Video: IU players react to win over Texas Southern

  • 11/17/2014 9:02 pm in

Yogi Ferrell (20 points, seven assists, four rebounds), Robert Johnson (21 points, six assists, five rebounds) and James Blackmon Jr. (19 points, five rebounds) met with the media following Indiana’s 83-64 win over Texas Southern on Monday night at Assembly Hall.

Watch the full press conference below:

Quotes are available after the jump.

Q. Yogi, thinking about Robert’s performance tonight, obviously he scored a lot of points, six assists, but how is he growing into that position in terms of taking the ball and running the offense?

YOGI FERRELL: He’s growing into that really well. You know, he’s always in there watching film, but he was just very poised out there. He didn’t rush anything. He kind of picked his spots, and when the driving lane was there, he took it. When it wasn’t, he drove it and kicked it out. I thought he just made great decisions tonight.

Q. Robert, how much has your game, scoring, rebounding and passing carried over from Benedictine?

ROBERT JOHNSON: Yeah, I think those are some of the things Coach Crean talked to me about when he recruited me. When you come here as a guard you’re expected to do multiple things, and he only recruits versatile players, you’ve got to be able to rebound, drive the ball, dish it out, make smart decisions, just be a complete player.

Q. Yogi, talk about the offensive efficiency tonight.

YOGI FERRELL: Well, I think it was overall just being more locked in the second half. We talked a lot during halftime about our defense, and I think I brought a little bit more effort there, and I think I just listened to Coach more, and unselfish things helped me get off a little bit.

Q. Yogi, how much have you seen Hanner adapt to playing more this season?

YOGI FERRELL: He makes it a lot easier for us. I feel like Hanner this year has gotten better with timing the block now and going up and blocking it, so if we get beat off the dribble, we know we’ve got back line defense, and Hanner is going to be up there to block it for us. We’re going to definitely need that from him.

Q. Your coach said a lot of it is just translating things from practice, finally getting Hanner up to game speed. How much have you seen him kind of adapt this year, what he can do?

YOGI FERRELL: Hanner has adapted a lot I’d say, coming from freshman year. He struggled a little bit last year, didn’t play as much. This year we know he’s a guy we’re going to need. A lot of it is coming from practice, though. I feel like his confidence has grown in practice, and that’s carried over to the game. That’s why you see him out there killing it.

Q. Yogi, with the three teammates coming back for the next game, is that going to be hard to integrate that into this? What do you think the next one is going to be like?

YOGI FERRELL: You know, I feel like maybe they’ve had the upper advantage because they’ve been watching the games really and giving us pointers, so it’s basically like them watching film of the game basically. They’ve got kind of the upper hand, and I think they’re going to go in and do what we need to do, move the ball, just kind of gel with our offense.

Q. James, how has Robert improved since you played him in summer camp?

JAMES BLACKMON, JR.: I really didn’t play him in EYBL, but I played him in, I think, Nike Global Challenge. But I think just not being better but all around, like everything he does has gotten better, not specifically one thing, because Coach has been working with us on the things that we brought here, and he wants us to keep getting better at those things.

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