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Postgame Notes
*-Yvan Ouedraogo finished with career highs in both points (11) and rebounds (14) on his way to his first career double-double. He had 12 rebounds against South Dakota State and also had 11 points against Southern. Ouedraogo is the first Husker freshman to have a double-double since Shavon Shields accomplished the feat against Michigan State in 2013. Ouedraogo is just the ninth player in NU men’s basketball history to have a double-double as a freshman.
*-Haanif Cheatham went over 1,000 career points on Saturday, going over 1,000 career points on his 3-point play with 8:45 left left in the half. Cheatham finished with a team-high 17 points to pace four players in double figures.
*-Nebraska’s 15 steals were the most since also recording 15 steals against Long Beach State on Nov. 26, 2017.
*-Nebraska’s 52 points allowed was a season low (56 vs. Purdue) while the 31.7 percent shooting by Texas A&M-Corpus Christi was NU’s second-best effort of the season.
*-Nebraska went 20-of-28 from the foul line, marking a season best for free throws made and. NU had made 19 each against Southern Utah and Southern
*-Nebraska had an 11-0 run in the first half, the 11th double-digit run for the Huskers this season.
Nebraska Head Coach Fred Hoiberg
On having better body language in the game
“It was everything that we talked about. We try to simulate that in practice and put them in adverse situations and put them in as many of those situations as possible, but nothing compares to the gametime situation with the crowd in there and with every possession meaning something. For us to go out there and take positive steps, I thought early we had some great looks. We missed a couple easy layups and some wide open threes, but we stayed in it. We stayed together. We kept guarding and got that run when we went up 18. You want to manufacture some points when the ball isn’t going in the hoop. We were 1-13 from the three point line at halftime, but we got to the free throw line 19 times. A lot of that was Haanif [Cheatham] getting out in front of the ball and attacking the basket. You have to have that when the ball isn’t going in, and you have to be able to guard. I thought we did that tonight.”
On what is most important for the rest of the season in Big Ten play
“It’s just consistency of everything we are trying to do. We have to have a great week of practice. I thought the guys came back with good focus after the holiday break. We have to continue on an upward trend if we are going to have a chance to compete with the teams we are about to face in the next 18 games. When you compare yourself, you hope to be playing good basketball at the start of league play. You have to. We can’t have lulls where we drop our heads and have poor body language because teams will take advantage of us, and they’ll go on a big run, and it’ll be too late. We’ve done that in our league games so far, and we hope those two games are ones that we can build on. We had a disappointing loss in our last one [North Dakota]. I thought we bounced back especially on the defensive end tonight. Offensively, that ball really got moving in the second half. Defensive pressure led to some easy baskets and found a way to manufacture some easy points.”
Senior guard Haanif Cheatham
On the team’s focus after the loss to North Dakota
“[We] understand the season is going to be a process, but that last game going on a little break was kind of devastating. It was something that was probably on our mind for the whole four days of break that we had off. I think we came in expecting to play better and didn’t go all the way, but we came in for practice these past two practices and locked in and just showed what we could do.”
On defensive play
“I think we showed what we could do the first two Big Ten games. I think we showed what we could do defensively and that’s a big key for us. We’ve got good guards that guard the ball. We’ve got [plays] that come out from the ball screens. Once we show that and play great defense for 40 minutes. We understand they’re going to go on runs sometimes but just sticking together on defense, that could win us some big time ball games."
Texas A&M Corpus Christi Head Coach Willis Wilson
Opening Statement
“It was just a lot of disappointment. We didn’t bring our ‘A game.’ We have been getting off to good starts and tonight was not a night we got off to a good start. We really played anxious and not characteristic of the way we have played lately. We have played good basketball in spite of the losses and tonight was not one of those nights.”
On learning from tonight’s game
“We have to identify and make a clear delineation between what we do well and what we do not do well. Unfortunately, tonight we did not do a lot of stuff well. The good news is that we can go back and look over the last four or five games, we are really good on the offensive end. Where we got into trouble tonight was our defensive transition. Our defensive transition was just atrocious. We gave up 27 points in transition, and I can’t tell you the last time we have given up that many points in transition. We are, typically, a very good team in defensive transition but tonight was a night where Nebraska just ran it to the rim, and we didn’t have an answer for them.”
On the focus in practice over the next couple days
“We have to get back to basics. Passing and catching and handling the ball. There were a lot of balls that we got beat to tonight by Nebraska. There were a lot of balls that came off the rim that we didn’t go after with all five guys. This was one of those nights, when you play against an athletic team like they are, they are going to beat you to the ball so you have to hit and then go get and we didn’t do a very good job of that, so that will be one of the focuses we will work on. We will go back and work on our defensive transition as always and we will go back and work on our shell defense and guarding the point of attack. It is just basic basketball and things we have done a decent job of in the past that we just didn’t do a very good job of tonight.”
NU Athletic Communications