What Tommy Lloyd, Caleb Love and Trey Townsend said after the Arizona Wildcats’ win over Samford

Arizona took care of business Wednesday night, keeping Samford’s pressure defense in check and maximizing its own offensive chances for a lopsided win to get back to .500 on the season.

The game saw a change in the starting lineup, as well as the collegiate debut of a promising prospect, as well as a big performance from the Pac-12 Player of the Year Caleb love.

Our game summary can be found here. Below is what Love, Tommy Lloyd and Trey Townsend said after the win:

Lloyd on handling Samford’s press: “I generally felt really good. In the first half, I think we only had four turnovers and I can (only) think of one that was against the press that I can think of off the top of my head. We were able to handle the pressure, get a small lead. In the second half we lost a bit of ground. And they do it as a team. They wear them down a bit. Maybe I should have subbed or cycled through, but we didn’t get off to a good start. I wanted to see if we could build a lead again before cycling back through our rotation. Maybe some guys got a little tired, but still, that’s no excuse for not being tough. I could think of two lively rebounds where I think Delly had a rebound and Tobe had a rebound and they just threw a blind exit that you would normally feel good about. But against these guys, they stole them both and three. They disappointed a little bit. And then I just felt, during that stretch in the second half, I think a couple of guys, Caleb and maybe JB, maybe tried to force a ball into a little window. I don’t think you need to do that when you have a lead. You have to find a way to be a little more solid.

On shooting a season-high 58.2 percent: “The other thing you have to deal with them is just the shifting defense on the other end. 2-3, 1-3-1 zone, obviously they play one man. So I thought our guys did a good job of to handle it for the most part. Because you can’t really get into a rhythm in calling sets. And I thought our guys did a good job, overall.”

About the transition game: “The transition is fantastic, but you also have to be good in the half court. And I thought our ball movement overall was better today, just had a little bit of a feel for it. You can tell it showed in the assist numbers for that. We connected a few more passes and that’s really important. The way we play passing the ball is so important and frankly it just hasn’t been good enough so far. So hopefully we can continue to make progress there.”

If Love goes for 23 after 7 vs. UCLA: “Caleb’s a good player. And you know what? I want to hang with him. I mean, it’s my job. We’re going to hang with him. I’m not a fair-weather guy. I love my players. And look, I holding them accountable. We have a lot of conversations about things and we have real conversations. But this is college basketball and I don’t care if NIL is involved or what, my job is to kind of help a young man through hard times and through struggle That’s my job, and I will. And you know what? I’ll wear it and when it goes well I won’t take credit for it. That’s just how I’m going to operate proud of how Caleb played, but it’s one game. Have a game on Saturday, do it again.”

About Love to take 8 foul shots: “We’ve noticed his free throw shooting is a little bit lower than last year. I don’t think there’s anything like that tactically that we’ve talked about. We want him to get to the free throw line and he did well today. He has to find a good mix of chasing catch-and-shoot shots and drives and plays in transition.”

On why he started Anthony Dell’Orso over Carter Bryant: “Trying things. I don’t claim to have all the answers. You know I’m not a guy … often shaking up the starting lineups. I will occasionally if I think it can help our team. But I just felt like at the start of these games, maybe a little more shooting could help us. And look, Delly was shooting like, coming into the game, 52 percent from 3, and against UCLA, I didn’t get him enough minutes I wanted to see how it looks out when he starts. The funny thing is, believe it or not, I don’t have the pixie dust because he didn’t start well. So we’ll take something positive from that.”

On Bryant’s play: “He’s growing in the program, guys. Today is the first day we played him some minutes at the 4. Maybe I could have done it earlier. When Big Mo threatened and came back and wanted to be in the center of the core of our team , you’ve got to plan for it. If he’s in there, it might knock Henri down to a few more minutes at the 4, so all of those things happen in a way. But the biggest thing is that the 4 and the 3 in our system in the way we play on, it’s just a little different movement patterns. And sometimes for a freshman, it could be a lot. He’s had a steep learning curve, but I thought he really impacted the game and played well.”

On Bryant, who is slowly coming: “The 4 and 3 in our system for a freshman, it could be a little confusing. You know who figured that out? A kid named Pelle Larson. He figured it out with ease, so it was easy to do different things , lineup wise, with him Carter, with a little more experience, I think we can do that too.

“He’s finding his way and everybody’s running their own race, and I’m really confident that Carter’s run will end up in a good place. Like our team, we’re going through it. You’ve just got to hang in there. It’s been a month. A month to come not to define Arizona basketball, or it shouldn’t even define our season. Now it does, 100 percent it does, but it doesn’t. So let’s fight for the result we want, and that’s us do. And I think that Carter does the same.”

On facing TJ McConnell while at Gonzaga: “TJ McConnell versus another kid named Kevin Pangos. Wow. Two complete studs coming after that. They both went on and Kevin had a cup of coffee in the NBA, but he’s crushed it in Europe at the highest level. TJ has obviously had a lot more, he’s had a full barrel in the NBA. Those two guys are studs, and any college basketball coach who could get a player like that would fold their arms and take him in a second.”

On Emmanuel Stephens scoring his first career try: “Damn a tip. Just what we’ve been doing.”

On deciding to play Stephen for the first time: “He’s ready. We’ll see how it works because we think he’s ready to contribute. He probably needs another week or two of good practice and then we’ll kind of find out of some packs we can play him in. But hey, when you see him, there’s always something going on, he’s kind of a whirling dervish out there, which is exciting because there is so much potential.”

Love for his performance: “Just seeing a ball go through the hoop, it was a great feeling. But I give all my credit to my teammates because they put me in position. I moved a bit more and I know I had to do it for the team, for the distance. I kind of got into the rhythm from there.”

By starting with a made 3: “If you see the first one go through, you feel good about yourself. You just want to take the best shots possible. I give credit to my teammates for creating for me. It’s just good basketball, not just me. When we move on the ball, I feel we are at our best.”

About getting to the line: “Finally. I had only shot 12 free throws coming into the game and to shoot eight tonight, it felt good.”

On his confidence: “When you don’t shoot the ball well, or make shots like you usually do in training, or practice, you get a little in your head. You just have to double your practice and double your belief and still believe you can make those shots. My teammates trusted me, my coaches trusted me. It shouldn’t be a question of my confidence.”

On dealing with the team’s slow start: “We just have to keep believing that we’re a great team. In the summer, we felt like we had a great group of guys and we could be the best team in the country. And just because we’re 5-5 and struggling early, It shouldn’t take away our faith. We have to keep building and building every game. And I think it’s just an opportunity for us to make this a great story .”

Townsend on handling the press: “We’ve had a good week preparing for them. Our scout team did a good job with the pressure throughout the week to try to get ready for it. We really focused on the fundamentals during the week so we were prepared. We knew they were going to push and capture the whole game and for the most part I was happy with how everyone did it. They stayed balanced and we’re able to be at ease for most of the game.”

When facing two even teams that force a lot of turnovers: “They’re both very aggressive. Obviously we experienced that this past weekend, but it just came down to being fundamentally sound, which I said we worked on a lot this week, and just being tough with the ball. When we were focused on the fundamentals first and just being tough, everything just became easier for people. We slowed ourselves down to see passes instead of letting the defense dictate our speed, we tried to let our offense dictate the defense.”

On the goal for Saturday’s game against Central Michigan: “Try to play a full 40 minutes. Obviously we were close today, but there was a stretch of three, four minutes where we kind of slowed down. I still don’t think we’ve played a full 40 minutes.”