been and that's why I'm perceived, sometimes, I think in the wrong way. Man, I'll miss those kids.”

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