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NCAA WOMEN'S LACROSSE CHAMPIONSHIPMay 26, 2017Kenzie KentZoe OchoaAcacia WalkerKate WeeksBoston, Massachusetts Boston College - 16, Navy - 15 Q. What was the message at halftime because things obviously took a turn for the better? KATE WEEKS: Yeah, so basically Acacia was not the happiest with our performance and neither were we. Our team is really good at handling the adversity of kind of the first half, and we broke up into our sections, being defense and offense, and kind of went over like basically our three strengths, like what got us here, and to get back to that because we weren't being good shooters on offense. What made us good shooters; shooting is what got us here, our ball movement, everything like that, kind of focused on our unit, not so much inspirational because that was already there. It was more technical stuff. KENZIE KENT: I mean, I think we just tried to go back to what got us here, so like she said, shooting, ball movement, and just heart to win, and I think that's what we did. Q. Kenzie, you have experience in the Frozen Four; do you think that helped you in the Final Four for women's lacrosse? Do you think that championship experience meant something? KENZIE KENT: Yeah, definitely. One thing that my hockey coach told us the past three years was to not get too high but don't get too low, so stay in the middle. And that's what Acacia actually said at half time, too. Q. Kate, it seems like the team has always been kind of -- not necessarily so much better but gets stronger in the second half over the course of a whole season. What's kind of the main reason for that? KATE WEEKS: Well, it's something that we understand happens to us a lot, and you can either crumble for it or you can own it and do everything you can to fix it. If we're having a first half like that where it's like, okay, is this a game again we're going to be a second half team, we're just going to own it and get fired up from it, and come out in the first five minutes and just kind of destroy the draw and get as many goals as we can, and basically not feel like we don't get really insecure from it because it's sometimes just part of who we are. Q. Zoe, that first half, things were kind of coming fast and heavy at you. There was a lot of shots, a lot of offense, Navy out-shot you guys almost double, same with draw controls. Just what's kind of going through your mind as you're being forced to stand tall time and time again and really kind of answer the bell what Navy was bringing? ZOE OCHOA: I think the biggest thing on defense is just kind of taking it one play at a time and every time the ball comes down, it's regroup. It's a new 90 seconds on the shot clock. We all have to do our jobs and just hope that everyone trusts each other, we make the stop. If not, it's a goal, shake it off, figure out what we did wrong, move on to the next one. It's kind of not how many shots you see, how many offensive possessions they have, just kind of taking them one at a time, just staying focused in the moment and not thinking about the last one or the next one. Q. Just curious what message did the Patriots have for you guys? I know Belichick has been around here. Did they say anything to you guys? ACACIA WALKER: Exactly what you would think: Do your job, don't be afraid, let the leaders lead, and let everybody else step up. He said something that stuck with me, that you don't have to have experience in this moment to make it work. He talked about Tom Brady winning Super Bowl in his second year, Lawrence Taylor leading the Giants to the Playoffs his second year. We have no experience here, but I think what we took home from that message is you don't have to have experience, you just have to do your job and do what got you there. Q. Zoe, it's an interesting position obviously playing goalie, and more interesting when you see two goalies split time. And it doesn't always work for teams; however, it's been successful for you guys, especially here in this run. How does that work for you two, and what's the dynamic like between you two? ZOE OCHOA: It's really good actually. We both are very different goalies, so every practice we can learn so much from each other. And, like she's a lefty, I'm a righty. She plays differently, I play differently. So we can kind of go back and forth. And I can see what Lauren is doing and be like, oh, that works when that happens, I should try that. We're watching the same shooters. We can scout people together. We kind of like are a team. Rather than going out there alone in the crease every day, it's kind of nice to have someone to fall back on and have support constantly. It's really nice. Q. Kate, just go back a minute or two to what you were talking about with some first-half struggles this season. If you can look forward to Maryland on Sunday, how important do you think it'll be to not have perhaps a slow first half against them? KATE WEEKS: Obviously it's huge. I give a lot of respect to Maryland. They're a phenomenal team and program with great coaches. And to be honest, we respect every opponent we go against, but nothing fazes our team that much. We stay extremely grounded, and I think that even though we maybe didn't have the greatest first half, it's something that we have fixed. And by the end of our season, none of us are really worried about that because we know that we had a bad first half this game, and it's something that we have been working on, and it won't happen again. Like I said, nothing fazes us. We're very confident going in against Maryland, you know. Q. What did you find there in the second half at the beginning? It seemed like you put Weeks kind of goal line extended facing the field, and she had three assists. It looked like you found something that was working there. ACACIA WALKER: