WATCH: Coach Jans Postgame Presser - No. 20 Missouri
February 01, 2025 | Men's Basketball
2024-25 Mississippi State Men's Basketball Postgame Quotes
No. 14 Mississippi State vs. No. 20 Missouri – February 1, 2025
Mississippi State Head Coach Chris Jans
Q: Missouri pretty much dominated from start to finish. What did you see out from your team's energy in the first half?
CJ: Yeah, definitely was a dominating performance by Missouri. Congratulations to Coach Gates and their staff. We knew they were a really good basketball team before the ball was tipped. I told everybody that would listen to me that they're the best team in the country, not just the SEC, that nobody's talking about. I know they ranked 20th, but they just looked really good to me all year long, especially on tape in their recent games."
"Unfortunately, I sensed it a little bit. I tried to do something about it verbally with a couple of guys before the ball was tipped. Usually, you can settle in, and the competitive juices will take over. When it was 35-31 late in the first half, I remember thinking that we could get to halftime. Maybe be where we're at now, or maybe get a little bit closer that we could regroup and come out and get the crowd behind us."
"It just went from bad to worse. All of a sudden, it was 14 at halftime in the last three minutes. It was a bad stretch for us. It just took the wind out of the crowd's sails. At halftime, you're doing what you can do to try to get them to understand there's a lot of basketball left, and we're going to have to really take it segment-by-segment. You can't get it back all at once. We started that way. I think we cut it to ten. Then, it was just downhill after that."
Q: Missouri hit 15 three's tonight, some of them contested, some of them uncontested. How were they able to hit so many three-pointers?
CJ: Yeah, it's our third home loss that we've had this year. That's been a tale to tape 16 [versus Kentucky], 15 [versus Alabama] and 15 [versus Missouri] and efficient doing it, not with a bunch of attempts. So, we're going to have to really break it down as a staff and go backward a little bit to change some things because it's not working. It's not a one-off, it's been consistent. There's a lot of teams in this league that are capable of shooting a basketball like that. You all know how I don't believe in the saying, 'They just made shots.' Sometimes, they make a shot or two, but not 15 of them. We have something to do with that, and we're going to have to try to fix that ASAP."
Q: I know you have multiple capable scorers on this team, what do you need to do to get those guys going?
CJ: Yeah, we just got beat in every category. That's just the bottom line. I told the team, since the staff and I arrived, I'm guessing we've played 50-plus games in the Hump. It's got to be around there. We've had some tough nights, and we've had some tough losses. We haven't won every game that we've played at home, but I don't ever remember that feeling that I had this afternoon. I was embarrassed for all of us, it starts with me. It's my responsibility to have the pulse and get them ready to go, either via game planning or just motored up and motivated. Obviously, we weren't."
"In the first couple of possessions of the second half, we had some guys that got after the ball in a different mindset than they did the whole first half. That's where I told them, 'The cat was out of the bag, what were we waiting for?" Do you think at 4-4 in the SEC and coming off a tough game against Alabama that we were just going to show up and win because we weren't playing a top 10 team?"
"I feel awful for our fan base, for the administration and for everybody that that loves Bulldog basketball. It was an awful feeling, and I never want to have it again. We're going to do what we've got to do to make sure that it never happens again."
Q: You have a week before your next game, what is your plan to get your team in the right spot physically and mentally?
CJ: It's going to be a long week. It's something we talked about. We're going to have a little bounce on our step going into the bye a week, or we're not. Certainly, the 'or not' is what won out. So, I haven't got my mind around exactly what our plan is going to be. I thought I had it, but it may need to be altered now in terms of practice time. But we'll have plenty of time, tape, and work on the court and work off the court to try to make sure that this never happens again.
Q: You play Georgia next week and then a string of ranked opponents, what do you have to do to be prepared for games against ranked teams?
CJ: I just don't feel like over the course of not every game but too many of these games, we're just not playing the way we need to play on both ends. It has always started with defense, rebounding, and toughness. In this league where there's a very small margin of error, you take your foot off the gas, and everybody's going to take advantage of it. We've been able to do that to other teams, too. We've just got to understand that we've got a margin of error that's small, regardless. We've got deficiencies. Most of the teams do, but they're all really, really good, but they do. We've got to play to our strengths and understand what our strengths and weaknesses are. I've got to figure out how to get us in a better position so we can have more success."
