Nov. 29, 2005
Courtesy of San Jose State Sports Information
Santa Clara Head Coach Dick Davey
On the game
"We were very lucky. That kind of sums it up I think. We played reasonably
well defensively. I was tremendously impressed with George's (Nessman)
group. They're smart, they play hard, and they conduct themselves as
gentlemen on the floor. It's a nice group to watch, but not necessarily to
play against. We had a dogfight the entire way. We made a few miscues at
the end that gave them a better opportunity. We were fortunate that on the
out-of-bounds play Travis (Niesen) figured out what he should do, and did
it, and we managed to win by one."
On the Broncos' team defense
"Defensively, we had been playing reasonably well most of the season.
Offensively, I thought was going to be a pretty good team and we
are starting to find our stride. But I think our defense has kept us in
games and it allowed us to be successful the other night against UOP, and it
allowed us to stay around tonight."
Santa Clara Senior Forward Travis Niesen
On the winning shot
"I approached like it was in practice. I set a flair screen for Brody
(Angley). I knew I had the left side, which works out since I'm
left-handed. I threw up my hook and was fortunate that it went in. I was
pretty confident that it was."
San Jose State Head Coach George Nessman
On the team's poor shooting>
"Part of it was Santa Clara did a great job defensively. They are really
big and physical, and took us out of some of the things we'd like to do.
But, we also missed some shots we need to make. We missed some open looks
that we need to knock down. That's part of the growing process for our
team. Getting close is nice and all, but it doesn't mean much. We need to
be able to finish a game and make the plays when the game is on the line."
On the play which resulted in Travis Niesen's game-winning shot
"Niesen made a great play, but shame on us for letting him dribble with his
left hand. That was just a fundamental breakdown on our part. He took
advantage of it and converted the play."
On playing the next night at Cal
"You never want to play back-to-back, unless it's a tournament. But it was
the only date that we could get a game with Cal, and we thought playing the
Bears would be good for our progam, so we had to do it."
