The 15 best Russ Smith quotes of all-time

We are now less than 48 hours away from Russ Smith Day in the city of Louisville, which means it’s time for the Card Chronicle tributes to begin.

We’ll start with the 15 best quotes from arguably the most quotable Cardinal in program history.

15. Russ becoming the first U of L player to publicly acknowledge the existence of DePaul Day (RIP) in 2013:

“Yeah it is DePaul Day so the fans came out and supported us... We always thank the fans.”

14. Russ’ pregame summary of Louisville’s Sweet 16 matchup up against Oregon in 2013:

“Pretty much whoever gets more confused is going to lose the game.”

13. Russ with Peyton Siva after the Seton Hall game in March, 2012

Peyton: “Me and Russ have a little steal battle going on. I had six tonight, I don’t know how many he had.”

Russ: “I didn’t have none.”

12. Russ on which team he would prefer to play before the 2012 Final Four:

“I want UK because of the in-state rivalry, but I want Baylor because they got the infragreen uniforms.”

11. Russ after his game-winner against Cincinnati in February of 2014:

“Last year I would’ve shot that from halfcourt.”

10. Russ introducing his friend and teammate Michael Baffour at the 2012-13 Tip-Off Luncheon (while holding a teacup):

“In New York, ‘slime’ is slang for ‘my dude.’ And his skin complexion, you know it speaks for itself. So I call him ‘Dark Slime.’”

9. On talking to the ref after not getting what looked like an obvious foul call in the 2012 Sweet 16 game against Michigan State:

“I went to the basket and Adreian Payne just shoved me. Like, that was ridiculous. I was like, ‘Dag’ and then I told him that was probably the makeup no-call for all the times that I done flopped so that was a great call.”

8. Russ after Rick Pitino and an assistant who shall not be named claimed that the 2008-09 Louisville team brought more defensive pressure than the 2012-13 squad:

“Old heads always going to have something to say. I mean, I can’t even—Coach P said he never even had a turnover in college.”

7. Russ on how he got the whole team banned from Twitter:

“When I was on Twitter as a freshman, I was ridiculous. I was using profanity, just being all-out reckless. I would tweet at such a high rate, and so recklessly, that it was just like, ‘Russ has to stop.’ I got in trouble from Coach P so many times. ... I was injured, not playing, so it didn’t even feel like I was part of the team yet — I didn’t think it would matter what I said. But the [coaches] printed out all my Tweets and showed me how bad they were, and after that it was no Twitter allowed.”

6. On if there was a specific tweet of his that led to the ban:

“No, not a specific one, it was just more the volume of them. But I guess I did once tweet something like, ‘Alright, I’m about to take a shit.’”

5. Russ on some of the criticisms he received from NBA scouts while he was in college:

“It’s frustrating for someone like me, because you want to do everything you can to impact the game, but the scouts don’t want to see that. But what they don’t understand is that I have to do that in order for us to win. It’s hard for Coach to say, “You play defense, you play offense, but you have to come back because you didn’t have a good assist-to-turnover ratio.” Wow, are you serious? I was critiqued unfairly. If you talk about me as a point guard, obviously other guards had a better ratio, but I wasn’t playing that position. That wasn’t my job. My job was to win games, and that means putting the ball into the basket. A better assist-to-turnover ratio would’ve helped me, but I don’t play for me, I play for the team, and if I have to take some ill-advised shots to kick-start the team, well, I’m not about to leave these guys stranded because I’m only focused on improving my draft stock.”

4. Russ on being unafraid of going up against young talent as a veteran:

“Playing against guys who are surely going to the NBA never scares me, because I’ve played against guys who are now in the NBA who I felt like couldn’t guard me. That’s nothing against them; there are guys in the NBA now who I’ve had trouble guarding. But when I look at [one-and-done] guys in college, I don’t see them as anything more than a jar of talent. Once they put it all together they’ll have an explosive NBA career. But as of right now, in college, I’m probably the most confident person going in, because I know how to play this game. If you haven’t played a game of college yet, you’re still in purgatory. You don’t know the ins and outs. I’ve got a freshman year under my belt, I’ve got an explosive sophomore year, I’ve got a tremendous junior year, and, now that I’m a senior, nothing scares me.”

3. Russ on the criticism that he’s an inefficient player:

“People say I’m not efficient and I won the efficiency award last year. I just play basketball and I make people’s lists sometimes. I am efficient. I can’t become efficient in their opinion because they probably never played basketball before. If you win the efficiency of the year award, then you’re efficient. I mean, two-plus-two is four.”

2. Russ on being in Rick Pitino’s doghouse early in his college career:

“He was just very unhappy. It got to the point where he was in my face yelling, and I was like, ‘Alright, coach, alright coach. What I could really use now is a hug.’”

1. Russ on his own game-winning assist during an intrasquad scrimmage:

“Nice pass, Russ.”