NCAA WOMEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP: SECOND ROUND - CREIGHTON VS IOWA

March 19, 2022

Jim Flanery

Emma Ronsiek

Lauren Jensen

Creighton Bluejays

Media Conference

Q. When you saw the crowd yesterday and then found out you were going to be playing an ABC, what were some of the things going through your mind as you realized this is going to be quite a significant viewing audience tomorrow both in person and on TV?

EMMA RONSIEK: For me, I'm really excited to play on this, and I think all my teammates can say the same. We're really excited to play in front of a crowd, even though it's going to be a little skewed towards Iowa, I think, because it's a home-court advantage for them. But nonetheless I think we're all really still excited about just being able to play in front of this kind of stage because this is what March Madness is, just playing front of a crowd like this, so I'm really excited.

LAUREN JENSEN: Yeah, just echoing everything Emma said, it's obviously going to be a really fun game with that crowd and ABC at noon. So it's going to be fun. Like Emma said, this is what March Madness is about, so I'm definitely excited, and I know the whole team is, as well.

Q. Looking back at your scrimmage in October, whenever it was, do you think you guys and Iowa have both changed in any way, and if so, what?

LAUREN JENSEN: I think we have. You know, obviously that was the end of October and now it's March, so we've obviously progressed and grown in different ways, but we're also the same in a lot of senses, and so they've gotten better, we've gotten better, and so yeah, I think that there's a difference in that.

EMMA RONSIEK: Yeah, I agree with Lauren. Every team I think can say that they've gotten better from October to now, and it's just about every day getting better, progressing with each other, and for us, I think we've gotten better every day, and I'm assuming Iowa can say the same about themselves. I think it's just going to be a total different ball game tomorrow as it was in October.

Q. I have one question about two different players for both players. For Lauren, you guarded Caitlin Clark in practice last year so you know what it's like to guard her. What does it take to guard her well? And for Emma, Monika Czinano, shooting 70 percent from the field. If each of you could talk about guarding those respective players.

LAUREN JENSEN: Obviously Caitlin is like a great player, leading the nation in scoring. Honestly it takes a whole team effort. She can do so much, shoot the three, obviously got very deep range. She can drive it. So just trying to be adds fundamentally sound as you can and just do your best and also relying on if you do get beat, relying on that help from your teammates.

EMMA RONSIEK: When it comes to guarding a player like Monika, I am undersized for a 5. I think a lot of people would consider me undersized for a 5. I would consider myself undersized. But I think it's just really paying attention to detail for me, doing what my coaches want me to do, listening to scout, just being prepared.

I think just being prepared and coming into the game knowing that we can all play with them, it's just going to be really good for us, and I think we've got a really good game tomorrow.

Q. Lauren, I'm just curious how you're handling the emotions of being back here so soon in your career after you left and how you're processing those and compartmentalizing them in the right ways for you to be effective.

LAUREN JENSEN: Yeah, you know, obviously being back in Carver and everything, like it's fun for me. We were here in October, so I feel like that's helped, like I've seen the team, I played against the team, and there's no bad blood or hard feelings or anything.

That's good, but I'm excited. It's kind of fun to be back here and playing in Carver.

Q. Just kind of jumping on that, can you take us through the process of maybe about 11 months ago when you decided to leave and then to go to Creighton, how that all transpired?

LAUREN JENSEN: Yeah, so when I decided to enter the portal, I had some places in mind, but with obviously Creighton being one, but I kind of approached it with more of an open mind and wanted to talk to -- give the majority of schools a chance.

When I ended up picking Creighton, I knew it would be the right fit, and it has been. It's kind of crazy, a full-circle moment being back here almost like a year later since when I entered the transfer portal. But the whole process went smoothly and adjusting to Creighton and just the team and everything.

Q. To follow up on the Czinano question, you've faced Maddy Siegrist, Rayven Peeples, Sidney Cooks, UConn's front line. There's a lot of players that seem similar in that regard in terms of having to deal with a potent 5. How similar is this matchup in that regard in terms of leaning on past experiences from this season?

EMMA RONSIEK: Yeah, I mean, I think we can definitely take -- or me personally can take a lot of learning lessons from the other teams that we've played in the Big East. Big East is more of positionless I would say than the Big Ten is, but I could still say the same for guarding Sidney Cooks at Seton Hall is very similar to Czinano because they both are bigger than me and I can just use that as learning lesson for tomorrow. So yeah.

Q. I had a question about Morgan. She has an opportunity -- does she know how good she is or the potential she has to go off and have a huge scoring game when you might really need it tomorrow?

