Wake vs. Notre Dame: post-game Q--As

Coaches and players spoke with the media following Wake Forest's 65-58 win over Notre Dame.

Wake Forest head coach Jeff Bzdelik

Opening statement: "First, I want to thank our fans. Our fans were awesome this afternoon, and I appreciate their support. It was a very hard fought competitive game. Fortunately, at the very end there we made some timely plays offensively along with making free throws. We got some timely stops and that was the difference in the basketball game. We competed hard and they competed hard and fortunately we made enough plays in a timely way to come out on top."

On Codi Miller-McIntyre's play: "Obviously, he's going to learn as a player, especially coming off the game he had, that there is going to be a focus by the opposition. But he did a really good job of not forcing things even though he had not had a huge game offensively. I am not afraid to call his number because I have great confidence in him. He and Travis [McKie] both made big play for us in terms of free throws and shots."

On Devin Thomas' play: "Devin plays with great passion. I got upset one time because he was all over the floor and needed some company. He just plays with great passion and obviously the game he had, making 10-11 from the floor, we should have gotten him the ball a little bit more inside. We tried to, but of course they're a good basketball team too."

Wake Forest forward Devin Thomas

On the importance of the win over Notre Dame: "Big game for us and a big win for us. We needed to come out strong and not have a let-down after coming off the road of our first ACC win (at Virginia Tech)."

On his role in the game: "I made my first couple shots, which gave me a lot of confidence. Unfortunately, I missed one shot, but we still got the win."

On the Syracuse home game next win: "Right now we are feeling confidant coming off a two game winning streak. We always play confidant at home and Syracuse is a good team."

Wake Forest forward Travis McKie

On the overall game: "You know, it was an up and down kind of game. It was kind of slow in the first half, but it picked up in the second half. It was a very close game, but we converted at the end and got away with the win."

On the last minute of the game: "When it got tight like that, we decided to play great defense like we had been doing the whole game, and just limit them to one rebound, so the biggest thing was rebounding."

Notre Dame head coach Mike Brey

Opening statement: "You got to take your hat off to Wake Forest. They made really big shots at key times in the last couple of minutes. I love our group, again we put ourselves in position. We weren't playing that great offensively, but we still found a way to be in position to maybe steal road win."

"I thought Wake made big-time shots. There were clutch offensive possessions that took away any hope for us."

On what made it difficult offensively for Notre Dame: "I give credit to their defense. We had some great looks early in the game. You got to make a couple of those to feel good on the road. We could never make enough three-point shots to feel like you are in a pretty good groove."

"That's a weapon of our offense. That's a staple. We need to make some threes. I didn't think any of them were going in tonight, for some reason. We made two and when the two went in and I was shocked. I just didn't think any of them were going in."

"Wake did a good job defending us. They got some size, length and quickness to take away angles. [Garrick] Sherman gave us a hope there. We were going to him a bunch, but we couldn't get much else scoring-wise."