here<\/a>. Below is what Lloyd, Brayden Burries and Motiejus Krivas\u2014both of whom had career highs in scoring\u2014had to say afterward:<\/p>\nLloyd on coaching last year\u2019s team vs. this one: \u201cIt\u2019s been great for me. I feel like, personally, I\u2019m coming into my sweet spot as a coach. I don\u2019t want to act like I\u2019ve had all the answers, and maybe in the past I felt like I did and I was proven wrong. I\u2019ve got a lot of experiences to pull from, good experiences and tough experiences. And last year was a tough one, but I think it says a lot about our program. When you\u2019re a place like Arizona, you\u2019re 4-5, panic ensues, and we were able to steady the ship and have a really good year. I mean, this says a lot about the players. I think it says a lot about the staff. Let\u2019s see how this year plays out. We\u2019ll withhold judgment till the end of the year, and then we can see how much I\u2019ve improved.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Burries: \u201cBrayden\u2019s a great player. He\u2019s a great young man, and we\u2019re fortunate to have him in our program. He\u2019s a winner. He\u2019s always won. He does about everything in his life the right way. It\u2019s just a joy to coach him every day, and it\u2019s really fun to help him on the journey. Brayden is not a guy you gotta poke and prod, you can be pretty direct with him. I told him, he\u2019s a guy that I don\u2019t want to coach by being confrontational with him. I think he\u2019s too good of a kid and he\u2019s really motivated. He doesn\u2019t need that. I\u2019m very direct with him, and you know what, he\u2019s got enough experience now, I think he\u2019s really learning. And not that he didn\u2019t trust us, but I think just, we\u2019ve had time to really build the relationship. He obviously played a great game today, as well as I thought a lot of other guys played really well as well.\u201d<\/p>\n
On if Burries can get better: \u201cI\u2019m not putting any limits on it. Brayden does a great job of being aggressive, but staying within the framework of the team. Let\u2019s just continue to give him space and let him do his thing and, I\u2019m gonna try to keep encouraging him to learn. I told him you got through a rough stretch, you had a good stretch, and now this January should be maybe the most significant jump maybe you make in your young basketball career should be this month, based off having positive and negative experiences. So let\u2019s approach it like that. It looks like he\u2019s off to a good start.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Koa Peat: \u201cI always tell Koa, he\u2019s a special player, and he\u2019s so versatile. It\u2019s really impressive, just when you put his physicality with his versatility as a basketball player. But I always tell him his cheat code is the effort and energy he could play with when it\u2019s packaged with the physicality he delivers. He can never short himself in that area. I mean, don\u2019t try to over accentuate the other stuff, unless that effort, that energy, that physicality, is in front of everything he does.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Peat\u2019s technical foul: \u201cThe play happened fast. I know he got a good dunk, and then they had called the timeout, and I think he, you know, celebrated to their bench. You just can\u2019t do that. Koa is an awesome kid, he apologized right away. To me, we always encourage our guys to celebrate to each other. Don\u2019t celebrate against somebody, celebrate with your teammates. It\u2019s a great reminder, because that that can change the game.\u201d<\/p>\n
On having players who are able to defend 1 thru 5: \u201cI think we have a lot of guys that can. I think Ivan is right there, I think Dwayne\u2019s right there. I think Tobe is right there. I really like the versatility we have defensively. I think it allows us to kind of mix up some of our coverages and make adjustments in games that maybe are subtle to the untrained eye, but they\u2019re important.\u201d<\/p>\n
On switching: \u201cIt gives you options, you know. And everything depends on kind of what the other team is trying to do and how you match up with it. Switching sometimes can be a simple option. Switching keeps the ball in front, kind of keeps you out of rotations. It\u2019s a good card to be able to pull out of your back pocket at certain times.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Ivan Kharchenkov: \u201cWe knew Ivan was a really good prospect for a couple of years, but things were different. We didn\u2019t think he was coming, to the states, you know, for certain reasons. And when the opportunity opened up for him to come, we jumped back in it. And to be honest with you, it wasn\u2019t a deep study. We\u2019d seen him enough when he was young. And when Carter left for the NBA, we had a void that needed to be filled and and he was the best option.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Kharchenkov becoming a defensive stopper: \u201cI think he\u2019s a competitive guy. He has a lot of pride. I want a lot of guys that play both ways. I\u2019m not like trying to limit him offensively. I think he\u2019s continuing to grow there, and I think he\u2019s going to have, he\u2019ll be a guy eventually that\u2019s going to have a 20-point game, or close to a 20-point game on any given night. He\u2019s just a really, really good basketball player, and we really value guys that play on both sides of the ball.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Krivas scoring inside: \u201cI\u2019m probably a little frustrated myself, because I think I was on the officials a little bit. I didn\u2019t realize he had drawn nine fouls. I thought there could have been a few more, but I can\u2019t get greedy either. And I think he\u2019s going to continue to learn how to play against that physicality and finish on those shots quicker. He\u2019s just so reliable at the free throw line, he\u2019s really grown as a defender, and he\u2019s just a real winner.