Idaho at Nevada Postgame Notes:
- With the 69-61 victory over Idaho in the team’s WAC home opener, Nevada improved to 10-6 overall and 2-1 in WAC play.
- The win also marked Nevada’s 14th consecutive WAC regular-season home victory and was its eighth straight win in the series with the Vandals.
- The Wolf Pack has now won 31 of its last 33 games at Lawlor Events Center, including its last six.
- Freshman Armon Johnson led the team and tied his career best with 23 points. That marked the third time in the last five games that the true freshman has paced the Wolf Pack in scoring.
- Senior Marcelus Kemp added 18 points, his 26th consecutive game in double figures, while sophomores Brandon Fields and JaVale McGee each added 13.
- With his three-pointer in the first half, Kemp moved into a tie for second place on the Nevada career list for three-pointers made with Jerry Hogan (1990-94) with 185 treys.
- Senior Demarshay Johnson tied his career best with 11 rebounds.
- Nevada turned in a season high 11 blocked shots in the game, including four from McGee and a career-best four by Fields.
- With the four blocked shots, McGee moved into third on the Nevada single-season lists with 51, tying the 51 that three-time WAC Player of the Year Nick Fazekas had as a sophomore in 2004-05.
- Nevada returns to action on Saturday night, playing host to Boise State (12-5, 3-2 WAC) at 7:05 p.m. at Lawlor Events Center.
Nevada Quotes
Freshman PG Armon Johnson on overall team play:
“We had a tough game. We could have played better as a team. Give Idaho credit. They’re a much improved team and they worked hard.”
Senior guard Marcelus Kemp on the improvement of Idaho from last season:
“They’re a much improved team, thus far they are the most improved team we’ve faced.”
Kemp on the game:
“We struggled a little, but we fought through and got the win, and that’s the most important thing.”
Johnson on how the team handled their struggles:
“We didn’t give up as a team. We’ve been down before, so we know how to overcome adversity and get the W.”
Kemp on playing in front of the home crowd against Boise State on Saturday night:
“It’s always fun playing at home. Boise State is a good team. We’ll watch film and we’ll be ready.”
Nevada Coach Mark Fox on the game:
“I thought that was an ugly basketball game, but it is a win.”
Coach Fox when asked which phases of the game were ugly:
“I think it’s easier to say which phases weren’t. It was a game where we had 18 turnovers and left people open to drive to the basketball. We made some mistakes at both ends of the floor that contributed to an ugly game.”
Coach Fox on Idaho’s second half defensive changes:
“They paid attention to Marcelus in the second half and he can’t do it all. In the second half, he needed help.”
Coach Fox on his team’s defense:
“We have to commit to becoming a better defensive team. At the end of every night, we have to defend and have a chance to win. Our defense is not good enough right now.”
Coach Fox on the upcoming home game vs. Boise State Saturday night:
“They start four seniors. They have terrific interior play and great three-point shooting around them, so we’re going to have to be much better defensively than we have been the last 10 days.”
Idaho Quotes
Idaho Vandals Head Coach George Pfeifer on the game:
“It was the free throw line. They shot more free throws than we did and made more free throws than we did. I thought that was the key. We did some silly, foolish things just at the end of the half. That put us in a tiny bit of a hole. We were an inch closer but couldn’t get over. Free throws had something to do with it.”
Pfeifer on his team’s performance:
“We played hard. We had to play as hard as (Nevada) did if not harder and I thought we played really hard tonight. I think we had a couple of baskets if we could have got those to go in and you have to cash in on those. The door was open tonight and we peaked inside.”
Pfeifer on Nevada’s performance:
“They did a great job. (Nevada) Coach (Mark) Fox is a great coach. He makes great adjustments during the game and the kids follow those adjustments.”
Pfiefer on Vandals forward Michael Crowell:
“He constantly plays inside of himself. He plays lots of minutes. He’s a smart player, does the right things and doesn’t take bad shots. We ran that guy a lot of minutes.”
Idaho Vandals forward Michael Crowell on the game:
“We’re improving every game. My main goal is to win the conference and if we keep improving at this rate, I think we will be ready for the conference tournament.”
Crowell on team making fouls:
“We definitely had to fight through fouls. Luckily our bench comes in doing good work. They did a lot of good things for us. We were playing really aggressive tonight, we knew there were going to be a lot of fouls.”
Crowell on Vandals forward Darin Nagle:
“If he doesn’t block shots, he’ll at least restore them. He covers the ground pretty well especially in our zone and that really helped us out.”