EMMA RONSIEK: I mean, Morgan is just one of those players, she's so low key with her talents. You would never picture her as being this, like, monster basketball player. Like she is so good and she's so humble about it.

It's just so cool to me just seeing like she could have three points in the first half and finish the game with 23. It's just wild that she can just stack up her stats that much in that little amount of time, so yeah, she's definitely very dangerous, and I think a lot of people are going to have a hard time with scouting her because she is so versatile, she can score in the post and she can shoot the three like no other. So I'm very excited to see how they're going to match up with her tomorrow.

LAUREN JENSEN: Yeah, like Emma said, she creates mismatch problems, and so that can sometimes be a challenge for people to guard. She does score in spurts. She can just turn on at any point, and it's really fun to watch, and she is like super low key, super chill, and if she's off and maybe not shooting the best or really getting the ball to fall, she doesn't force it or anything, and she knows that it could be someone else's night, so I think that's really great about her.

Q. Coach Bluder said that she expects a track meet. You guys kind of play the same brand of ball, high assists, you guys have very low turnovers, very efficient. Do you see this as being a really high-scoring game where there's a lot of running and all that?

LAUREN JENSEN: Yeah, I would agree with that. We're both -- I'd say more offense oriented. Iowa has a great offense, and we like to get up-and-down and run the court and play faster, and so I would definitely agree with what Coach Bluder said earlier.

EMMA RONSIEK: Yeah, I would agree with that, as well. I think that for us to be successful we've got to slow them down on offense because they are such a good offensive team and they've got so many offensive talents on their team, and same as us, I think on our offensive end we just have to push pace because it's going to be a track meet and it's just going to be who gets there first.

Q. How do you guys react when Tatum barks at Flan and basically turns into a player coach?

EMMA RONSIEK: Yeah, I mean, it's just kind of like regular. I wouldn't say it's like super out of the blue when you hear that stuff, but you kind of just have to take when Tatum gets heated in those moments, you've got to take a step back and understand where she's coming from. She's a senior and this is her last go at basketball, so you just have to -- I have so much respect for her. She understands the game. She knows what she's talking about, so you kind of just have to go with the flow and just understand where she's coming from.

LAUREN JENSEN: Yeah, Tatum is a very competitive person and I love that. She definitely gets us all fired up. Like Emma said, she's a fifth-year senior. She's been around. She's the leader of this team. Her and Flan have a great relationship. So when that interaction happened, they were able to -- Flan was able to hear what Tatum was saying and work through that. Yeah, they have a good relationship.

Q. Is somebody on your schedule sort of similar to Iowa? I know Clark and Czinano are sort of outliers, but the way they play, besides being sort of similar to you guys, I guess.

LAUREN JENSEN: Honestly I'd say the team that might be most similar is Nebraska just speaking in the sense of that they have bigger posts because the Big East is more guard oriented, and so you don't see a lot of posts like Monika down there. It's more like hybrids like Emma.

In terms of that I'd say probably Nebraska.

EMMA RONSIEK: Yeah, I would also say Nebraska but I think you could also make a case for DePaul because DePaul is so good on offense and sometimes struggle on the defensive end, and they've obviously got Aneesah Morrow, probably the best freshman in the nation right now. So I'd say Nebraska and DePaul.

JIM FLANERY: Well, first of all, we're thrilled to have gotten the opportunity to play a first-round game and thrilled to advance. We have great respect for Iowa, their staff, their program, their players. We've scrimmaged them probably the last 10 or 11 years right around Halloween. You know, we have a great relationship with them, and that's why we kind of kept it at a scrimmage.

We've always felt like we learned a lot when we played them, and now we -- it never really felt like we had to win when we'd come over here, I always thought it was more of a learning tool. If we won, great. If we didn't, it was not a big deal.

Tomorrow that won't be the case. We've always scrimmaged in front of some people at the scorer's table and a few bench personnel, and tomorrow we'll be able in front of 15,000, so it'll be a little bit more challenging in that way.

But you know, if you're a coach or a competitor, what more would you want for. It's great for the sport, and it's great for the two teams who will be involved tomorrow.

Q. Tomorrow you're going to get the ABC time slot along with the crowd. Have you thought at all about what this means for your program to be on this stage, and what's your anticipation level going into it?

JIM FLANERY: Until you just brought that up, no, I had not thought a lot about that. I haven't mentioned it to the team. I don't know if they're of an age that they know that there's that much difference between ABC and ESPN or -- for someone of my generation when there were three television stations and public television was the fourth, and then later Fox came and way back before cable. But I don't know if they understand.

