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NCAA WOMEN'S 1ST AND 2ND ROUNDS: LOUISVILLEMarch 20, 2016Doug BrunoChanise JenkinsMegan PodkowaJessica JanuaryLouisville, Kentucky DePaul - 73, Louisville - 72 THE MODERATOR: We'll start it off with an opening statement. COACH BRUNO: It's always about the players. Every game that's ever played is played by the players, won by the players, and it's never more important than at this time of the year. So I thought our players did a great job of overcoming our seven point spot, we spotted Louisville seven points to start the game. I thought they did a real good job of gathering themselves, getting themselves back together, and then we played a really -- we did what we do for most of the game, until the end there. Louisville is a great team and Coach Walz and his staff do a great job. They have absolutely one of the best players in the country, and they have other players that are really, really good. There's a reason why they're a 3 seed, and they finished second in the Atlantic Coast Conference. So they made their run at us at the end of the game, and I was just proud of the players sitting next to me and the players in the locker room for being able to stand up to that charge at the end and do just enough to bring the game home and bring the, finish the game, in a great environment, but still a tough environment. So I'm just really happy for these players. THE MODERATOR: Questions? Q. For all of the athletes, you're down 7-0 early and Coach Bruno calls a timeout. What did he tell you during that timeout that caused you to turn around the game? MEGAN PODKOWA: We have been talking since last week about doing the little things and how this would be a really tough environment to play in. And as long as we did the little things we would win. So that first timeout he was telling us we weren't rebounding, we weren't defending and those were the little things that were going to help us win the game. JESSICA JANUARY: He told us to do the little things and just told us to calm down and relax and just play our game. CHANISE JENKINS: He definitely came -- brought us in and told us that we didn't rebound at all in those first seven points there, and we couldn't agree more. So we just figured that if we just get down, box out, rebound, and we'll be able to at least control their scoring, and then come back down and score offensively, and we were able to get on a roll from there. Q. Jessica, why do you think you were so effective? JESSICA JANUARY: I don't think it's ever about one player. It's all the credit is to my teammates that were getting me the ball. And just feeling comfortable and feeling like my teammates trust me to take shots, and I was able to knock them down. But on any given night, it could be either of these two or anyone on our team, so. Q. You did this seemingly impossible and stopped Hines-Allen for the final three quarters. You limited her to four points. What was working to frustrate her? MEGAN PODKOWA: I thought it was like a really good team effort when she got the ball in the post, our people digging and Jacqui Grant and Mart'e did a really good job of preventing her from catching the ball down the stretch. And then I think the guards stepping up, like Chanise took that charge at the end of the game, that was huge. I think they frustrated her a little bit with that and then foul trouble, too. Q. Jessica, what does it say about this team's half court offense that you guys can prevail late when you guys weren't really getting a lot of transition looks? How would you evaluate the half court offense at the end of the game? JESSICA JANUARY: I think we, obviously, have really good players. It doesn't matter who has the ball, we know how to make plays, and I think we spaced the floor, and we were trying to cut hard and let the offense take care of itself. Q. Chanise, this is your second trip as a Blue Demon to the Sweet 16. Different season, obviously. But what did you learn about the experience the first time that could be helpful going forward? CHANISE JENKINS: I learned that the team and I should really focus on staying together and focus on the little things that got us to this point. I think the first time we went to the Sweet 16, we were kind of all over the place and it wasn't really that great of a year for us. And I think learning from that experience will help us go forward in the tournament. THE MODERATOR: All right. Thank you. Take questions for coach. Q. What was your view on that final play, Myisha Hines-Allen goes in, what was the defense supposed to do and did they do it? COACH BRUNO: Well, going into the game, we knew that Louisville is susceptible to charging. So, it was part of the game plan, the entire game, for us to try to get in the lane and take some charges. We took a couple earlier in the game. At the end of the game there, I just really got Chanise Jenkins, is the player that was there. I didn't think it was even a close call. I thought she was there a long, long time and it's still a gutsy official that will call that call. So I'm just really impressed with what our players did to handle that situation, and I'm also impressed with the officiating that had the guts to make the call. And it shouldn't matter what time of the game it is, but you talk to officials and they will tell you, we're not going to make that call at that time of the game, the kids are going to decide. Well, taking a charge is deciding. Right, Sally? She's an officiating Hall of Famer. Q. How much of the foul trouble caused you to tweak rotations and kind of, it seemed like you were going between Jacqui Grant and stuff there at the end. Just whether you wanted to go big or small? COACH BRUNO: There's no doubt that we were scrambling for sure, because we lost two of our interior players in Jacqui Grant and Megan, they both picked up fouls. And we were scrambling the entire game. But yet it really -- we seemed to have a better offensive flow with only one of the post players on the floor anyway. So, it somewhat worked to our advantage. But at