FSU Basketball vs Wake Forest: Quotes and Video

Wake Forest Head Coach, Danny Manning:

--"Tonight was a hard fought ball game. You know I think both teams came out and, for stretches, really asserted themselves and played really good basketball...unfortunately for us we didn't make enough plays down the stretch and Florida State made some big shots...came up with some loose balls down the stretch to help push them over."

--"Coach Hamilton's team is always long, athletic, hard-nosed and they continued to grind and climbed back in it."

--"He's a dynamic scorer. You know, he scores at all three levels. He's able to go make plays for his teammates as well. Tonight...he stuffed the stat sheet and did a lot of things to put his team in a position to win."  --On what makes star freshman Xavier Rathan-Mayes such a difficult player to defend.

--"Devin is relentless in going after the basketball; his pursuit of the basketball is second to none. [He's] really athletic for his size and he has a really good understanding of where shots are coming off at, and he has really good feet." --On how Devin Thomas is able to be such an effective rebounder

Florida State Head Coach, Leonard Hamilton:

--"Obviously we dug a hole for ourselves at the beginning of the game...I thought that for whatever reason we just were not playing with the level of energy that [Wake] was playing with. After we got down about 13 or 14 points, I thought we started executing a little bit better."

--"The second half was a typical ACC game...this is the 12th*** overtime game of the year in the ACC..this is the nature of what the league has become...if you're not ready and at your very best for 40 minutes, you can get down." ***Obviously this was said before the UNC/Louisville and GT/NCSU games went to OT on Saturday

--"[Wake Forest] is what 1-7? And they very well could be 7-1...and you look back at the games that they played, three or four minutes to go they have been right there with the exception of one--and that was the Carolina game."

--"Ojo only played four minutes but he had two big rebounds...gave us some energy plays inside. Jarquez...had two big blocks during critical parts of the game. Boris, I don't think he scored a basket, but I thought he gave us seven rebounds and four blocks. Obviously Phil and X gave us some productivity from the offensive position...I look at the numbers and we had to fight and scratch and scratch and claw just to win a double overtime game" --On this team needing to win by committee.

--"Those 22 offensive rebounds they got, I thought that kept them in the game and kept them being productive. Some of it was we just didn't hold our position...some of it was the shot some threes--they shot 27 threes. When you shoot that many threes, the ball's gonna bounce long, it's not gonna bounce right in. And they ran a lot of those down."

--"I think we're learning the level that we got to play at to compete in the ACC--the new and improved ACC. This is a rock 'em sock 'em league now. It's going to become something that people are not accustomed to...what you're gonna see in the years to come, this is going to be a battle royal every time you have two ACC teams show up."

--"I've always tried to keep guys fresh and we don't have the luxury of doing that this year. So we probably going with our starters a little longer than what I would like for them to go. We're gonna have to find a way to get some more guys involved."

--"Montay [Brandon] has been playing a lot of major minutes and I thought this was the first night that he kind of showed the effects of the wear and tear that normally you get when you're playing guys 35, 36 minutes."

--"I think they're growing up." --Speaking about Phil Cofer and XRM

--"Yes, I did."--on whether he thought about calling a timeout at the end of regulation

--"Phil [Cofer] is a tremendous athlete, but his heart is as big as a lion. he just has tremendous aggressiveness. He's a warrior. And we had to have those plays. His teammates found him, and we needed--we've been challenging him--he gave us some big plays down the stretch. He's learning how to emotionally engage himself into the game and come away with those plays. I thought he was very clever during that period; he had some pump fakes and some step-throughs, he maintained his composure, and he went up and made some big plays for us...you like to see your young guys in January making those kind of plays. We just got to get a few more of our veterans being more consistent." --On what makes freshman forward Phil Cofer so deadly down on the short corner, and how he's been able to come on so quickly. (It's very obvious by his body language that Coach Hamilton would be quite pleased with a team full of guys like Phil Cofer. Click on the interview below and you'll see why).

Phil Cofer talks about what the team did well, how he's developed this year, his role on the team, and playing in college vs high school. This was the first time I'd been able to speak with Phil and just from this one interview you can tell that he is the kind of kid that will win you some basketball games. HUGE steal late in the recruiting process last year.

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Devon Bookert talks about playing 49 minutes and the development of the freshman:

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FSU hosts Miami tomorrow (Sunday, February 1st) at 12:30pm. Come see if the dynamic freshman duo of Phil Cofer and Xavier Rathan-Mayes, plus the veteran leadership of Devon Bookert and Montay Brandon can lead the Noles to another victory. A win would give Florida State a state championship.