The North Carolina Tar Heels kicked off their preseason exhibition schedule on Friday night in Greensboro, taking on the USC Trojans. After a slow start, the Tar Heels were able to pull away in the second half.
That big final 20 minutes helped the Tar Heels take down the Trojans 88-70. It was an impressive performance from the Tar Heels, getting contributions from all over the roster. It was also a good first look at what we could expect moving forward.
Following the game, head coach Michael Malone met the media, where he talked about his team's performance as well as his coaching debut. All quotes via Inside Carolina.
What happened where you turned the game around and took the lead?
“In the first half they shot 47%. In the second half, they shot 27%. In the first half, they had 16 paint points. Second half only
six points in our paint. At one point I think we’d gotten seven or eight straight stops, which is something we try to pride ourselves in. It did not happen in the first half very often. So we got our defense into the game that got us out running, playing with a little bit more of an attack mindset.”
On Maximo Adams
“What you guys saw tonight was what we see every day in practice. Maxi gives just relentless effort on the glass. He can impact the game in so many ways without just scoring the ball. And Maxi’s a wonderful young man, a great family, but his ability to rebound the basketball and give you extra possessions. Obviously, I told him he can’t go one-for-four from the foul line. He’s got to stick his free throws for us. But Maxi has a chance to be a special player, and I love working with him every single day.”
On if you expected this from Maximo Adams?
“He came up to me after the game and said, ‘Thanks for taking a chance on me, and I told him, ‘No, thanks for taking a chance on me.’ He didn’t have to stay. Him, Jarin, and Jaydon Young all wanted to be a part of something, and Isaiah tonight played big minutes and was really impactful running his team, scoring, putting pressure on the defense, and he’s had a really good stretch of practices from summer into the fall into the practices that started in September, so I’m not surprised by Isaiah’s performance. He has been waiting for this opportunity, and he took it and ran with it tonight. And now the challenge is: can he continue to do so?”
On what he saw from Sayon Keita and Alex Samodurov?
“For Sayon, a lot was going on. I thought the game was kind of fast for him, and then I felt in the second half he showed glimpses of the player that we know he can be, blocking shots. You saw, you can tell a lot about a team and a player when he has a play like he had, and the whole bench is up, going crazy because they’re happy for him, and that’s the kind of young man that Sayon Keta is. And then Samo, I thought he did some really good things for us out there.”
On his coaching debut?
“It was really cool to come through that tunnel, and obviously I can’t wait for November 2, our first home opener, regular season, a real game. But I have to give a lot of credit to the fans who came tonight, first glimpse of watching our team, and the reception. I don’t take that lightly, and so to have a warm reception people clapping for you and welcoming you here. That means a lot to me.”
On anything that surprised him?
“Matt Able and Terrence Brown are a lot better players than what they showed tonight, and we’re going to need them to be a lot better players than they were. And that’s not just on them; I always put it on myself as well. My job as a head coach is to help those guys into the game.“I can’t wait to watch the film to see all the areas that we have to work on and clean up. But Jarin Stevenson playing the way he did – that’s really pivotal for us. Him being a guy that we can play through, exploit a mismatch, knock down the three-point shot. That is a real weapon, and we look forward to using that to the fullest.”
On any halftime changes?
“I felt that we got a lot more aggressive. I felt we were getting downhill more to the rim. We played in the post more, and I’m not sure how many free throws we took tonight. We got to the foul line 30 times, so we really spent a lot of time talking about our shot spectrum. We do not want to be a mid-range shooting team. It’s just the worst shot in the game, so we want to live at the rim. We want to live at the foul line, and we want to get quality threes up.”
On Jarin Stevenson and leadership?
"I don’t have a ton of time with him. But I met with Jarin. We met with his family when I got the job, and we’re finding ways of ‘How can we get Jarin to be more aggressive?’ And one thing I learned a long time ago is I’m never going to ask Jarin Stevenson to be something he’s not. I take him for who he is, but it’s also my job as a head coach to make sure I’m putting him in position to have success. It’s my job to put him in a position where he can showcase his full range of capabilities.”
This article originally appeared on Tar Heels Wire: What Michael Malone said after UNC Basketball's win over USC
