Maryland head coach Kevin Willard spoke postgame about the Terps’ second-half comeback, Derik Queen’s star effort, the growing frontcourt chemistry and more:
Willard on the second-half adjustments vs. Villanova
“We're still only five games in, six games in. [I’m] still learning this team and we have a little bit of a coolness factor sometimes at the start of games, and then all sudden, I challenge them at half to come out and play more physical, be the more physical team. And I thought Julian [Reese], Derik [Queen] and DeShawn [Harris-Smith] did a great job coming out and also just playing more physical.”
On the bench performance
“That’s kind of what – I think moving Deshawn to that second unit gives him more freedom to be the player he's capable of playing. And in that first unit, he's almost forced to be a shooter and think about shooting where once we get out there with a smaller lineup, he can now be a point guard. He can be more aggressive. He feels a little bit. He's not – he doesn't have to stress about shooting because he's out there. And I thought Jay [Young] and Malachi [Palmer], I thought they came in and just changed the energy defensively. They got three big deflections, two big steals, and changed the complexion of the game.”
On Derik Queen’s performance, especially in the second half
“That’s kind of – I love the kid because he got so much confidence but he's got to have that level of that fierceness that he played in the second half from the start. I think he just, he's so talented, he's so gifted that I think his mentality sometimes I'm just gonna go out do it and not realize he's playing against Eric Dixon. He's playing get some good guys. And I did really challenge him and he obviously accepted it very well.”
On Reese-Queen chemistry
“It has to because we're going to play them together. I’ve got to get them both their minutes. But I tell you what they do a really good job of, is they get a good job feeling of where the other guy is. Derik had five assists. [Julian] had two, a big assist in the second half to Derik. Learning how to play with each other and again defensively, we didn't actually do that bad of a job. Dixon, really, just sometimes you gotta give credit to a guy that's on fire and Dixon was on fire.”
On Villanova star Eric Dixon’s 38 points
“We tried everything. And he was kind of – he's been in college six years now. I told him after the game, I said “I'm so glad I'm never going to see you again, because you've been haunting me for six years.” But extremely talented player and we let him get it going early, which with good players, you can't do.”
On the momentum built with the Villanova win
“I think every game right now, still trying to figure them out, still trying to put the right offensive pieces out there at times. And that's kind of what I've come to realize, probably the hardest part of this job is getting ready for the two Big Ten games in early December. Because you want to try to balance your schedule where we play a Marquette and Villanova where they're going to battle you but at the same time, with new era of college basketball, you need some games to play multiple guys. So the biggest thing is getting ready for Ohio State and Purdue.”
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