Dec. 9, 2006

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Post-Game Quotes
Loyola vs. Loyola New Orleans
Dec. 9, 2006

Loyola Head coach Jim Whitesell

Opening Statement
"This game was fun to watch. Overall, I was happy with the performance. A lot of people asked me, `Why are you playing this game?' with Loyola New Orleans. This provided a unique opportunity for a fellow Jesuit university that had a catastrophe down there. One thing about our university that I'm really proud of is that we took in over 300 students from the New Orleans area right around Labor Day weekend (last year). We had a lot of our faculty and staff that work a lot of long hours to accommodate a lot of people from the New Orleans area. I'm really proud of our university doing something like that. The throwback game was great. It was having the 1950s team back here to get the tradition started. The uniforms are being auctioned off and the proceeds are being donated to Loyola New Orleans. It was a small gesture, but a pretty nice one."

On increased playing time for Loyola bench
"We wanted to play a lot of guys. I like the way Courtney Horton came in and gave us a lift and gave us good play and Tom Levin hit a couple of threes. We had a lot of contributions. Darrin Williams got going a little bit. We played him at Purdue and we wanted to get him some minutes on the floor with Leon (Young) being out. He's helped us with that big body that we're missing with Kye (Pattrick) and Leon because they're big and physical guys. I'm happy to see Darrin get a lot of time. We didn't play anyone too many minutes so I think it was a really positive way to go into finals."

On Loyola's offense
"You're going to have nights when you need to step up. We're deeper than we were last year. For Darrin (Williams), that was a really good experience. He didn't start terribly well, but I thought he finished well. I liked that. Going into the game, I thought we could get a lot of guys involved by making the extra pass and I thought we did that."

Loyola guard J.R. Blount

On Loyola's diverse offense
"Coach (Whitesell) talked about it all week. We wanted to move the ball from side to side. In the Purdue game, we kept the ball on one side of the court so I think that was one thing we definitely wanted to establish early today. Coach has been right all along, we were successful when we did that."

Loyola forward Brandon Woods

On the Ramblers' 18-0 run
"We wanted to get everyone involved today. In order to do that, we had to get out to a nice lead and get a lot of other guys playing in the game. I really wasn't looking to play a lot of minutes in the game. I just wanted to go out there and do what I could then let my teammates come in and contribute."