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NCAA WOMEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP: FINAL FOUR

March 27, 2018

Geno Auriemma

Columbus, Ohio

THE MODERATOR: Good afternoon, and welcome to today's women's Final Four head coach media teleconference. For the next several minutes you'll have the opportunity to visit with the head coach of the UConn Huskies, Geno Auriemma. UConn will be playing in its record 11th straight women's Final Four in 2018, and be playing for a record 12th National Championship. At this time I'll ask Geno for some opening remarks and take your questions. Geno, I'll turn it over to you.

GENO AURIEMMA: Thank you, Rick. Well, it's been kind of a whirlwind for all four of us coaches, I'm sure. But this is the day that all the players, all the coaches, when the season starts, this is what you're trying to do. You're trying to put yourself in position to win a National Championship, and to go to the Final Four is the step that you need to take.

We're very fortunate that we've had an opportunity to do this. I think the field is maybe the strongest I've seen in a long, long time, maybe ever. And the fans are in for a treat. I don't know if the coaches are, but certainly the fans are in for a treat.

We're pretty excited to get going and that's about it. That's about it.

Q. Aside from maybe changing the business attire from maybe a little bit more formal to casual formal, Coach Walz, what's helped him transform that program in such a relatively short amount of time?
GENO AURIEMMA: Wow, he's been there a long time. I don't know if it's a short amount of time. It seems like he's been there forever, from our days in the Big East. It kind of took off right away. It didn't take very long. We played them in the Final Four when he had Angel and that crew. Then we played them again.

So he's certainly set himself apart from a lot of other college coaches and has done a remarkable job there. The record speaks for itself. The accomplishments speak for themselves, the attendance change, everything. He's one of the best coaches that we have in the game. I don't think any of us in the business are surprised that he is where he is, and I would expect them to be a factor on a regular basis.

Q. What makes him so special?
GENO AURIEMMA: Angel McCoughtry, Asia Durr, you want me to keep going? It's the same thing that makes the rest of us able to do what we do. He has the ability to recruit good players, good people to come into Louisville. He coaches the hell out of them. He demands a lot from them. They play in a way that's enviable. I think a lot of young coaches should watch how hard they play and the intensity level that they play at.

They're not easy to play against because they do a lot of different things. He's just a really good basketball coach. You put a really good basketball coach with really good players, and you've got something going.

Q. You've had the same four people together as coaches now for, I think, nine years. What is the value to you of that continuity? And what conversations do you have with Shea and Marisa about their future aspirations and what role you feel you can play in that?
GENO AURIEMMA: Well, I agree 100%. There's a lot to be said for having a coaching staff that's been together where everybody understands what the expectations are, everybody's comfortable working together. That's not to say that it's a piece of cake every day. But I think the players and everyone else benefits from that kind of continuity. We had a lot of continuity before Shea and Marisa came. C.D. and I have been the two constants.

As far as their future, I think every coach has their own idea of what the future is. You could say that most coaches that are assistant coaches want to be head coaches some day, but not all of them do. Some want to be head coaches earlier than others, sooner than others. Others are more patient. Everybody is on their own timetable as far as I know.

We talk a lot about what's in store, what is the future and when is an opportunity -- the right opportunity, because certainly they are presented with opportunities on a regular basis. I'm one to encourage when the right opportunity comes along to go. Sometimes I might say go and they say no. And sometimes I might say I think you should stay, and I've had coaches go, nope, it's time to go. So I think each coach is following their own path.

Q. You've had the better of the rivalry by a lot with Notre Dame, but it is still a great rivalry in terms of some of the great players and great games you guys have had. Can you kind of put that in perspective what that rivalry meant to you and what you think it's meant to women's basketball, especially over the last several years as you guys have had so much Final Four success and appearances?
GENO AURIEMMA: Well, I remember when Notre Dame first joined the old Big East. We kind of felt like it's just a matter of time, you know? It didn't take all that long, but from the time in 2001 where we lost to them in the Final Four to today, I mean they certainly had their moments where they haven't been Final Four contenders.

