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PAC-12 WOMEN'S BASKETBALL TOURNAMENTMarch 7, 2019Adia BarnesAari McDonaldCate ReeseLas Vegas, Nevada Arizona - 76, USC - 48 COACH BARNES: Well, I'm really proud of our team today. We came out with a level of intensity that I expected from this team. I told them when we talked a lot before, we're playing our best basketball right now. That's not evident because we have the gauntlet the last four games of the regular season, you know, playing Stanford at Stanford, Cal, and then Oregon and Oregon State at home. But we were competing and we had chances to win those games. We're playing our best basketball. And we came out, and we always say punch first, and I think we did that. And we also know that USC is a very good team. They're coached very well. They have very good players, and we didn't overlook them by any means. We knew we had to play a good game to win, and I thought we played a good game for about 30 minutes today. Q. You guys just played Oregon last weekend; how much does that help in such a short turnaround time to have sort of a scouting report fresh in their minds versus a team you may have faced a month ago? COACH BARNES: I think it's an advantage for us because I think when you've beat a team just like us, when we beat SC a few weeks ago, it's hard to go and beat a team two times in a row. But we know Oregon is a very good team, and we felt we played 30 minutes of good basketball against them. We know they're coached very well. They have a lot of weapons. But we feel like we have some good weapons, too, so we're excited. And I think that we're in a situation where we're not afraid to be underdogs, and when you're the underdog, you have no pressure. So you can go out and just play your game, and whatever happens happens because no one expects you to win. I think that for us, there's no pressure, we can go out and have fun and just play basketball. For Oregon there's more pressure because they're supposed to win. And I think at this time of year anything can happen. So I think we're feeling good, we're confident, and we just have to go out and show what we can do tomorrow. Q. What was the message going into the tournament, coming off those four tough losses at the end of the season? COACH BARNES: So the message for us, I was proud -- I didn't know how we'd respond. Last four games, very tough. A lot of teams would have laid down and hung their heads and just been a little discouraged from the four losses, but I didn't feel that with this team. I felt like they knew we had chances to win, we could have won and we didn't. But I thought like they're confident to feel we can -- they feel like we can play with anybody. So I still didn't know how -- this is a lot of firsts. Aari hasn't been here in two years. Dominique, it's her first time in a Pac-12 Tournament. Tee Tee, it's her first time. So that's three of my starters and one hasn't been here for a while, they haven't been here. Cate has never been here. I didn't know how we would respond right away. We knew we had to play good basketball, we knew we had to punch first, and those were things we focused on. When I looked in their eyes, they were hungry, they were ready. Yesterday at practice they were feeling good. They couldn't miss. I thought this is a good sign or a bad sign you're either going to make them all or miss them. But I think we're playing our best basketball of the year. I think we feel like we can play with anybody, and they set the tone from the get-go, and I'm proud of them because the whole year they've been everything I've asked, they've played with their hearts, and they played a lot of minutes all year, and it just doesn't look like that today, and I'm proud of that. Q. You talk about Oregon and the wealth of weapons they have. Obviously Sabrina is one of them. What challenges does she present with her skill set? COACH BARNES: A lot. There's probably a list. But she's a very good player, one of the best guards in the country. You know, she scores in a lot of different ways. I think that what makes her special is it's not that she's the most athletic or the quickest, she's extremely smart, a very high basketball IQ, she can score in different ways. So she has a good mid-range game, a good three-point shot. She's an extremely good passer. So I think that makes a complete player. But we have a pretty good player next to me, so I think it's an exciting match-up. I'm excited for that challenge. I think that they have a lot of weapons, but so do we. But I think that we have to know that she's going to score, so we just have to make it difficult for her to score and make her score in different ways, and I think that -- what makes Oregon really special is they have four players that can shoot above 40 percent from the free-throw line, and they have a really good post player inside, so it's very difficult to double off of anybody because of their shooting ability. But I think we're really good in transition, so we have to do a lot of different things and just give it our best shot. We don't have any pressure. We have nothing to lose, so we're just going to go out and play basketball tomorrow. Q. What was the key defensively to you limiting them so much, players and Coach? COACH BARNES: Well, I think we just -- we've played aggressive defense all year long. The catalyst on defense for us is Aari and Tee Tee. She's a competitor. She's -- you can't teach quickness and you can't teach size. She has a little bit of quickness, so she's just a piranha on the ball. Tee Tee also sets that tone for us defensively. But I thought tonight Cate, Dominique, Destiny did a really good job on their post players. So I thought it was just a really good team effort. I think also in the zone a lot of times we tend to relax and get a little complacent when we play zone, but I thought tonight we did a pretty good job, and I think that's been our identity all year. We just knew that this year, in order to win games, we knew we had to play great defense because we had to find ways to manufacture offense. So if we were going to play a slow game, we didn't have the size, we didn't have the depth. So we knew we had to go out and get steals, be in the passing lane to get some offense, and I think that's been good for us. And I don't think USC has scored 48 points all year long. So that's a credit to our defense, and these two played some really good defense tonight, or today. Q. You kind of pooh-pooh'd your best game of the year. Is this not your most complete game of the year? COACH BARNES: I don't think it's our most complete game. I think we played good basketball, but I wouldn't say it's our most complete game because I thought the third quarter was bad. I think we played a really good first half. I think we came out and we were really intense, we were great defensively. We had some good offense. But I wouldn't say it's our best game. You can ask them. They can probably answer that better. Do you think it's our best game? AARI MCDONALD: I don't think it was our best game. I can say