Nov. 4, 2010
College Station, Texas - Head Coach Mark Turgeon and members of the Texas A&M men's basketball team met with the media today at Reed Arena to talk about the upcoming 2010-11 season.
The Aggie Basketball team defeated St. Mary's (Texas), 70-53, in an exhibition match at Reed Arena Tuesday. The season officially tips off next Friday, November 12 with a home game against Alcorn State, scheduled to begin at 7 p.m. CT.
Non-conference individual game and season tickets are available through the 12th Man Foundation. Click here to get yours today!
Audio from today's press conference is available to the right in MP3 format, quotes will be available below soon.
HEAD COACH Mark Turgeon
On what the team saw from watching film of Tuesday's exhibition win... “We're getting ready to go watch the film now. We were actually pretty good. I thought we executed our secondary break at a pretty high level. We passed the ball at times really well and shared the ball. Defensively the first 20 minutes we were pretty good. We held them to 16 points. They are a pretty good team, well-coached, and really disciplined. I thought we let down defensively in the second half. So everything I felt during the game and after the game I felt after watching the film. There are a lot of real positives in there. It's hard to get in a flow when coach is taking you out every four minutes and subbing five guys in. So there might be a little bit of an excuse. I think they'll respond well to film and I think they'll learn a lot. I think we'll learn from it.”
On senior Andrew Darko... “I've felt great about Darko since he's been here. He's worked hard, is a great kid and takes care of his academics. He's always had the players' respect. Last year, when Darko got tired, we had to stop practice because he had to go out. He was that important to us in practice. He's earned it (his scholarship). He played like he belonged the other night. I know I do, and my assistants and all his teammates do, have all the confidence in the world in Darko. He's a Big 12 player, whether he was on scholarship for three years or just one. He's going to help us a lot. He's a great kid. I hope he has a special year because he deserves it.”
On sophomore Khris Middleton leading the team in assists on Tuesday night... “I can see Khris battling Dash (Harris) for most assists on the team this year. He'll be in a position to do that. He's just an all-around good player offensively. Hopefully he can get his stroke the way we want it and the way he finished last year. He'll help us in a lot of ways. The whole key is just putting him in position to make those plays. We need him to be that threat out there for us. I expect Khris to shoot the ball better than he did last year.”
On who will step up and replace Donald Sloan as the go-to guy at the end of a shot clock... “I'm not sure yet. Last year was easy for me as a coach. I would just stand up and yell his name and everyone knew to just get out of the way. This year I'm going to have to coach a little bit. We'll figure it out. We've got a lot of good players. We've got a lot of guys that can score. We haven't practiced our top guys together except for maybe two practices so far. They'll start getting used to playing with each other. We can really score. We'll have a variety of ways to do it.”
On the freshman big men... “I'm really excited about both of them, Kourtney (Roberson) and Keith (Davis). I think about where they are now compared to where David (Loubeau) was at the same time. Now, David's one of the most coachable guys I've ever been around. He works hard, does everything I ask. If those two do the same, we'll have two pretty good players on our hands. They'll have great careers.”
On the early-season road game at Texas A&M-Corpus Christi... “We did it last year with SMU. It's kind of risky. But also, getting on the road early kind of brings you together. I imagine we'll have a few Aggies down there which will help. (Last year) we had a few Aggies in Dallas, which helped. I like doing it. I tried to get us away early and just get us ready for what will be a tough tournament in Orlando.”