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Arkansas State (18-7, 9-3) 75 at UTA (18-6, 8-3) 81
Saturday, February 11, 2017
College Park Center • Arlington, Texas

Postgame Quotes

UTA head coach Scott Cross
Overall thoughts on the game:
"It was a hard fought win. It looks like we won that game because we got to the free throw line a little bit more and got a couple extra possessions from them turning it over a few more times than us and we had more offensive rebounds. I'm proud of our guys for pulling this one out. They were a very good basketball team and we had a tough time stopping them in the second half when they were really driving us and getting to the basket. They have three really good shooters that were out there so it was kind of like, pick your poison. They were driving us in and hitting three's at the same time. Our guys got a little tight but they pulled it out. It is probably good for us going down the stretch to have a hard fought victory. I think it will help us later in conference."

On the Sun Belt Conference standings:
"It's definitely a blessing for us that the teams that were ahead of us lost. We control our own destiny. If our guys play like they're capable of, I think we can win this thing. If we relax and take a play off or two plays and let one slip, then one of these other teams will. It's nice to be in control again and we have a big one against Little Rock. I've been watching them on video and they're playing really well now that they have their 6'10 guy back. They are playing a lot better and we'll have our work cut out for us."

On Erick Neal taking over:
"He did a great job creating offense for us. He is so quick, nobody can really stay in front of him. I think the biggest thing with him is getting him to use those ball screens because it creates problems. If you help too much then Hervey or Jorge will be open on the roll or the pop and if you don't help he should be able to get into the paint and either finish it or kick it to one of those shooters so we were getting a little bit stagnated there for a while. Offensively we slowed down a little bit so we tried to change it up and Erick did a good facilitating for us."

On staying focused and composed:
"This is one of those games where you have the lead and it starts dwindling away. You get tight, it's hard to make shots, hard to make free throws, so it was good that our guys were able to overcome. When Drew hit that big shot late in the game, I thought it gave us a big lift. Our guys were able, for the most part, to hit their free throws and I think that's what the game came down to. They hit 76.5 percent in a game that's really tight and we're losing a big lead. I think that's a credit to our guys for stepping up and knocking those down."

UTA junior guard Erick Neal
On how he took control in the 2nd half:
"I don't really know to be honest, after I got dunked on I was just like man, I've got to do something to make us keep us going."

On Jorge Bilbao's scoring drive:
"I was excited. I always get on him in practice for doing that because sometimes he ends up dribbling it off his feet or turn it over, but every time in a game he somehow gets it to go and I'm just like man it's amazing that a 5 man is able to do what I can do. It's just great."

On posting up in the 2nd half:
"Coach made that call. I guess he saw me hit a few threes, he wanted me to get a little more touches. We have a play called extra, and it's really the same play we run for Kevin but I go post in the corner and then I get the screen or I take the shot. It puts me in the position to be successful."

UTA junior forward Kevin Hervey
On playing good games versus good teams:
"Anytime you have a team that's almost as good as you are and competes at the level you do, then it's fun to play teams like that. They make you bring the best out of yourself, and then you bring the best out of each other and then the better team wins, and that was us tonight."

On the top 3 conference teams losing tonight:
"We actually found out during the game that Georgia State and Georgia Southern lost. We control our own destiny like our coaches tells us every day and it made us want to fight harder."

Arkansas State coach Grant McCasland
Overall thoughts on the game:
"We definitely settled in after the first half. Give UTA credit because they compete really hard defensively and they have such great pace to the way they run their offense. I think we got sped up a little more than what we wanted too early. It was a great game for us to prove that we're ready to compete in this league, on the road especially. The second half showed we've got a group of guys that want to fight and want to win together. We did get some good efforts from different guys. There was a few lose balls in those pivotal moments they got that we didn't get that led to layups for them, And-1's that we'll look back and kick ourselves for. We have to do better from the free throw line. We missed some down the stretch and I think we have guys that will step up and make. I'm proud of our team for the way we competed. We found a way to get back into it and get over the hump."

On the effort of Deven Simms:
"That's the heart of this whole team. We've got guys that pick each other up when you're not feeling well or when things aren't going great. There's a lot of belief in there. We were talking to them at halftime about what we needed to do defensively and if you look at the numbers, we did a good job guarding them from the 3-point line. We held them to 20 percent. At the rim, they made a few plays that we needed to do a better job on, but we limited them there. They just got to the free throw line too many times. We were doing a good job of being physical and trying to show our hands and it just didn't work out that way today."