It's great, but I'm not -- I haven't thought about it a lot yet, but maybe over the next 24 hours I will.

I figured we'd get a pretty good slot because I know Caitlin is must-watch TV to a large degree, and that's great for our sport.

Tomorrow will be great for Creighton women's basketball. I know it's more about Caitlin and Iowa's program, but like we have a chance to be there and make a statement and show what our program is about tomorrow, and so that's exciting.

I think if you're -- when we get past it, I think we'll look back and think that it was a great thing.

But right now, no, not that much.

Q. Tell us, what's the structure like of the super secret get-together in October? Is it a 40-minute game? I imagine you don't -- the scoreboard is not on as far as the score is concerned. How successful were you in October against them? What did you take out of that?

JIM FLANERY: Sure. Well, it used to be super secret and then they kind of relaxed the rules and let you print or release a box score. Typically we've played it -- we play a 40-minute scrimmage with a halftime and then typically we'll -- Lisa and I will agree to say, hey, let's play one extra quarter and maybe the kids that didn't get to play as much will play an extra 10 minutes or in the past we've done some things like that where we'll go a little bit longer.

I know Lisa is competitive because I've always probably used my bench a little bit more during those 40 minutes than she has, and she usually counts on those last 10 minutes.

You know, but from my standpoint, it's like, well, let's get through the first three quarters and then if the game is there to be won, we'll try to win it, but if it's not, we also want to look at our younger players and look at combinations and let's get better at execution against somebody who doesn't know us as well.

It's a learning experience, but I think it becomes competitive down the stretch.

I can tell you one year we were playing over here and I think the fouls were nine or ten to one against us, and one of the officials walks by and he goes, I'm guessing if this was a regular game you'd be yelling at me a little bit more, and I said, yeah, probably, but it's okay.

You know, you're just not as -- I know Fran McCaffery does not take that approach (laughter) because I've talked to people who have worked his scrimmage.

But you don't bark at the officials and get uptight about some of the small stuff that you do maybe in a regular game. But it's a great experience.

We've done it every year because, like I said, we like their staff, we like their program, and we feel like we get a lot out of it.

Q. Caitlin Clark, it's almost like she's variable X, but when you think about Monika Czinano, what is the challenge there? Assuming Caitlin gets the points that she gets because she usually does, how important is it for you guys to slow down the center and how do you do it?

JIM FLANERY: Yeah, we actually spent a lot of time in our half practice -- it's kind of halfway between a practice and a shootaround usually on a day like today with our posts working on her tendencies and being -- what do we want to do on the left block or the right block, how do we greet her when she dives into the post and in transition. We probably spent more time on her than Caitlin because just to your point, Caitlin is going to get hers, and Monika to some degree, too, because I feel like Monika is a key.

We did a good job on her in the scrimmage. She hurt us in the second half more, but yeah, I feel like she's a big key because she's just so efficient.

She's a product of a team that shoots it well and passes it well, too. If you don't have to guard them, extend out to the three line the way you do on all of them, and if they're not a great passing team, but she's so efficient in terms of just that catch and quick finish.

We've got to execute the things that we talked about, and if she beats us doing the things that we don't think she's quite as good at, then we live with that.

I can tell you when we played Megan Gustafson a few years ago in the NCAA Tournament, we hammered all week, right shoulder, right shoulder, right shoulder because she's a left-handed player, and the first three times she caught it, she went left shoulder, left shoulder, left shoulder, and our kids are looking at us like, what are you guys telling us?

But sometimes when they're that good, they're that good.

But you've still got to make them do what they have shown that they're maybe a little less capable of on film.

Q. Do you remember the first time Tatum kind of spoke up at you and how that kind of morphed into something that you kind of just understand to be her competitive nature and value it for what it's worth?

JIM FLANERY: I don't. It probably occurred in practice, and now that she's a fifth-year she feels a little bit more emboldened to be able to do it in a game. But yeah, I don't know if it was obvious yesterday, but during the time-out, as we came to the time-out, she's like, put another ball handler in. She's done that a couple times. In the moment you don't love it because you think that there's kind of this questioning of authority, but two seconds later after I breathe, I love it because she's a competitor, and she's made her point and now I'm either going to think about it and do it or don't do it.

All's fine 10 seconds later, but I think that's a part of what's made her an effective leader. She's not afraid to call her out teammates, and once in a while will even be like, well, Tatum, I watched you the last -- in practice, I watched you the last possession and you didn't do that.

But I think that's what's made her a good leader is that she's willing to speak up.

