Mizzou Men’s Basketball
Mizzou 62, Texas A&M 58
Postgame Quotes
Mizzou head coach Cuonzo Martin
On ugly wins…
“Oh, they’re all pretty when you win them. You can go back to the drawing board and point out what happened and what didn’t happen, but I won’t lose sleep over that. Keep plugging, keep winning. You never know when you’ll get the next one.”
On his team’s defense…
“I’d like to think that’s who we are as a team – defend, rebound and play hard. We want to make those guys work for everything, make catches tough.”
On discussing with the team if they are an NCAA Tournament team…
“Absolutely not. If you look at our resume, I think we are passed that easily. I think we can let our resume speak for itself, we’re just trying to get better as a team.”
On Kassius Robertson…
“I think it’s safe to say he’s our leader, guys like him because he says the right things in the locker room. He doesn't do that with a level or arrogance or cockiness with him, he’s got humility and guys respect for him. And you’ve got to respect guys that work at the level he works at. And he’s a good guy, so I think it helps. Guys don’t mind working to get Kassius shots or getting him open.”
Mizzou graduate senior guard Kassius Robertson
On the last minute of the game…
“It was kind of a scramble, out to the first guy you see. If they get two, we’re tied and we can go to overtime, but we had to scramble out to the three-point line and make sure they don’t get any threes out. That’s what’s going through our minds.”
On his second half performance…
“I’m never really worried about what my numbers are, and I’m always confident in my shot – it’s going to go down sooner or later. I kind of like to think of myself as a second half player anyways, so I just tried to come out and play big when it counted.”
On the five-game winning streak…
“It’s huge. To come off of a three-game skid and turn it into a five-game winning streak just says a lot about our team, especially in terms of the SEC race and trying to get a good seed in the tournament. You know, it’s everything. We’re beating really tough teams, we had a pretty rough stretch with Kentucky and Alabama and Texas A&M, and we weathered the storm, for sure.”
Mizzou freshman forward Jeremiah Tilmon
On the team’s improvement from the last time Mizzou played Texas A&M…
“I think the energy was different. Last game, they got the best of me, but I kind of put my mind right this game and went out there and played ball.”
On the last five games…
“It’s fun, because winning – I mean, what more can you ask for besides winning?”
Texas A&M head coach Billy Kennedy
On Missouri’s key to winning…
“I thought Missouri’s defense and their ball pressure, and our inability to get the ball inside to Tyler Davis was a big key and to Missouri’s credit, they double-teamed him some in the first half, some in the second half and the ball pressure for 16 turnovers is too many turnovers in a one possession game.”
On Jeremiah Tilmon…
“(Jeremiah Tilmon) gave Tyler Davis foul trouble that was a big factor in the first half. He picked up two fouls and Jeremiah was very aggressive in getting it. Tyler picks up two fouls and it’s a big difference in this game compared to the last game.”
On the difference from the last time the two teams played…
“Playing at home, obviously, they (Jontay and Jeremiah) played really well. They played with more confidence, that’s the biggest thing. They’re just maturing and are both good players, top-50 players and that’s why Cuonzo has done a good job building confidence in them, especially since the last time we played them.”
On the Tigers' bigs…
“They have two post guys that can match up physically with us, but doubling the post and the way they play defensively and offensively, the pace they play is slower than some of the other teams we played, but their defense is much better than some of the teams we’ve played recently.”