the intensity we had throughout the game, that probably was one of our best. But no, like she said, the third quarter, our defense was not that good. But we'll pick it up next game. CATE REESE: I think when we play Oregon we can't let up like that in that third quarter. It wasn't that great. And if it was a close game they would have gotten a lead or gotten a bigger lead. We had to be more focused and stop fouling so much because in the third quarter we kind of fouled a lot. But I think other than that we were pretty focused in the game and we were intense. COACH BARNES: I think one of the things we learned, so we've had a lot of learning lessons this year, and some of them have been tough. You know, we had a triple overtime game against UCLA, so we really learned the value of free throws at the end and boxing out, and then we had a tough game at Stanford within one shot. Our shot went in and out; could have won that game but didn't. So that was another learning lesson. Then we were up 20 at Cal, and we learned you can't relax and let teams make a run on you. I think all of those things are preparing us for now and they've made us better. When we played Oregon a couple weeks ago, we played 30 minutes of good basketball, and then 10 minutes you don't. But against a good team, a top team in the country, that 10 minutes can be 30 points. So we know tomorrow to win the game we need to play 40 minutes of really good basketball. But we're very capable, and I think our team is confident and feeling good. So I think they're ready for the challenge. I think it's going to be fun. Q. Coach, I noticed you're up by about 30 and you almost emptied your starters, but you left Sam out there for a little bit. Was that in regards to maybe playing in front of her hometown crowd? She went on a little bit of a run there for herself. How important was it for her to get out in front of her hometown crowd and get to play? I know they've seen her, but in a tournament game here in Vegas? COACH BARNES: I think really exciting because I'm sure a lot of people wanted her to stay here and play here at home. I honestly didn't think about that. I was just trying to not put everybody in at once and just get the experience and rest some people, and I was trying to let her get into a little bit of a rhythm. But I guarantee Sam didn't even think about that. I think when she's locked in a zone, she probably didn't even think about that. But I think she is excited. She had probably 30 people here at the game. But I think it's important for me to keep her confident and keep her ready because she's a very important part of what we do, and we need her to play really well against Oregon to win. So there was a combination. I think also if you look at our stats sheet, this is probably a season low for minutes for Aari. She has 32. That sounds like a lot, but she's usually playing like 38 minutes a game. Sam had 36, so that's probably two minutes less than she normally plays. Trying to find a way to also balance that, where we have the positions on the court, but then we can kind of rest a little bit, was important, just because we could potentially play four games in four days, and we don't have a tremendous amount of depth. Q. Aari, what did you take away from those first two games against Sabrina, and Maite Cazorla on the other end, too, just their backcourt that you can use tomorrow? AARI MCDONALD: We just can't let them get hot, because like Coach said, they shoot over 40 percent from three. So we just can't let them get hot. We know we like to facilitate, so we have to apply more ball pressure. But I'm excited for this match-up, and so are my teammates. They put on their shoes just like us, so we're ready. Q. Cate, a couple of hard fouls in that first half where they send you to the ground, but then you finished the half with a bucket inside, you hit the three, you blocked the shot right before the buzzer. After going through a stretch like that, how would you say you've kind of progressed with the physicality inside and just how people are generally going to play you from the start to this point of the season? CATE REESE: Sometimes I think it's kind of hard, and I've gotten used to being undersized, and like my coaches always say, doing your work early, trying to make sure they don't get the ball so I'm not put in the position to have to guard them one-on-one. I mean, I think I've grown a lot as a player. When I came in here, I couldn't play defense at all. So, I mean, I've definitely gotten better in that aspect -- COACH BARNES: Not all, but it's definitely improved. She was playing like high school defense. CATE REESE: We weren't taught defense in high school, so I don't think I played defense very well. They'll probably say that not in front of the camera. But I definitely think I've improved, and my teammates, they pick me up, they taught me a lot. I think I'd give it all to them from where I've gone, especially on defense. I'm ready for tomorrow, and I think my team is, too. Q. Aari, talk about Tee Tee's performance, shooting from the outside to soften up that defense to allow you to start penetrating? AARI MCDONALD: It was amazing. When Tee Tee hit a couple threes in the beginning, I'm like, okay, I kind of like where this is going, and she definitely took a lot of pressure off me today, and so did Cate and my other teammates. Like they're starting to contribute at the right time. But Tee Tee definitely had an efficient game today, and we need her to continue that for us to keep winning. COACH BARNES: I mean, Tee Tee, 5 for 7, 4 for 5 from the three, four rebounds, 14 points, five assists, zero turnovers. I mean, that's pretty amazing. And the thing about Tee Tee, she's not a shooter. She's just a competitor. She's a fierce competitor that is not afraid of anybody. She's the type you tell her you're going to guard Sabrina, she's like, Okay. Other people tell her, I'm guarding her, she's like, Okay. She's not afraid of anything. We always -- like as a team, you say she has that dog in her. She definitely has that in her, and she has that grit, and you can't teach that. She's not afraid, so she finds ways just to get the job done. And when we need her, she comes through, and she stepped into a different role. This is probably the most minutes Tee Tee has played in her college career, and the exciting thing for us is she's back another year. She had the choice this season to just have her senior year and be done because she's graduating this year, but she decided to come back, and despite her injuries, and she's a leader for us on and off the court, and we would not do a lot of things that we do without Tee Tee. So she's important, and she's played great. This last month she has changed. She's stepped into a role that has been amazing for us, and it's one of the reasons why we've been successful. Yeah, she's just played great. I think Tee Tee and Destiny were huge in the first half, especially to get us going. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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