I try to empower our players. I ask them once in a while, what do you think, what do you want to do on this, what do you like in this situation. So I think it's partly a product of that we empower her that way.

Yeah, in the moment it can be a little -- I've experienced it before. I've had players in the past. I had a player one time tell me -- I said, would you back-cut one time? And she goes, I just did. Watch the film.

Q. I know she had a role in 2018 when you guys were in the tournament, too, but what was it like having Connie as an assistant again yesterday? I noticed some of the exchanges seemed like I was watching those early 2000s coaching staffs again. What was that like for you guys?

JIM FLANERY: Yeah, it's been -- the last two years for those of you that don't know, Connie's role is program advisor so she hasn't been in a coaching role, but last year with COVID and then with Carli's pregnancy this year, she's been activated to where she is actually a countable coach within games, and so therefore she's able to provide direct feedback and insight, et cetera. It's been good.

I feel like she's been more willing to do that because of early on it was like I think harder for her to do that because she felt like maybe that wasn't her role, but she's kind of become more willing to speak up.

It's good because I think she's got a different perspective than the rest of us even, and she has head coaching experience, and she'll often say, I know you're thinking about this, but -- and sometimes it's something you are thinking about but sometimes it's not. She's good about providing feedback without making it be, like, this is what you need to do.

Q. Coach Bluder said she expects a track meet tomorrow. What do you expect?

JIM FLANERY: I was wrong about yesterday. I did not think -- we got some free throws late to get to 84, but I didn't think we would get up in the 70s and 80s. I don't know, but yeah, it'll be up and down. I think both teams are -- this is not a knock against Iowa, but both teams are better offensively than they are defensively. I think Lisa and staff and team would agree to that. That's the way we're built. We're both skilled teams that shoot it well, try to be as good as we can with who we have defensively, but neither of us is an elite defensive team, and they like to run.

I think we've got -- we have to be a little careful that we can't slow it down a little bit and take the crowd out of the game if that needs to be done. I feel like that's something that I've thought about and we've talked about as a staff is if we feel like that's something that can help us -- I think both teams can go deeper into the shot clock. When you've got Caitlin Clark who can get a shot any time, they can go deep in the shot clock, and I think we can do that, too, because we've got multiple kids who can make a play late.

Yes, it will be up and down, but I do think there will be -- there's enough familiarity, too, and there's enough respect for the transition game of each team that I'm assuming that will be a focus for Iowa. It's obviously been a focus for us, transition defense.

Q. You just brought it up. I was going to ask you about the transition part of it. Caitlin is just so quick and smooth and everything she does transitions from one move to the next so easily. How do you begin to corral that transition game when she's got the ball in her hands coming at you full speed?

JIM FLANERY: Well, your nearest defender besides the on-ball defender has to be in a position where they're able to help because if you're just -- it's hard to take away a logo 3 and not get to the point where she gets even with you and you're on your hip and she's keeping you on her hip and she's getting to the rim. In order to get all the way up -- not all the way up but most of the way up on that, okay, you've got to have somebody close that's communicating and what we call gapping the ball or helping there. I think if we can do that, that's going to be effective.

We will rotate people on to Caitlin. We will not put Tatum on her for 35 minutes. We've got three people who will guard her for X amount of time.

I mean, they're too good around her to -- there's only so many things you can do from a scheme standpoint is what I'm saying, so you need somebody who's reasonably fresh and locked in to be able to guard her for three to four minutes at a time in my opinion. We can do that I feel like with what we have from a personnel standpoint. So that'll be our approach. Whether we can get it done -- you know, we're going to have to just take who we take in transition, too. It's not, hey, if we're telling Rachel she's got Caitlin for the next three minutes, that doesn't mean that she's always going to have Caitlin because if the ball bounces long and somebody else needs to take Caitlin, somebody else will. So it's not going to be that the entire way. But rotating defenders on her.

Q. What's your story?

JIM FLANERY: Good one. I brought two outfits, right. Got ready to get dressed yesterday. Had my black pants laid out and my blue shirt. Jumped in -- pulled my black pants out, started putting them on. I'm like, wait, these are my wife's black pants. They got about halfway up -- I told the team, I said, I'm going to wear the same pants both days because I don't have the pair of black pants that I thought I had. My wife's pants in our closet are kind of right next to each other. I think I've got two pairs of black pants and I just grabbed something that looked like my black pants.

Q. Will you wear your tee shirt?

JIM FLANERY: Will I wear my tee shirt? I don't know what I'm wearing. I think I'm wearing a black shirt. But anyway, same pants unless my wife got me some at the mall today, which she offered but I said I don't think I need them. So we'll see.