BIG EAST CONFERENCE WOMEN'S BASKETBALL TOURNAMENT

March 5, 2022

Jim Flanery

Mohegan Sun Arena

Creighton Bluejays

Postgame Media Conference

Seton Hall - 66, Creighton - 65

THE MODERATOR: We're joined by Jim Flanery.

COACH FLANERY: The last two games with them have obviously been either/or games. And today we were on the short end of it. I thought when we had the lead, two or three minutes in, whatever it got up to, seven-ish, I thought we were in good shape. But we didn't stop them down the stretch.

We gave up -- Espinoza-Hunter got a couple open 3s. We left Park-Lane there. She hit a big 3. And we just over helped on that last play.

Credit to them they hung in there. I thought -- I could have helped our team down the stretch better than I did. I thought we didn't get into the kind of stuff that maybe would have been a little more effective.

Like I said, 50/50 game. Really similar to the last game we played them. So, super disappointed but still proud of our group and hopefully we see our name called in whatever it is, week and a half, little over a week.

Q. You could obviously talk about the final play, at the end of the game with you on offense. But defensively, Bembry hit the winning shot. But given the offensive arsenal Seton Hall has, where you have Park-Lane, Espinoza-Hunter and Cooks, you could say at the same time that you would rather have a player like Bembry rather than a player like an Espinoza-Hunter or a Park-Lane who is more of a legitimate closer in that scenario.

COACH FLANERY: Yes and no. The "no" would be she was six out of eight or five out of seven and hit the last shot to go six for eight. If she's 1-for-5, absolutely, 2-for-6, absolutely. But when a player plays as well as she did tonight -- we had Park-Lane swallowed up, we switched. Morgan Maly had her. She's down on the baseline and we just overhelped.

If she had a clear lane to the basket you can make that argument. But I think we had her swallowed up dead on the baseline.

But still a big shot by Bembry. She played really well. She was probably the X factor. She got off to a good start. And we usually try to give a little bit of help off of her on to Cooks. Bottom line we just didn't do a good enough job on those two that they had 16 field goals. But credit to her she had a stuff shot.

Q. How much trouble did Park-Lane, in particular, give you tonight, getting into the lane, finding seams and then opening up some easy looks for Bembry and others?

COACH FLANERY: I thought the first half we didn't do a good enough job. I thought we actually did a better job in the second half. We left her -- I don't know what happened on that miscommunication where she got the wide-open 3 there late that tied it.

But I thought we did a better job on her in the second half. She's tough. She plays with the ball and she gets you to lift your hips and then she's even with you or by you. And we talked about that. We played them three times. That's why she's a good player because she can still make those plays when you've seen her for a third time.

Q. When you got the seven-point lead, I think it was, you did that pretty much in the paint. And then the next three possessions you looked like you fired up really quick 3s, all of which missed.

COACH FLANERY: Yeah.

Q. Any explanation for why that happened or was it just the stress of really, a really close game?

COACH FLANERY: I think they're 20-, 20-year-olds. We're over there on the sidelines saying that was too quick. That was too quick. But we also live and die, to some degree, with the 3. We had 42 3s in a two-game stretch not too long ago. We're not going to tell most of our kids not to shoot an open 3.

But we needed to throw it inside better. They did a good job of helping off the kids they wanted help off of. They cross-matched a lot. They played Cooks on Saunders and Rembao. And Tatum hit a big 3. But they were going to beg those kids to shoot and play Cooks as kind of a paint protector. So it wasn't always easy to get the ball inside because of how they sat off of how Cooks, sat off whoever she was guarding.