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WOMEN'S NATIONAL INVITATION TOURNAMENTMarch 16, 2017Lisa BluderAlly DisterhoftMegan GustafsonIowa City, Iowa Iowa - 95, Missouri State - 74 LISA BLUDER: I really want to thank the crowd that came out tonight. Really appreciate their support in the WNIT and coming out and supporting us over Spring Break. Hopefully, they will all come back, plus more, on Saturday at 3 p.m. But, obviously, Ally becoming the all-time leading scorer here, that's a record that stood for about 35 years, that's an amazing accomplishment and quite fitting I thought that she tied it on a layup and then got the record off of a driving drive as well. Just really, really proud of her. To come in here and to accomplish something like that is amazing. Really happy that I got to be a part of it. Happy that all of us coaches just got to see this happen and be a part of it. But really happy for her. Another record that fell tonight? Megan set a single season rebounding record. And again, when you think of the players that have come here, the athletes that have come here, when you go back to that Final Four year, that is an amazing accomplishment. So I'm really happy for Megan. She had her 16th double double tonight. But overall, this was a really good team victory. I know there was some individual records set tonight, but what a great team victory. I loved our bench play tonight, I liked our paint play. Q. Ally, you got fouled on the record breaking shot. I thought I saw you take kind of an extra moment on the ground kneeling down when the crowd was going crazy. Kind of what's going through your head when you set the record? ALLY DISTERHOFT: Honestly, I just have to give it all up to the big man upstairs. But relief was probably the biggest emotion at that time. We haven't made it a focal point in our conversation within the team room or with the coaches, but it's definitely been a topic of conversation outside Carver. And Haley came up to me before the game in shoot around and said, Ally, just don't put too much pressure on yourself. And I think I just needed to hear that from her. To go out there, to obviously play aggressive, take the shots when they were there, but just continue to play team basketball. And it's hard not to get emotional because I've had so many people support me along the way, my coaches have been incredible, my teammates, my family. So, relief, but happy with that. Q. How tough is it not to look up at the score and foul chart and see okay I got 12 points to go, I got 10 points to go. ALLY DISTERHOFT: It was a little difficult, just because it's so big with all these renovations now. But like I said, I think I've always played my best basketball when I've taken the focus off myself and I think that that can be said for anyone on our team, because our style of basketball is you pass up a good shot for a great shot, you work to get your teammates involved. And like I said before, when you focus on the team, those individual successes will fall in line. Just like how Megan has gotten her rebounding record. She's never focused on herself, it's always, how can I help the team, and I try to do the same. Q. Coach told a story about being on a poster as a nine-year-old, but to be on that poster and to be the all-time career scoring leader, it almost like a Cinderella story, isn't it? ALLY DISTERHOFT: Yeah, it's a really cool story and I'm so appreciative and grateful for all of the opportunities that have been given along the way. Obviously, the hard work has gone into it, but a lot of kids work hard and they don't get these opportunities given to them and the coaches have believed in me since I was a freshman, they set me up to succeed out on the floor as well as off the floor. My teammates have done the same. So I'm just incredibly appreciative, grateful, thankful for all of the staff helping me get here, for sure. Q. Was it relief going through your head, too? LISA BLUDER: I was excited. I got a little emotional because I was so happy for Ally to get this record. But I think it shows that I can identify talent at eight years old. Q. Megan, your thought about your record tonight. MEGAN GUSTAFSON: I think that I love rebounding, that's something that I'm kind of meant to do here. I kind of think of it as whenever I get a rebound it's not my rebound, it's Iowa's rebound. So, again, like Ally said about her record, I would have to say the same thing, it's all my teammates that helped me throughout this time , and coaches have always believed in me in rebounding, so I'm really happy about it. Q. Ally, what did you think about the crowd reaction? It was clear that everybody knew what was at stake. ALLY DISTERHOFT: I know. I missed them a few times too. I knew it, because I would miss and they would go, "oh" and I was like, sorry, guys, we'll get the next one, I promise. But the crowd, our fan support in my four years here has been incredible. There's nothing like being an Iowa Hawkeye, running out of that tunnel, hearing the fans cheering you on. And their support over the fast four years has been incredible. So, really appreciative for them, grateful for tonight, hoping we can get something similar against South Dakota on Saturday. Q. How do you feel about having to come out and play again in