No. 14 Mississippi State vs. No. 20 Missouri – February 1, 2025
Mississippi State Head Coach Chris Jans
Q: Missouri pretty much dominated from start to finish. What did you see out from your team's energy in the first half?
CJ: Yeah, definitely was a dominating performance by Missouri. Congratulations to Coach Gates and their staff. We knew they were a really good basketball team before the ball was tipped. I told everybody that would listen to me that they're the best team in the country, not just the SEC, that nobody's talking about. I know they ranked 20th, but they just looked really good to me all year long, especially on tape in their recent games."
"Unfortunately, I sensed it a little bit. I tried to do something about it verbally with a couple of guys before the ball was tipped. Usually, you can settle in, and the competitive juices will take over. When it was 35-31 late in the first half, I remember thinking that we could get to halftime. Maybe be where we're at now, or maybe get a little bit closer that we could regroup and come out and get the crowd behind us."
"It just went from bad to worse. All of a sudden, it was 14 at halftime in the last three minutes. It was a bad stretch for us. It just took the wind out of the crowd's sails. At halftime, you're doing what you can do to try to get them to understand there's a lot of basketball left, and we're going to have to really take it segment-by-segment. You can't get it back all at once. We started that way. I think we cut it to ten. Then, it was just downhill after that."
Q: Missouri hit 15 three's tonight, some of them contested, some of them uncontested. How were they able to hit so many three-pointers?
CJ: Yeah, it's our third home loss that we've had this year. That's been a tale to tape 16 [versus Kentucky], 15 [versus Alabama] and 15 [versus Missouri] and efficient doing it, not with a bunch of attempts. So, we're going to have to really break it down as a staff and go backward a little bit to change some things because it's not working. It's not a one-off, it's been consistent. There's a lot of teams in this league that are capable of shooting a basketball like that. You all know how I don't believe in the saying, 'They just made shots.' Sometimes, they make a shot or two, but not 15 of them. We have something to do with that, and we're going to have to try to fix that ASAP."
Q: I know you have multiple capable scorers on this team, what do you need to do to get those guys going?
CJ: Yeah, we just got beat in every category. That's just the bottom line. I told the team, since the staff and I arrived, I'm guessing we've played 50-plus games in the Hump. It's got to be around there. We've had some tough nights, and we've had some tough losses. We haven't won every game that we've played at home, but I don't ever remember that feeling that I had this afternoon. I was embarrassed for all of us, it starts with me. It's my responsibility to have the pulse and get them ready to go, either via game planning or just motored up and motivated. Obviously, we weren't."
"In the first couple of possessions of the second half, we had some guys that got after the ball in a different mindset than they did the whole first half. That's where I told them, 'The cat was out of the bag, what were we waiting for?" Do you think at 4-4 in the SEC and coming off a tough game against Alabama that we were just going to show up and win because we weren't playing a top 10 team?"
"I feel awful for our fan base, for the administration and for everybody that that loves Bulldog basketball. It was an awful feeling, and I never want to have it again. We're going to do what we've got to do to make sure that it never happens again."
Q: You have a week before your next game, what is your plan to get your team in the right spot physically and mentally?
CJ: It's going to be a long week. It's something we talked about. We're going to have a little bounce on our step going into the bye a week, or we're not. Certainly, the 'or not' is what won out. So, I haven't got my mind around exactly what our plan is going to be. I thought I had it, but it may need to be altered now in terms of practice time. But we'll have plenty of time, tape, and work on the court and work off the court to try to make sure that this never happens again.
Q: You play Georgia next week and then a string of ranked opponents, what do you have to do to be prepared for games against ranked teams?
CJ: I just don't feel like over the course of not every game but too many of these games, we're just not playing the way we need to play on both ends. It has always started with defense, rebounding, and toughness. In this league where there's a very small margin of error, you take your foot off the gas, and everybody's going to take advantage of it. We've been able to do that to other teams, too. We've just got to understand that we've got a margin of error that's small, regardless. We've got deficiencies. Most of the teams do, but they're all really, really good, but they do. We've got to play to our strengths and understand what our strengths and weaknesses are. I've got to figure out how to get us in a better position so we can have more success."
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