Dusty May’s Monday press conference

I personally, as a staff, we expected to play much better than we did defensively. Much more sound. Our communication wasn't great. Our anticipation wasn't great. So we have a lot to work on on that side of the ball, but we're certainly capable of being elite in that area.

I'm not confident that it's just going to get worked out. We're now having pixie dust to sprinkle on it. So we've all got to be much more intentional about passing and catching, about giving the ball space. I thought our spacing was one of our biggest areas that caused the turnovers.

I feel like we were crowding the ball. We weren't playing with good rhythm. And I felt like almost everyone caught the ball and tried to be the primary playmaker. We just didn't have— I don't say anyone— we didn't have a lot of guys trying to connect the offense.

And that's something that I think all of us in the basketball universe are striving for now, to find connectors to make it all work. And usually the beautiful thing about basketball is those connectors end up scoring more, and they do it at a much higher efficient rate. And so we're looking for that. And I think if we can really find a couple connectors, their minutes will go up, guys that are just steady and solid and play mistake-free basketball on this team, then they'll have a chance to carve out an even bigger role.

One play in the game I liked the most? Man, I love how quickly Morez Johnson was getting to the ball. His intensity level, I just think like the moment he got back into practice, and he's been out a while, we were very cautious with his injury. The moment he set foot on practice, the intensity in our gym was elevated exponentially, and that's what he, that's his secret sauce.

And he did a lot of other good things. He put pressure on the rim. I thought just him being on the floor gave everyone a lot of confidence, probably too much confidence. I think he sometimes he's out there and they believe he's going to go make the plays behind him that we can be a little bit loose and overaggressive. But man, he brings a lot of things that we needed to this team.