the same time, I don't want to go forward in this tournament with Megan Podkowa playing only 20 minutes, and I don't want to go forward in this tournament with Jacqui Grant and Megan Podkowa in foul trouble, so it's very important they keep themselves on the floor. And Jacqui did a really, really commendable job of battling Hines-Allen and that's all we asked her to do was battle her. We didn't tell her that she had to stop her, but we just told her that she had to battle her and that's a really good. Q. What progression have you noticed from Jessica in games, in this season in particular? COACH BRUNO: She said it best herself. She said, I was just comfortable, and I just think Jessica's gotten herself comfortable. It's experience as you get older and used to playing more and having more opportunities. I can't say enough about our entire team, but I go back to our schedule also. This was a murderer's row schedule. But there's nowhere we have been this year that's been -- in the hostility of the crowd today, which was great for women's basketball, we really like it and embrace it and appreciate what the people here at Louisville have done to have that crowd. But we have been through it at Texas A&M, we have been through it at Notre Dame, we have been through it at a lot of really hostile places this year. So I just thought the players were a little bit prepared by our schedule, and I just think that was really important. Q. Ashton had 12 points, shot a perfect 5-5 and grabbed four rebounds. Can you just talk about how important she was today, not only on the offensive but defensively too? COACH BRUNO: There was a time, you guys have followed us all year, where Coach Bruno here was moaning about what we were going to be able to get out of our bench. And yet, if you look at the last two games the bench has been absolutely huge. The bench was huge today. We outscored Louisville, our bench outscored Louisville's bench. And I didn't go very deep in the second half, those players of ours that were on the floor missed a couple shots down the stretch, probably because I didn't give them rest. But it's that kind of a game, it's that time of the year, so I was tight with the bench in the second half. But we don't win the game today without our bench. Elri gave us really nine minutes. And Tanita scores the ball, but she did some freshmen things, she did some things that she hasn't done. She really contested it. She made Durr miss a shot that only people like ourselves like coaches know this, in the first half. She went and actually blocked a shot and recovered a ball. She got a couple key rebounds. So Tanita Allen was really, really huge for us off the bench. And Mart'e Grays was great. Lauren Prochaska didn't play a lot, but she, it took Chanise a little while to get going here. She didn't have the best first half. She didn't have a vintage Chanise Jenkins first half. She got it going in the second half. So I think that Lauren Prochaska also helped us. I thought the bench was huge. Q. January just seemed to make a field day out of driving on the dribble drive and scoring inside. Is that something you picked up on in scout prior to this game or just her own effort? COACH BRUNO: What we're trying to do offensively is -- Matt asked a question about the running game. We love to run. If the run is not there, we have to have a half court offense. Our half court offense has a -- spacing of the floor only exists if people can make threes. So Louisville had to guard our three-point line. When you have to guard our three-point line, the three-point line isn't there just to make threes, it's there to try to create opportunities to get to the rim. Now that said, we got to the rim a lot, based on your question, we almost didn't get to the rim enough down the stretch of that basketball game. We almost didn't get to the rim -- they did a good job of closing off the ability to get to the rim at crunch time of this game and we were lucky enough to hang on and make some plays. We got some good shots, but they weren't at the rim down the stretch. Q. You mentioned the defensive approach a little bit before, but it seemed like clogging the lane and trying to swipe for steals this is something that -- you guys didn't really go to the press as much and trap at the half court like you do. Is that something that you've done to Louisville before and you just applied it to this game again? COACH BRUNO: This is programatic time for every team still playing. What that means is, simple basketball fundamental functioning that you've been doing all year long. So we played a lot of athletic teams. So we're constantly against people that are very athletic, trying to make athletic plays. And we tried to teach our players to use opponents athleticism against them. Fake a pass to make a pass. It's really important that, when you're playing against great athletes, that you just don't succumb to the simple quick throw. You use your eyes and let your eyes work for you. So these are principles we have been teaching since we had to go home and start over from scratch last year, when we didn't beat Notre Dame at Notre Dame on their home court. We won -- we were a lower seed and in the 9-8 game, Notre Dame beat us. Well, that all started not for Louisville the last couple days, it started last April. Is that a Jerry Garcia tie? It's a beautiful tie. That's a great looking tie. All right. Thanks everybody for covering women's hoops. I really do appreciate it and it's just nice to see seats starting to fill up and I just can't say enough about the Louisville program and all that they have done to make this tournament great. There's a lot of hard work that goes into this by a lot of people, so thanks to everybody here and now let's go to Dallas and Saint Bonaventure, we played earlier this season, early in the season and they got Oregon State and we'll be on the bus watching our opponents. All right. Thanks, everybody. THE MODERATOR: Thank you. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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