Yeah, we just made a slight adjustment. They were doing a really good job of covering her in the center. She's a really -- she's a threat off ball. So we've just been practicing sort of an inverted version of our motion where we put Kenzie or Sam inside to sort of separate the gaps of the zone, and then just put Kate in a position to be able to feed. Luckily they're multidimensional, and that allows us to be able to make an adjustment like that, and it wound up working. It helped us against Syracuse, it helped us against USC because I think towards the end of the season you can be a little bit predictable. So we just tried to make some adjustments so that that wouldn't happen. Q. Navy came out with nine goals in the first half, and then the BC defense held them to 15. Would you say that that's a product of switching the goalie or a change in strategy, or do you think the team just played better overall? ACACIA WALKER: Maybe a little bit of all of it really. We knew coming in that we were going to have to make defensive adjustments because we were prepared for them to have some of our defensive tendencies scouted. As expected, Cindy knew where to plug right in and who to attack and where to attack, but luckily we made a couple of adjustments. The goalie thing helps us every game. But also I think the girls just sort of felt the moment at halftime, and we just recalibrated and came out, and the whole team just played a little bit better. We were being out-hustled. We can't have that happen. Q. Your team scored your first seven shots in the second half. Did you see something out of the locker room or did you tell your team to look for something or just they happened to fall? ACACIA WALKER: No, we were shooting horribly in the first half, and shooting has been our thing all year. I just told them, they're just turning and shooting, they weren't actually turning and looking. At this level you can't just throw a simple fake in. You have to have two or three fakes that allow you a little bit of extra time to see where the goalie is stepping and where to shoot. In the first half we weren't doing that, and you know, she lit us up, as expected. But they just made some adjustments and just -- we just mapped out what we needed to do at halftime, and they did it. Q. THE championship game is going to be pretty interesting for you being a native Marylander and playing your alma mater. How special is it going to be that it's against Maryland? And not only that but now you're kind of an adopted Bostonian playing on the home turf; what's all that mean to you? ACACIA WALKER: I don't know yet. It means everything. I'm just excited for the girls. I don't really think about it having anything to do with me really. I'm grateful to be there and to be coaching against Cathy, but these girls, they've earned it. It's their opportunity. So really they're in their backyard. I'm just going to try and do a little bit of scouting in the next couple of days and hope that my girls can put together more of a 60-minute game. It's special, though, definitely special. Q. This run has been historic for you guys, although it's not done yet, a big one coming up this weekend, obviously. Just what have you noticed in the girls to kind of stay grounded? I know that's a phrase that they use a lot, but what is it tangibly, do you think, that actually leads to that? Because it's one thing to say it, but it's another thing to put it into practice. ACACIA WALKER: Yeah, I've said this, I don't know if it really makes sense, but I'll say it again. I think the reason they're able to stay grounded is they're very smart kids. They're very smart people. So I think they almost know better than to get caught up with the bright lights and the noises and the distractions. But I really do think -- again, I don't know if that makes sense. They're really smart. I would say like when I was in this moment I was super jacked up and getting distracted by this and that, but these girls are really smart, they know better. We've also practiced, we visualize and meditate all the time. We practice this moment and being in this moment, and yeah, we hold them pretty accountable. When I see them staring off or if I feel like they're drifting off or thinking about something that's not right, we get right on them as quickly as we can. I think a part of them are afraid to, but also they're just really smart kids. Q. Talk a little bit about the fan support that you had out. I know everybody was wearing those bright neon green tee shirts in the stands. What did that mean for the girls, and what are you hoping for more of that on Sunday? ACACIA WALKER: I think I was kind of tired of trying to keep them grounded as I knew that the crowd would be louder than anything they've ever heard, and I knew if they were able to look up in the stands and see their families, I think that would help them keep two feet on the ground, which is the point of the whole thing. It wasn't really to be obnoxious, it was so that the girls could look up and see their families, which, you know, this group of girls, they do, they play for their parents and their siblings, so I wanted that to inspire them throughout the game. Q. Just looking forward to Sunday, what are a couple things that at this point right now coming off this game and coming off what you've seen from Maryland that you know you need to do well to win Sunday? ACACIA WALKER: We have to have a strong start. We have to have a good first half. What I know best about Maryland is they'll eat you alive if you have five minutes off, and you can't, so we're going to have to figure out how to recover our bodies and prepare our minds and get strapped on because we can't take time off the way that we did tonight. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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