I have a great group of kids. This hurts us for conference contention, but we can still go out there and work for other achievements.

They tried to box-and-1 (defend) Alex right off the start, and we ran him off some screens and gave him some looks. Some stuff he did on his own. It was a total team effort. I have to credit Gladstone for hanging in there and fighting. I honestly feel it was our guys being able to counter-measure everything that they came back with that ultimately kept us ahead.

He's a guy who has worked hard on the game, put a lot of time in the weight room, sees the floor well, and is unselfish. But we certainly need him to be an offensive threat for us.

It's unfortunate. The kids wanted it real bad É we had our opportunities. They made a couple of buckets down the stretch and we weren't able to counter it.