Mark Turgeon  

Opening Statement:

"Honestly I am really proud of our team. We had a really good Purdue team that was extremely well coached, that's really owned us the last two years. I don't know if we were a little bit sluggish or if we were a little bit nervous. But we weren't very good in the first half and [at] halftime I just went in and I just tried to change their body language. It wasn't really about X's and O's, it was just changing our body language and believing we could win and play well. We did change some things offensively. We changed bringing guys off the baseline, playing through the post, and I think because we scored early in the second half it gave us confidence. Then our defense was terrific. You can't say enough about Darryl Morsell and Anthony Cowan [Jr.], on those two kids all night just chasing them around. And they will get a lot of credit, but our big guys need to get credit too because on every handoff and ball screen they stayed along time and showed hard and played without fouling. It really wore them down as the game went on. I keep saying it, we get better every possession, we are really coming [along]. I heard we had 21 straight points out of our freshman and defensively we're really getting to a high level. I told our guys before this game our half-court offense has to get better, and our half-court offense was really good the second half."

On the growth of freshman players:

"You know it's crazy, I went back and watched that film today and it made my stomach hurt because man we were young, and we just played hard and got it up. We had no business in that game and we've come a long way. They are young guys but they have a lot of experience now and they just keep getting better. I am on Aaron Wiggins all the time telling him to shoot more and we had him coming off screens. We were great against the double team. Eric [Ayala] has done it all year, he hit back-to-back threes which was huge for us, it tied the score. It's a good feeling. And then Stix was as bad as he could be and he was as good as he could be. He still didn't make any threes I don't think but he was terrific around the rim and defensively he was much better in the second half."

On Darryl Morsell in the second half:   

"Darryl has to understand that what he is doing for our team is just as important as Anthony scoring, or Bruno scoring, or Bruno's rebounds and I think he's accepted that. The thing I like the most is that I think Darryl is having a lot of fun. He had a smile on his face and he was really enjoying the moment and that's all I ask the guys to do. Because it's the best time of their lives, playing a big game in front of a sold-out arena. You can't get here by 6:30, but I told our guys when the game started 'play well, venue will be full by the end, just play well.' And the guys had fun."

On Eric Ayala's three-pointers and making Carsen Edwards fall:

"I think he made him fall but the play was for Anthony, and Anthony early in the year may not have thrown it right back to him but that just shows how much confidence Anthony has in Eric. That wasn't any easy shot but like I said Eric is the first one in the gym and the last one to leave. Most times he's in there working. So that was big and the out of bounds play was something we haven't shown, and I knew Eric would knock it down and make us look good. It was great to see."

On the freshmen's defense:

"I don't want to get ahead of ourselves but it's pretty amazing what this young group is doing defensively. And we talked before the game and I was like, 'defensively you guys are doing so good and we're doing it with five freshmen'. Tonight, our upperclassman were great with Darryl and Anthony and Bruno. They work at it and we work hard at it. I think we have come the furthest with the young guys…they are playing smarter. We made some mistakes in the first half, we didn't play as smart as we needed to be. In the second half we played smarter. We were closer to shooters, there were certain shots we wanted to give up and we gave them up and they missed them for us. It is pretty impressive, and I think we can get better defensively."

On F Jalen Smith's decision making:

"He's just a heck of a player but I just say, 'keep your head up Stix, you're a great player.' My whole thing was body language at halftime. Just telling the guys, we can win this half by nine. The building is going to be full we can win by nine and that's what it was about. He was terrific, and he was really hard to guard when I put him at the five. It got him going and then he was much tougher. I was really proud of how he stepped up and made the two free throws. Just to give you an understanding, we haven't shot well in the last two games at the free throw line. We were number one in the league going into that. We take a two-minute water break like every 20 minutes. And our starters most of the time…top six guys shoot free throws during that break. And it just shows you how committed they are to being great."

On how this game can give the Terps confidence as they head Michigan:

"Well first of all it was great to be home. We had to re-introduce ourselves to our fans, they forgot what we looked like in person. It was great to be home. Now we have two more on the road. It is what it is, we're comfortable out there. We are getting better that's all I can ask, and I don't know where we are. I think there's six games left and we are 10-4. Six games left we're going to see what we can do."

On less turnovers in the second half:

"Bruno kept quick jumping the pass and that was his. And Anthony just settled down. The other guys just played a lot more poised and our half-court offense was better. We were very confident, and we work on it. We keep turnovers in every drill that we do, and we talk about it and were trying to get better. We have a young team and 11 is a good number for us. And Anthony isn't going to have six every night, so we just have to keep working it out and talking about it. It's a part of getting better at half-court offense so were coming, were getting better."
 

Freshman Guard Eric Ayala

On the key to outscoring Purdue 40-18 in the second half:

"Just a collective effort from everybody. We knew we had to play harder coming into halftime, we didn't feel like we were playing as tough as we could. Going out in the second playing with passion and love for the game, it kind of showed. We were into it, the crowd was into it we just fed off the crowd and played Maryland basketball."

On supporting Jalen Smith:

"Yeah, I tell Stix (Jalen Smith) every day 'you are a key part of what we do.' In the second half he played tremendously and when he is playing well we are on a different level. He brings us a different dynamic from the inside outside and I appreciate Stix. I got to stay on him."

On the play where he shook off Carsen Edwards and made the 3-pointer:

"It was just another basketball play for me personally. I work on those shots every day. It didn't come as a surprise to me that I hit the shot because that is something I shoot every single day. Credit to Carsen Edwards, he is a great player, he made a lot of fantastic plays tonight. It was a team collective effort to guard him tonight."

On what the 21 straight points made by the freshmen says about the growth:

"I just want to commend Coach Turgeon; he has a tremendous amount of confidence in us. He never lets us down, he is always uplifting us and making sure that we are OK and confident. That's one thing he preaches is to stay confident. With a young team the ups and downs can get to you as a freshman. Coach and the coaching staff do a great job of keeping us uplifted and confident and I guess that kind of showed.

Sophomore Forward Bruno Fernando

On how big this win was:

"It was a huge win for us. It helps us build on our confidence for sure, the freshmen's as well with how well they played. I think that's a win where we can look back and realize we can stand against anybody in our conference. They're a great team, they run their offense extremely well, they are really well coached and have a lot of great players. For us to have that win means a lot. We are taking it one game at a time, we have Michigan next and that's all we are thinking about right now."

On holding Purdue to 18 points in the second half:

"Just locking in defensively. I think as a team we did a much better job in the second half defensively. Just staying connected, getting stops and making runs from there. I think they got a little tired as well in the second half guarding the ball. I got to give a lot of credit to Darryl and Anthony, they played their minds off just guarding screens the whole time. That was great to see as well."

Sophomore Guard Darryl Morsell

On wanting Edwards to take shots because he(Darryl) is locked in defensively

"No, I do not want him to take shots (laughs). Whenever he touches the ball it's a good chance he will score. I just tried my best to make it tough for him. My teammates helped me a lot, it was a lot of team defense involved. He is definitely talented and can score."

On this game being his best defensively:

"I don't know. I was locked in, we had 17 in the first half so I kind of took it personal. As a team they only scored 18 in the second half, not only me but the entire team took it personal being down at halftime. We protected the rim, I don't think we rebounded as well as we should have but we did enough."

-Terps-