But that's been, I would say, in the last 10, 11, 12 years. That's been rare. So when we play Notre Dame during the regular season now, it always seems to be a match-up between Top 5 teams in the country. And they have a slew of All-Americans on their team, and so do we.

As you know, they've got a passionate fan base and so do we, so it makes for great rivalry. Rivalries start going in ebbs and flows. We beat them a lot for a long time. They won a National Championship in 2001. Then we kind of had our way for a long time, and then they kind of had their way for a couple of years, three or four years it might have been, when Skylar was there.

It's been because of the magnitude of the games, the regular season, and then because we've played so many times in the Final Four that the games take on a huge significance every time we play. That's what rivalries do. That's how they're born, and that's how they are sustained.

Q. Geno, I have a similar question, I was going to ask about the rivalry and you talked about what it meant to you. How do your players respond to it on a little bit bigger of a stage, much bigger stage being in the Final Four, but do they embrace it? Do they like playing, like you said, those really big games in particular?
GENO AURIEMMA: Well, I think if you -- when you come out of high school and you choose to go to Notre Dame or Connecticut, you're saying I want to play in big games. You're making that decision. I want to play in big games. I want to play on the big stage.

We recruit a lot of the same players, so we've got players that they've recruited. We've got players that we've recruited. I'm sure they stay in touch, and they're friends. Everybody knows everybody anymore in college basketball.

So there is tremendous anticipation when we play them. I'm sure there is from our end, and certainly I'm sure there is on their end. That's what the players want. That's what our players want.

It was difficult when we were in our other league, in the same league together, because we would end up playing each other four times some years, and that's not always good. So now that we're not in the same league, it doesn't seem as intense, but it's still there, believe me. It's there, and it will come out Friday night. That rivalry will come out Friday night.

It's because there is so much mutual respect, I think, off the court. The coaches and the respect we all have for each other, the rivalry is a healthy one. It's a good one.

Q. I was talking earlier with Vic and Jeff, and I was asking about the identity of the teams and that led to an interesting discussion about both saying what's most important is how you play the game. I'm curious, I know it's kind of been a man that of yours. What does mean to you? How do you define that? Is it playing it the right way? What is the core of that?
GENO AURIEMMA: I always get a kick out of that because I hear people say that quite a bit. Hey, Connecticut, or like you just said, Louisville or Mississippi State or Notre Dame, whoever say, wow, their program, they play basketball the right way. I'm thinking, well, how many coaches know that they're playing basketball the wrong way? You know? I don't know that there's a right way and a wrong way to play.

I think every coach makes a decision that this is the way that I see the game. This is how I see the game being played. This is what's comfortable for me. This is what I believe in. This is what I know, and this is what I'm going to teach my team.

If you're winning, then, you know what? They play the game the right way. If you're losing and everybody feels sorry for you, you know, they play the right way, but they're just not very talented. And if you're winning, everything's great. Everybody admires you. Everybody admires what you do. I see it all the time. As soon as somebody's winning, they become a way better coach than they were when they weren't winning as much.

So I think if you asked the coaches in the Final Four and they were honest, you would say what is the secret to your success? Well, we all have really, really, really good players. And anybody who says they don't, is lying. For all those people that say, well, Connecticut gets all the best players, so it's not fair.

Well, last time I checked none of our four schools would be at the Final Four if we didn't have great players and lots of them.

So we're fortunate, all four of us, to coach really good players. When you have really good players, you can get a lot of things accomplished that maybe other coaches can't get accomplished. So it looks like we're doing things the right way.

Now, don't get me wrong, there are some teams you watch and you just go what do they do at practice? Because it just doesn't look good. And when you watch our four teams play, even though we have, I think, somewhat different styles, you can tell it just works. That's why we're all going to be in Columbus.

Q. As a follow-up, I guess part of this is if you're winning by 30 points, 40 points, human nature would be kids cruise, whatever. Maybe that's where how you play the game matters is score becomes secondary to execution or whatever. Maybe that's part of this too?
GENO AURIEMMA: Right, right, yeah. Yeah. I've never believed that the final score is going to be indicative of how you played. To me that's never the issue. To me the issue is are you getting the most out of the kids that you're coaching? Are your kids able to respond to what you're coaching them to do, and do they compete? I appreciate when people say that about our team.

