| 11/11/2024 | Men’s Basketball BOCA RATON, Fla. – Florida Atlantic men’s basketball Head Coach John Jakus met with the media on Monday to discuss the upcoming week on the road for the Owls. Jakus talked about the first road matchup of the season for Florida Atlantic. The Owls will hit the road for 15 days as they first take on the Knights of the University of Central Florida on Tuesday, Nov. 12, at 7 p.m. before traveling to Charleston, S.C. Head Coach John Jakus “Looking forward to this week. Obviously, it’s a huge week for us, a big opportunity to play three games in one week and all [against] really good opponents. We will be on the road for about 14 days, I haven’t experienced it before in my career, but we are just treating it like an NBA road trip; we will get the most out of it and hopefully the basketball piece will grow as we go. It is a great opportunity to play six games in a row on the road, we are looking forward to it.” On the biggest takeaways from the first week of the season “The first thing is probably the five or six days on the road between our exhibition and the Indiana State game. That gave us a good beginning indicator of how to handle ourselves as we travel with sleep, food, and peaking at the right time as you play and not exhausting yourself is really important and I thought the guys were incredibly mature. The other thing that stood out is the fact that we had four different guys do the press conference after the game and we have had eight guys in double figures. The depth and willingness to share has been a really positive thing. Defensively, there was some growth, our defensive efficiency numbers are better than I thought they would be at this point. We still have to grow there and I think each of the next three teams will cause some wrinkles for us that will really test our defense. Those three things we are pleased with and from this point on, it is just taking it a day at a time.” On bench scoring “We want to get to the point where we have eight or nine starters and that the guys view themselves that way. I don’t want who starts to impact how they view themselves or the confidence they have when they shoot the basketball. I have said early on that our goal is by the time we get to [American Athletic Conference] play, we can lead the league in bench points. You can’t control things like foul trouble and injuries, so to go all in on five guys would be foolish and shortsighted. On top of that, the assistants did a good job. Our depth offensively is really good. Instead of trying to get a guy the ball, we try to pick on certain things. Whether it is a mismatch or a ball screen coverage, we’ll use different guys in different ways, so different guys will have certain nights. For the most part, we are thrilled with that, we want to keep that going and that will continue to be a focus.” On playing fast “It is a good sign. There are going to be people that get back on defense and then force us to have to execute other things. We have to have two plans because when the first plan does not work, you are still going to need something. When you watch us, there can be this spurt-ability where all of a sudden really quick, we will put a bunch of points together. I would say our spurt-ability is better than our consistency right now. At portions, the way we flow into things is exactly what we are looking for, and then at other portions we can really stall ourselves or get stuck. We are going to keep tinkering with that balance. We are going to try to run and we need to be opportunistic when we run.” FOLLOW THE OWLS To stay up to date on all things FAU men’s basketball, follow the Owls on social media @FAUMBB. Florida Atlantic’s 2024-25 season is sponsored by Phil Smith Kia/Phil Smith Acura. |
