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BIG EAST CONFERENCE WOMEN'S BASKETBALL TOURNAMENTMarch 6, 2018Carolyn KiegerAmani WilbornChicago, Illinois DePaul - 98, Marquette - 63. CAROLYN KIEGER: Congratulations to DePaul. They were phenomenal tonight in all areas, and we were obviously not. What a difference a year can make in terms of a game. Unfortunately, they gave the best effort and we didn't. But I still choose this team any day. We've got a lot to fix before selection Monday occurs. We just had a good meeting in the locker room, and we know that there's a lot of basketball left to be played. We're going to give our best effort, but I'll still take these girls no matter what. Q. So early the team has been doing a great job with three-point defense, but not tonight. What went wrong there? AMANI WILBORN: I think we didn't communicate well tonight. That was pretty much what it was. Q. How was it just with the quick calls and you getting a little too many fouls early on, how was that just with the calls and stuff like that? AMANI WILBORN: It was rough early, especially when we were taking punches at the time and we were trying to fight back. So just getting the fouls early I didn't really adjust how I should have. So, yeah, next time I'm going to try to adjust better to the rest of the time. Q. Despite today's outcome, as a leader for your team, how do you expect to get the ball moving for your team, because there is still a lot of ball left for your team? AMANI WILBORN: Yeah, just knowing that we've still got basically a whole other side of the season. Knowing that we've got to remember this to get better. So we're just going to progress after this loss. Q. Especially with the hot shooting in the second quarter, did you expect that they would start dropping off because shots are random or did you think you had to change something defensively to make a change happen? AMANI WILBORN: DePaul's one of the -- they space the floor and they're one of the better teams shooting in the nation from the three. Everybody on their team pretty much can shoot. So our communication, we should have taken care of that early and tried to get a hand up and not even let them get shots off, but of course they still got the shots off. Q. Was there any reason why Allazia, why she wasn't able to get going tonight? CAROLYN KIEGER: I'm not exactly sure, to be honest. That's a question we're going to have to figure out and figure out in a hurry, because like we said, we'll watch the film. I think she hit a couple shots early, but if I had to say, I think it's effort and confidence and we'll help her with that. Q. First of all, Natisha Hiedeman seemed to have a little more confidence at points in that game taking shots from three-point range. Are you seeing that she's starting to feel a little more confident in shooting the basketball right now? CAROLYN KIEGER: Yeah, the biggest thing with our team right now is consistency. Natisha needs to be more consistent and so does our entire team. Obviously we're going to try to address that. When our team is confident and when we're sharing the ball and making the right pass, we're really hard to guard. When we're not confident and we're passive, we get stagnant, the ball doesn't move, it gets stuck in one player's hand and obviously you'll get the results that happened tonight. I'm looking forward to getting back in the gym and fixing that. Q. When they were hitting back-to-back to back threes and they were on a run, was there a sense of panic did you feel with in the team? Was there something you had to do to slow it down or pull it back a little bit, because it seemed like they were a little bit scattered when that was happening? CAROLYN KIEGER: Yeah, obviously they were shooting lights out, but that's what DePaul does. So it's not a surprise. They can shoot like that on any given night. I think our players do a good job of responding, and then obviously it spiralled out of control. We've got to be tougher in those moments. I thought DePaul was extremely tough tonight in every way. I give a lot of credit to Doug and their players because they outtoughed us, they outhearted us, and obviously, clearly outshot us. Q. What about DePaul's offense and how they played at full-court, transitional offense? What makes that so tough to defend, especially tonight? CAROLYN KIEGER: They have five people on the floor that can hit a three at any given time. The way that happens and the way they space the floor and they cut and move, it's really hard to guard. I think Amani was very right, we didn't talk. When you don't talk and you don't communicate to each other, you're never going to be able to defend DePaul. They're just too good. So we talked about max effort in the locker room, we talked about communication, and those two things are the biggest things coming away from this game that we've got to fix. Q. You eventually finished with 20 fast breakpoints, but it seemed like transition was also an area where you just weren't getting those opportunities. What did DePaul do to limit those chances? CAROLYN KIEGER: I think they did a really good job of gapping. Not denying that they were taking away our dribble attacks. When that happened, we didn't have a second option or third option. So I credit they're packing the paint and just getting out of the passing lanes. Q. Talk about Amarah Coleman's performance tonight on both sides. Especially the turnovers forced late in the second quarter? CAROLYN KIEGER: She's phenomenal. She played like an All-American tonight no question. I actually thought when we played them last time in DePaul, she was lethal in that game as well. She's hard to guard. She's got a high release. She can score off the bounce. So she played phenomenal. She was hot. She had it going. She was hitting with shots in her face, somebody in her face, without, she played like she wanted to win tonight. Q. I know you can't, but if you were to play that game over again and you were to play a team like DePaul in the NCAA Tournament, what would you do defensively to make it a different outcome? CAROLYN KIEGER: I mean, exactly go back to the basics. It's nothing. We didn't have help side. We didn't have communication. Probably send a couple more people back in transition. I thought that killed us. They were shooting threes. They were getting lay-ups. You know, just being more mentally aware and trying to change up our defenses more than we were able to tonight. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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