Hey, if you play against Connecticut, they compete, and they compete every possession. That's a great compliment to our players.

Q. Just wondering, I was talking to Vic Schaefer earlier today, and he was talking about how difficult it is to make it to back-to-back Final Fours and just the target on your back and everything like that. Obviously you guys have now made it to 11 straight Final Fours and just wondering how you've been able to handle that, the pressure, the target, whatever you want to call it. Why UConn has been so successful and the kind of sustained success?
GENO AURIEMMA: Yeah, that's kind of what we have to deal with every day. I think you have to try really, really hard to recruit the kind of players that are ultra competitive, that are not satisfied with just being really good, that they want to be great, and that they want to be coached really, really hard. They want to -- they want to be part of something really special.

You come to Connecticut, and you look up on those walls when you come to our practice facility, and you look around and you go, all right, well, I'm going to be here four years. Well, what in God's name can I accomplish that hasn't already been done?

If you're in awe by that, or you're intimidated by that, then you're not going to be successful here and we're not going to be successful.

So we have a hard time recruiting those kinds of kids because there's not a lot of them around. We've managed to -- our staff has managed to get those kids year in and year out. It's not easy. You know, people talk about this and that and yeah, you win by this many, and you're bad for basketball and all that. That's the biggest bunch of crap I've ever heard, you know? There's a lot of really, really good teams out there, and there's more good teams than there ever have been.

It is harder to get to the Final Four than it used to be. South Carolina just found that out this year, like we did in 1991. Then we found out again in 1995. It's not as easy as people think. When your fan base and your players all come to expect -- it's like a right of passage that you go to Connecticut, you go to the Final Four, I mean, that's the most dangerous way to think ever.

We have to fight every day, everybody, the expectations. Even though we know they're there and even though we've created them, it's -- if Vic thinks this is hard, wait till he sees what it's like the next three years.

Q. Following up on that, have you ever thought about getting a target tattoo put on your back (laughing) ?
GENO AURIEMMA: Yeah, yeah (laughing). The two things I've thought about getting, a target tattoo on my back and a sign saying don't ask me why I don't coach men's basketball. If I could do away with a couple of those, I'd be a happy camper.

Q. Just the continuum of it, when you were growing up, you and I are exactly the same age, we have exactly the same birthday. So I was going to ask you this: When you were growing up, who was that team -- I'm not talking about Tennessee later in coaching, but who was that great dynasty team that you looked at and wondered how do they do that?
GENO AURIEMMA: UCLA. UCLA.

Q. What stood out about UCLA in your mind then? Go ahead. I'm sorry.
GENO AURIEMMA: Obviously I was at an age where I could appreciate everything they were doing, because you were just captivated by them, everything about them. You know, the way they played, the uniforms they wore, the way they looked on the court, their unbelievable accomplishments, the air about them. You could feel it across the TV set.

I remember my buddies and I would talk all the time about which would you rather do? Would you rather go to a Division-I school and play 30 minutes a game and probably never play in the Final Four? Or would you rather go to UCLA and know you're probably going to win a National Championship, or come close, but you might not play as much? And that was always an interesting point of conversation with guys.

I always thought what in God's name must it be like to be in that program every single day? I'm sure the New York Yankees were like that. I'm sure the Boston Celtics were like that. I'm sure that the Montreal Canadiens were like that. So there's been a lot of examples of that stuff.

But for me, it was UCLA.

Q. And the answer -- in the answer to that question, what is it like to be in that seat?
GENO AURIEMMA: Well, now I know why John Wooden retired at still a young age because it's, in some ways, it's exhausting. It really is.

Listen, as I'm saying this I'm going, man, you know, it's going to be 5,000 coaches at the Final Four this week, and they're going to read it and say, "Yeah, I wish I had your problems." I get that. But I tell you what, you wish you had my problems for like one year. You don't want to be in this position for 25 years because it's -- it takes a lot. It takes an unbelievable staff. It takes knowing that you have to get a certain kind of player every year.