a mere 42 hours? MEGAN GUSTAFSON: Ready to go. I think we're going to get some good night sleep, rest, and get ready to have a good practice tomorrow and some film, too. Q. Ally, does it feel like this pressure is now off you? Do you think now, okay, let's see what we can do the rest of the way? ALLY DISTERHOFT: Yeah, I think that it's always kind of been in the back of my mind that this was possible. And just because it's been in the conversation, like I said, outside of Carver, it has been weighing a little bit on me, I think, subconsciously. Even though, like I said, coaches, teammates have done a great job of taking that pressure off. But yeah, hopefully now we can just go out there and just compete really hard and try to make good things happen for the team. Q. Did you guys feel like you were a little bit rusty in the first quarter, that it was just sort of some early turnovers, because you haven't played a game for forever. ALLY DISTERHOFT: Yeah, I think that that's just sometimes how basketball goes. They go on some of their runs, we go on some of ours. We have been practicing really hard over the course of the past week and a half, two weeks, so can't really blame it on that, because we have really been getting after it in practice. But I think once you start getting into the flow of things a little bit more that you could really tell that. Q. Hannah had 10 points, just bam, bam, bam. Can you talk about that. LISA BLUDER: We just felt like we had an inside height advantage and talent advantage. I felt like we had both. And we needed to take advantage of it. It was one of our keys is to push the ball and get the ball inside. If you've never gone against Megan and Hannah, it's pretty tough in that first time it happens to you. Q. Following up on that, 15 points in the paint that's a pretty high number. LISA BLUDER: Yeah, and what I was happy about is when they went to zone we were still able to get it into the paint and that's where Hannah really got some of hers was against the zone. So that was nice to see. We talked to our team a lot about stressing a good shot from a not such a good shot. And tonight I think we set a WNIT record for field goal percentage in a game. We shot over 60 percent, I believe, from the field. And we had 23 assists too, so I thought that was really great team basketball. Q. Nice to see Christina out there. When did she kind of get back to game readiness? LISA BLUDER: She was completely -- she was healed of her concussion, but when you're out that long, you got to get your legs back. And it was nice to see her. I thought off of the bench we had a lot of really good performances off the bench. And we only played 21 minutes for Ally and for Mak. Those are our leading minutes, and that bodes well for Saturday, when you do have a quicker turn around. Q. Ally tied the record and there was a point where she came over and you two, you said something to her. Was that to do with the record or something completely opposite. LISA BLUDER: I said, do you want to get it tonight or do you want to get it on Saturday. And she said, tonight. And I said, okay, we're going to leave her in then. So we had a significant lead and I could have taken her out, definitely. I thought it might have been kind of fun to tie it today and break it on Saturday, but I think she just wanted it over with and so I was going to listen to what she said. Q. Why has it taken so long for someone to break that record that is a lot of points but... LISA BLUDER: It's a lot of points, yeah, you score over 2,000 points and it has to be the perfect storm. Like you have to come in and you really have to stay healthy and you have to start all four years in order to accomplish a goal like that. And not all the time does all that happen, right? And then you have to be pretty good scorer on top of it. So, Ally just, obviously, had a good opportunity, she stayed healthy, and she was a very good basketball player. Q. It's not out of the realm of possibility it could be broken in two years. LISA BLUDER: Yeah, that's the goal that's really what we would like to see happen is this, to Megan to add on to it and then somebody else add on to it after that. Q. Talk about the start of the second half. You had a 10-0 run, a couple 3s. How important was that? LISA BLUDER: Yeah, it was fun coming out of the locker room and we hit I think four straight shots, one 3 for sure in there. It was clicking. And it was, it felt good. Again, I just thought this was such a great team win and those are the fun wins, when everybody can contribute and feel good about their play. Q. Do you know anything about South Dakota? LISA BLUDER: Yeah, they are the defending WNIT champ, so that makes it kind of interesting, going against them in the second round. Obviously, they have been here before. They do have a new coach this year. But I know Dawn, she was an assistant at Michigan for awhile. She's done a great job. But Coach Jensen has the scout and she's watched three or four games on them already, so when I go upstairs we'll watch the game tonight and then prepare the scout for tomorrow and at 12:30 tomorrow we'll meet with our team and present it to them at that time. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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