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Krivas being self motivated: \u201cMo\u2019s a high character guy. He doesn\u2019t need me to light a fire under him. I\u2019m not afraid to push him, because I think he responds to that. You\u2019re seeing a guy who\u2019s kind of coming into his own. I mean, this is really his second year college basketball is. Obviously, the previous year was cut short, he was injured, then he got to play, and then he really got injured. I just think you\u2019re seeing a guy who we knew was going to be a dominant player in this program, but it\u2019s finally coming into fruition.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Jaden Bradley taking a hard fall early: \u201cYou know what\u2019s crazy? We\u2019ve talked about everybody but JB. Obviously he\u2019s our leader and, he\u2019s our alpha dog. It says so much about him that we can talk about all of those other guys without bringing him up. And you\u2019re right, he does take a hard fall, he stays in the game. He makes the free throws. I mean, he\u2019s a bad man, he\u2019s a bad man, and he\u2019s an absolute winner.\u201d<\/p>\n
On going 3 for 16 from 3: \u201cI don\u2019t make anything crazy of it. I thought we had some good looks at three in the first half that would have been nice if they went down. But also, when you just kept looking up at that foul count, you saw that we were ahead in the foul count, and so the messaging for me was, don\u2019t settle. Let\u2019s take advantage of these bonus opportunities. The game got physical, and we\u2019re okay with that. The refs, they\u2019re good refs. They called some fouls, they didn\u2019t call others, but that\u2019s what you get on a night and night basis. I was okay with the shot selection overall.\u201d<\/p>\n
On if he\u2019s worried about the freshmen hitting a wall at some point: \u201cI\u2019m not putting limits on these guys, and I\u2019m not making assumptions either. We\u2019re going to watch them. We\u2019re watching all our guys, we\u2019re starting to dig into how we practicing. What work are we doing outside of practice? What does strength and conditioning look like? How\u2019s our recovery stuff? We\u2019re digging into all that right now. We\u2019ll leave no stone unturned to make sure these guys are as fresh as possible over the course of a tough season.\u201d<\/p>\n
On TCU and Jamie Dixon: \u201cJamie\u2019s a great coach. Last night I had the old 100-inch TV split into a couple screens, and I was watching Kansas and TCU on one, and I was watching Texas Tech and Houston on another, just like you guys. Jamie\u2019s a guy I\u2019ve gotten to know over the years. I really respect Jamie and really like him. Jamie, he\u2019s a great game coach. We\u2019re expecting a real battle on Saturday.\u201d<\/p>\n
On if TCU blowing a 15-point lead at Kansas will impact Saturday\u2019s matchup: \u201cI\u2019d be getting into the weeds too much. Let\u2019s prepare like the game\u2019s gonna start at 0-0, and prepare like they\u2019re gonna come out and play great at home, and we\u2019ll navigate the game possession by possession. I\u2019m not a big believer in momentum from a previous game, positive or negative.\u201d<\/p>\n
Burries on his improvement from the first 5 games: \u201cI don\u2019t think I\u2019ve changed, I think I\u2019m just getting used to the speed. More games, more experience, that\u2019s why I\u2019m getting better. I\u2019m honestly just going out there and just hooping, trusting my teammates and the game plan.\u201d<\/p>\n
On defending on the perimeter with Arizona\u2019s frontcourt behind him: \u201cIt makes it easier because I know Mo and Tobe and Koa got my back if they go in the paint, so it makes my job easier.\u201d<\/p>\n
On his rebounding: \u201cLast week Coach Lloyd kind of talked to the team on the emphasis of rebounding. In high school I rebounded a lot, and I kind of like shied away from it when I saw we had 7-2 Mo and Tobe getting all the rebounds. I had to get back into it. When a guard rebounds it makes it easier for the bigs. When you get a rebound you can just go.\u201d<\/p>\n
Krivas on his career-high 25 points: \u201cEvery guy our team tries to put a paint presence, and this time it worked. I just had it going. They see that I was scoring and they trusted me.\u201d<\/p>\n
On the increased physicality now that Big 12 play is here: \u201cEvery team will try to win games that way, with rebound and physicality.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Arizona is nearly at the halfway point of the 2025-26 regular season and has yet to lose a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":524827,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3723],"tags":[9763,7,217,231,772,1544],"class_list":{"0":"post-524826","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-basketball","8":"tag-arizona-basketball","9":"tag-basketball","10":"tag-college-basketball","11":"tag-ncaa","12":"tag-ncaa-basketball","13":"tag-ncaab"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115859407712531652","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/524826","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=524826"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/524826\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/524827"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=524826"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=524826"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=524826"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}