Believe me, after all these years, I'm still amazed that it turns out the way it does. So the hardest part about being in this seat is trying to convince yourself that, hey, it's okay if you don't win a National Championship.

Now it bothers you if you don't, but I keep repeating what my mother said last year. "It's okay if you lose. You don't have to win all the time. You win too much. That's why people hate you" (laughing). So I try to keep that in mind every once in a while.

Q. Follow up on that, just real quick, this team in particular, if you look at just your season, I would think a moment of truth was at Texas when there was a huge crowd there, biggest crowd they'd had in 10, 15, 20 years, everybody's out to get you. It's a close game, and Crystal Dangerfield hit those two free throws near the end to put you guys back up comfortably. But was that the moment of truth for this team from the standpoint of facing a challenge? Samuelson gets a black eye or swollen eye coming out of it and stepping up? If you understand what I'm saying, does that game stand out to you -- I don't know if turning point is the right word -- maybe the apex or the corner?
GENO AURIEMMA: I think it was certainly one of them. Yeah, I think it was certainly one of them. Again, the environment, the quality of the team we were playing against. We struggled a lot of the game. But as I'm sitting on the bench a lot of those times I'm saying what is the worst thing that comes out of this game if we don't win? We go home and we've got another game to play, and we're actually better off for it because we'll have a pretty good understanding that, hey, during that situation, this didn't work.

So I always want to win, and I'm glad we pulled it out. But I think the bigger moment, to be honest with you, even though it wasn't on the road, was the fourth quarter. The whole second half, but mostly the fourth quarter in the Notre Dame game. Gabby was on the bench the whole second half, and Lou was on the bench most of the fourth quarter. And we had some guys step up and make some huge plays to beat a really, really good team, a great team, actually.

So I think that day I wonder if we had been on the road, would we have lost that game? I don't know. But we were at home, and we needed some players to make some huge plays that don't necessarily make those plays. That made me think, okay, we have some other things going for us other than just the players that everybody says are the best players.

Q. You mentioned that this was one of the strongest fields in a long time. I was wondering, when you have four one seeds, four teams with six losses combined, I know it's going to be harder to play these teams, but in some ways is it easier to prepare your team during the week knowing that you have to be that locked in?
GENO AURIEMMA: Yes and no, yeah. Yes and no. It is easier because you know you're playing a great team, and you better be ready. There better not be any stones left unturned. Every kid better be on their best behavior. And whatever they've been doing all year long, they better do it that well and better. So, yeah.

The harder part is you can do all that and still get your ass beat. And knowing that, it's kind of like, oh, my gosh, we could do everything right this week. We could prepare. We could do everything. We had everything taken care of, every contingency, we've got everything. We're ready to go, and then go out and still get smacked.

So that, you know, there are some other years where you go, okay, look, if we do A, B, C and D, there is no way we can lose. Well, that's not happening this week.

Q. Just as a quick follow-up, of all the Final Fours you've been to, one where you kind of learned that lesson about the harder part that you just mentioned?
GENO AURIEMMA: Well, I think there was -- there's been a couple times, actually. It's funny because it did involve Notre Dame both times, that I can remember. The one in 2001 where we were missing two first-team All Americans. We were missing Shea Ralph and Svetlana Abrosimova. And we went out there and we're up like 13, 14, 15 in the first half. It's like, yeah, we've got this. Then they came back and beat us, and beat us good.

So that kind of reminded me, hey, you don't have this. You don't have anything until the buzzer goes off. That's number one.

And then one other incident happened. We played Tennessee one year in the Final Four in Charlotte, and the game went into overtime and we lost, and we said, hey, you can do everything right, and we did. We did everything right that night. I wouldn't take anything back that we did. Our guys played as well as they're capable of playing, every one of them, and they beat us.

So, believe me, everybody remembers the 11 National Championships. I remember all the other stuff.

