Agnus Berenato Team Quotations

One loss does not diminish what this team has done. My view on making the NCAA Tournament has not changed. We are still above .500 in the conference, and we have 19 wins. I have all the confidence in the selection committee that they know what this team is capable of.

I feel like this team is focused. We know what our goals are. The first was to have a winning season, which we have. The second was to qualify for the Big East Tournament, which we did as the sixth seed after being picked to finish 11th. And the next goal is the NCAA Tournament.

We were a little sluggish at first, but there are no excuses. The home crowd was an awesome environment. I kept telling my team to focus on the task at hand.

At this point in the season, there are no excuses. I told the team at halftime to focus on the task at hand. I had to tell them not to focus on the student section or the rest of the crowd.

We didn't lose this game from lack of effort. I give credit to Connecticut because they are a top-notch program. But I am proud of our team and our effort.

This is a year of firsts for this Pittsburgh team. Our motto has been all year, 'Why not Pitt?' We came here to win. I talked to my team before the game and used reverse psychology by telling them Pitt had been to the Big East tournament before and Cincinnati, which is new to the conference this year, hadn't been here before. So they thought 'We' had been here before and they were right. 'We' as in 'Pitt' were before.

I'm a big believer that you reap what you sow. I tell the team that all the time. I don't think luck just happens. I think people create their own good fortune.

This was huge win for us. I feel like any time a team can get to .500 in a conference as good as the Big East, then they should receive an NCAA Tournament bid. The worst we can finish is .500. In the preseason, people thought we wouldn't even make the conference tournament.

This was a cool kind of night. It brought back some memories for many of our fans who used to watch games in this building. I really feel like my team bought into playing in Fitzgerald Field House. They played like an unbelievable unit.

This was probably our worst game this season. But DePaul is a very good team and they're the No. 3 seed for a reason.

This team is so young that, sometimes, I am not sure they even realize how big this game was. I tried to keep them loose and we just came in pretty relaxed. That is what you have to do with young kids. Kids are resilient. Sometimes, it is the grown-ups who put more pressure on themselves than the players.

This is the second-best defensive team in the nation. You can't prepare for that. We can't practice that kind of heat.