Kevin Willard quote book: Florida A&M

On difference in second half:
“I just thought we kind of made some shots and got a little momentum going, and were able to kind of get in the press. I thought Shavar Reynolds came in and gave us a really good boost with his energy. We just needed a little positive energy, that’s about it.”

On Sandro Mamukelashvili not playing after halftime, and Jared Rhoden replacing him:
“He wasn’t playing well. He just wasn’t playing well. I thought Jared and Tyrese played really well. Jared’s slowly getting back to the way he looked before he got hurt in August. He’s getting his bounce back, he’s starting to get above the rim again — he still hasn’t shot the ball well, but he’s been shooting it well in practice — so Jared’s getting close. He’s not where he was, but he’s getting close to being a guy that’s a big-time player for us.”

On what to expect from Tyrese Samuel:
“I think Tyrese is getting a little bit more comfortable out there. I’m going to try to get him out there more with Myles, just so he can be a little comfortable out there. He usually comes in when Myles comes out, and it’s a little bit easier playing when Myles is out there than when he’s not, so he continues just to kind of be steady and get better, and do really good things out there.”

On Myles Powell only taking two foul shots:
“He took nine threes, so half his shots were threes, technically. He got to the rim a couple times, but we got in from Saint Louis, who’s pretty big and physical, and obviously Michigan State’s pretty big and physical. He just missed some chippies.”

On Quincy McKnight’s aggressiveness:
“Q should be our second-leading scorer, he really should. With the amount of time he’s out there, he has the ability to be a scorer. He defers a little bit to Myles, which is fine, but at the same time, we need a secondary scorer to step up and be consistent, and he’s done it before. He’s a fifth-year senior, he has the ability to do it. He’s the guy that needs to do it for us.”

On next week’s Battle 4 Atlantis and future NCAA Tournament implications:
“Our next two weeks are brutal — the three (games) in Atlantis, come back and play at Iowa State, at Rutgers, and we’re home against Maryland — it’s a big test, Adam. It gives us a chance to kind of really see where we’re at, and if it doesn’t go our way, to really see where we need to go. It’s a good opportunity no matter what. I think when you lose by two or three to a top three or four team, I think it doesn’t hurt your seeding, it helps your seeding, to be honest with you. The fact that we’re playing these teams — we’re playing true road games — I haven’t seen anyone else go at Saint Louis, or is going to go at Iowa State, at Rutgers, so I think our overall body of work’s going to help our seeding.”

On intensity during practice:
“Oh, there WILL be more intensity in practice. There won’t be an option on that.”

On drawing almost 10,000 fans for a 12 p.m. game against Florida A&M:
“I think that’s why I’m so pissed. We had a great crowd come out for a 12:00 game, and we kind of sleepwalked through 20 minutes of the game. Our kids play hard, they’re fun to watch, but you can’t come out and sleepwalk when people come out and watch it. It’s unacceptable.”

On Battle 4 Atlantis structure and tip times:
“I’ve never seen that before. I don’t think it’s very good for having the elite teams that are in this tournament. I don’t know how you can play a 9:30 game and then come back and play a 4:00 game, it just doesn’t make any sense. I know why it makes sense, I know why it’s done, but it makes it very hard to win, to be honest with you. And as Adam says, you lose a 4:00 game and the NCAA selection committee comes down and just sees a loss, they don’t see the fact that you got done at 1:00 in the morning and you had to turn around and play at 4. So from that standpoint, I think it’s idiotic.”

On what other ranked teams may be saying about Seton Hall:
“I don’t know. I haven’t talked to them.”

On what atmosphere he cultivates during Seton Hall’s Thanksgiving travel:
“I’ll be honest with you: I think one of the great things about this job — and there’s a lot of them, but one of the best things about it — is our fans travel to our Thanksgiving tournaments. That’s why I do it. The one year I didn’t — I think the one year I went to Brooklyn, everybody was like, ‘why aren’t we going somewhere?’ Our fans travel. I think we’ve bought more tickets than any program in the history of the tournament, so our fans make it special for our guys. The people that travel, the booster club that gets down there, they take up all the good hotel rooms, but they travel and they make our kids feel great, so I don’t have to do much because our fans do such a great job of it.”