Kevin Willard quote book: Providence

By Jake Copestick (@JakeCopestick)

On Devin Askew’s 17-point first half:

“I’m trying to get Devin to play off of his strengths ever since he’s now full strength. He had a great week of practice, I think that was the big thing…I think everybody did. We had three really good days of practice, and that’s the way that he played the last three days.”

On Askew’s shooting and scoring ability:

“He can shoot, he can score. He had a really bad injury, then missed two months. I think when you miss two months of basketball and you try to come in and play high-level basketball, kids are kids. They’re going to try and come back and do what they always do. What I’m trying to get Devin to do is play off of his strengths more to start, and just go off that. I think he’s starting to realize how good of a shooter and a scorer he is, how much pressure he can put on defenses, and then he can play off of that. Two months of not playing or practicing, especially in September and October, he missed the two most important months as you’re trying to learn a new system, new offense, then get thrown into the fire. It’s just taken a little bit of time.”

On Askew’s importance to the team:

“Huge. That’s why I brought him here. This is the type of player he is. When you go into the portal, you have to really evaluate, watch film and see what he has. When he was on his visit, I think the best part about it is I just loved his maturity. He’s a terrific, terrific person. I think he’s getting rewarded for being a hard worker and a terrific person.”

On Askew and Tyler Perkins’ veteran presence:

“Perkins and Devin have been great. I think Perkins is even getting a little bit more confidence and a little bit more comfortable with a totally different style than he played (previously). Some of the early mistakes that we made, I think we’re learning from them. I think we’re doing some better things offensively. I think these guys are getting more comfortable offensively.”

On getting momentum in the second half after Providence cut into their lead:

“(Stefan) Vaaks is good. He’s a pro with his size and the way he shoots. We left him twice to start the second half. We kind of gave them nine points and let them back into the game. I thought we did a much better job of just sitting down and defending.”

On defensive improvements that forced 14 Providence turnovers:

“These guys are working hard at it. Our secondary defense still needs a lot of work. There’s times that we have to protect Duke with the amount of minutes that he’s getting. I still think we’re getting confused on some simple things, that’s more my fault. Sometimes I get a little more complicated than I should be with these guys, but these guys are working hard at it and trying to figure it out. Sometimes in the game, the game is going so fast, and what I think these guys should be able to do is not realistic.”

On what changed from the last meeting with Providence:

“We went through a battle with UConn and lost in overtime, and had six days off. They just went through a battle and lost at the buzzer pretty much, then they had three days to come here. Kim’s doing a great job. I love his team, I love the way that they play. They've had some really, really tough losses, man. For them to keep coming out and playing as hard as they’re doing just lets you know how committed they are to Kim and how much they want to win. It’s just that sometimes the schedule dictates how you play. We came off a bye week, which we needed, and they’re coming off two really, really hard losses. The Georgetown loss was obviously really tough, I’m sure, but then they came back and played great against UConn. To me, that’s a sign of great coaching, when you’re up 20 and you lose, and then you come back against the No. 2 team in the country on campus and have a chance to win in the last two minutes. We had three great days of practice and we’re ready for them, but sometimes that’s a big difference is the schedule.”

“That’s a lot of questions for four people.”