Q. My question is sort of along the lines of a previous question, so I guess building off of that, you previously mentioned that this was one of the toughest fields out there of course you have four No. 1 seeds facing off against each other, Louisville of course facing Notre Dame. I don't know why I'm drawing a blank. I was just looking at the other teams coming out of the other region?
GENO AURIEMMA: Mississippi State, Notre Dame, and Louisville.

Q. Thank you for reminding me. You see a lot of brackets being busted for the men's basketball team where you have an 11 seed and a 3 seed. How do you think having four No. 1 seeds really affects not only the level of competition for your team, but also the viewership experience? Do you think really the team is really more excited about facing this high level of competition?
GENO AURIEMMA: Well, two years ago we went to the Final Four, and we were the only No. 1 seed. Then three teams, according to the experts, came out of nowhere. So it's starting to happen.

This just happens to be one of those years where the committee got the No. 1 seeds exactly right, and those guys played exceptional basketball. Some of the upsets happened along the way, but not enough to derail the number ones.

As far as the fan viewership, you're getting a chance to watch the best teams. Again, some people are going to agree and some people aren't. I was watching Nevada, I think it might have been Nevada and was it Loyola?

Q. Loyola Chicago?
GENO AURIEMMA: Yeah, so you're watching teams that upset other people. Then you're watching Kansas state play Loyola, and people are saying, wow, you know there's a lot better teams out there and that's what people want to watch. You can't have it both ways. You can't have the excitements of the upsets and the excitement of Cinderella and then say we only want the best teams.

So this just happens to be one of those years where the four No. 1s, the four best teams in America are playing for a National Championship.

From a fan standpoint, I think it's tremendous because there is a pretty good chance that every single game is going to be competitive, ultra competitive. To me, how exciting is that?

I talked to one of my players this morning, and I said, how you doing? She said, I'm excited. I said how excited? She said this is the most excited I've been. She's been to a bunch of Final Fours and won a National Championship. So this is a big deal to all the players.

Q. Coach, this is your 11th straight Final Four. Would you see your team as maybe each year being different where after winning a National Championship or losing a Final Four you look at it as a clean slate moving on to the next year? Or do you view it as sort of a cohesive unit where going from year to year you're taking a lot of lessons that you've learned from the previous year and sort of building off of them as you try to create another team with players leaving and more players coming in? Would you consider it more of a process that sort of bridges gaps between teams over years? Or do you look at each year as sort of a clean slate?
GENO AURIEMMA: No, we start every year brand-new. I really don't care too much about what happened in the past. I know other coaches have a philosophy, maybe, but we're not one for slogans and rallying cries and redemption tours or any of that other nonsense.

What happened last year, happened last year. Whether we win the whole thing or whether we lose, that's insignificant to what's going to happen this year.

I don't hold on to losses going forward, and I don't carry wins around with me saying, well, we won in the past. We should win even more this year.

So every year for us is a brand-new team. I don't care if we have everybody back. It's a brand-new team, a brand-new start. We've got a lot to prove.

Q. I remember in last year's Final Four when Morgan hit that shot, you had a smile on your face, and you later said that everything happens for a reason, and something along the lines of course that shot would go in. What else were you thinking in that moment? Why was that your reaction?
GENO AURIEMMA: Well, one, I've always known this, and it's common sense. The more you keep winning, the closer you're getting to your next loss, because you can't win forever. So for anybody to think that we're going to win four National Championships in a row and then five and then six, and then seven, it's ridiculous. For anyone to think that we're going to win 300 games in a row, that's nonsense.

So the way that game was played out -- and we botched that last possession that we had. We did a terrible job coming out of that timeout coaching-wise, playing-wise, everything. And they come down, you just know. You've seen too many games, and the law of probability, you know, this shot's going in.

Then when it went in, all I could do was smile and go, of course. How could it end any other way? It's time. It was time. And that just happened to be the time. That was the moment. That was the kid. That was the shot. We've won enough for me to understand there is another side to this.

So that whole time, as soon as it was over, yeah, I get this. I know exactly what happened and why. Let's move on.

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