Georgia Tech Basketball: Everything From Josh Pastner After Win Over Northern Illinois

What did Josh Pastner have to say after the 18-point victory for Georgia Tech over Northern Illinois?

Jackson Caudell | Nov 18, 2022

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Georgia Tech raced out to a 23-point lead in the first half against Northern Illinois thanks to its stingy defense and they were able to hang on in the second half.

The Yellow Jackets' lead got narrow after some offensive struggles at the start of the second half, but the defense showed back up to help Georgia Tech finish the game off and win big over Northern Illinois.

Head coach Josh Pastner is now 3-0 at Tech for the first time in his career coaching the Yellow Jackets.

Here is everything from Pastner's post-game press conference after beating Northern Illinois.

Opening Statement:

"Ok, a couple of things. First off, let me give a ton of credit to NIU and Coach (Rashon) Burno, they have a great program and have a lot of good players and we had to fight our way to win that game and that is a credit to Coach Burno and his staff and their team. Secondly, obviously, it was a great first half for the first 18 minutes defensively, I thought the last two minutes defensively... I felt the last two minutes defensively and the first five minutes defensively in the second half we weren't... we allowed them... as much as we were not scoring, we did not get stops and we hang our hat on the defensive end as everyone knows. Now, we ended up holding them to 26% from the field and 20.8% from three and we had eight three stops in a row, but there was a stretch there where it got... we just were not getting it done on the defensive end."

"The game overall, we found a way to get a win. You go in there... and I told the guys at halftime, they are going to be ready to come out, we have to be ready to go and we can't have ourselves lackadaisical and to their credit, they came out firing and we just did not do a good job defensively to start that second half. Now, we won the game and pulled away because of defense. We gave up too many offensive rebounds, Ja'von Franklin was outstanding, had a double-double, plus five blocks, loved his activity, I thought Deivon Smith was really good in the first half, just playing the right way. Anyway, we are 3-0 and you celebrate the wins and don't take them for granted and winning is hard."

1. On Northern Illinois missing so many layups and the rebounding issues with his team...

"So, we spent a lot of time on rebounding and I am really disappointed in our defensive rebounding tonight. Now, a couple of them they had a bad bounce and they got, but there's a few of them where we just did not do a good job and they just beat us to the ball, the 50-50 ball, and we have to clean that up. We've spent so much time with that... rebounding just gives us coverage and insurance when things are not going well on both sides, defensively and offensively, it was really... even though we outrebounded them by one today, it was really disappointing, our defensive rebounding."

"Now, we did a good job and we didn't just stop playing when they got the ball, but they just beat us to the defensive glass and we have to be better about that and that is something that we talk about, practice, emphasize and reinforce is defensive rebounding and its just the physicality of getting the hit first mentality so, we have to be better on that, there's no doubt about that, that is a concern."

2. On the defense...

"Our goal is to hold teams to .95 points per possession. The first two games we played, we held them to .85, which is outstanding, obviously, I don't know what the points per possession stat is yet, but if that is what it is, under .85, that is great. Our goal defensively is to hold them to .85... excuse me, or .95. Offensively, we want to be 1 or 1.05 above on the offensive end points per possession. Now, we only had eleven turnovers again, we have done a good job of taking care of the ball, but the rebounding aspect to your question, going back to that, we have to better about that, we just did not do a good enough job at and we have to be better at."

"We signed the bubble, the bubble is a big deal to us and if you get four offensive rebounds or six defensive rebounds or ten total, you get the privilege to sign the bubble. Because in practice, we put the bubble up where you can't make the shot and so it is automatic rebounds so it forced you to hit guys and have contact and so we do that a lot with our practice of hitting the bags and that is why I was disappointed in giving up that many offensive rebounds to the opponent. Credit to NIU because we spent a lot of time with the bubble, we practice a lot with the bubble and we had Ja'von got assigned the bubble because he had five offensive rebounds, six defensive, which equals to 11 and Deivon had the privilege of signing the bubble because he had seven defensive rebounds tonight."

3. On Rodney Howard...

"You know Rodney, Rodney is really good for us and we are really counting on him. Yes he kind of... both... today he did not really get in rhythm with foul trouble and he just, it was just one of those things, you just did not get in rhythm. Ja'von played great but, I will say Georgia State, maybe there were some early turnovers, but once he settled in, he was really good for us defensively late, so he really did some big things for us late to help us win the game late and had some big rebounds late against Georgia State, he just did not get himself in rhythm tonight and that happens. But, as I said, we have more than five starters, the star of our team is the team. We've got great depth, which is a good thing and it can be any group of five or any individual that can step up for that night and its just how our team is going to be throughout this season."

4. On the scoring drives in the second half...

"Nah it was not moving it, we went off on one-foot layups and we tried to weaken it or down it on some of the ball screens around it in a direction, we were jumping off of one foot or we broke it off. broke a play off when we did not need to when there was a shot or two that I did not like but... part of it was that we did not get stops. We were defending at a high level and our defense was not performing at a high level, so we were not able to get stops and go in transition. We are best when we try to play faster and get more possessions and play more up-tempo, but we have to get stops and go and that is when we are at our best and that stretch where we could not score and got stuck on 44, we did not get any stops and that is not who we are."

5. On what he thought about the blocked shots...

"I loved the blocked shots, there was even a time or two where I got on Ja'von where he did not go up and get it, but him and Deivon had eight, Jalon (Moore) combined, had two, so I am all about shot blocking and for us, we need to have somebody on the All-Defensive team. Last year was the first time that we did not have shot blocking and we did not have someone on the All-Defensive team and that can't be who we are so we have to have... we've gotta affect the plays above the rim and we've gotta rebound the ball and we gotta have a lot of guys in All-Defensive team in the ACC. That is important to us.

6. On starting the season with three wins...

"We have talked about this a bunch, I mean, one thing, one awesome thing about our team, our program since I have been here is that we have gotten better as the year has gone on, but we have not started well. So, it would be nice if we could continue to get better with a good start so to start out 3-0 is a good way and we have a good opportunity and a great test on Monday night against Utah, a Pac-12 team and we will have to be really good playing against them down in Ft. Myers so we just gotta keep getting better and being 3-0 beats the alternative."

7. On improving the offensive points per possession...

"Defensively, our defense is ahead of our offense and you know the thing is with the points per possession offensively is we're not like turning it over a lot, considering the amount of possessions, 11 is not bad and you obviously want to have less than that, but in that range. Because they came in averaging teams less than 15 turnovers per game, but we have to be better offensively. Now, we had some great looks today that we missed so we just have to continue to keep cleaning some things up and we will continue to get better and that is an area where we can continue to get better to make sure we are better in what we need to do on that."

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