NCAA WOMEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP: REGIONAL SEMIFINAL - NORTH CAROLINA VS SOUTH CAROLINA

March 25, 2022

Courtney Banghart

Deja Kelly

Carlie Littlefield

Greensboro Coliseum

North Carolina Tar Heels

Sweet 16 Postgame Media Conference

South Carolina 69, North Carolina 61

COURTNEY BANGHART: What a great crowd for women's basketball. The growth of our game is on full display, which I'm really proud of. I asked these guys to give me both their head and their heart all year long, and that's what they did.

And so not only did they earn this moment, but they showed who they are, as they have all year. This is the team I see every day all year. I'm glad everybody else got to see them now too.

Q. To both of the players, especially Deja, they had so much size inside, but they also really were aggressive on the perimeter. What did they do to make it so difficult for you guys to get into the lane and also to get open looks?

DEJA KELLY: I think just that they're big. They take up a lot of space on our drives. So I think probably what we could have did a better job of was really attacking the paint and throwbacks to threes. I don't think we looked for the three-point shot as much as we should have.

But they're just really big and really aggressive. We expected that. But I thought overall we attacked it pretty well.

CARLIE LITTLEFIELD: I agree with what Deja said. They had length at every position, so that always makes it hard. But I'm really just proud of us and what we were still able to do out there. We battled back.

Q. Carlie, what -- it looked like the first quarter, fourth quarter you guys were going. Those middle two quarters were maybe a little more of a struggle there. What wasn't going right for you guys?

CARLIE LITTLEFIELD: Basketball is a game of runs. We will have quarters that are more of a struggle than others. When it was going right, we were getting stops, we were getting bodies on them so they couldn't get as many O boards. And we were running. We thought we could run on them with their size, and I think we really exploited that the most first and fourth quarter.

Q. For any of the players, it seemed like early on the defense was kind of smothering Boston, and then they hit a couple of threes, and then you kind of had to switch. What was kind of the process of how your defense kind of changed throughout the game?

DEJA KELLY: I would just say we kind of -- our initial game plan in the beginning was really crowd the paint, really limit the bigs' touches. And then the guards kind of started going on their own little run. They were hitting outside shots, jumpers, which is something we were going to make them do, and they did. So then we had to adjust on the ball screens. The ball screens were getting set lower and lower, but we couldn't help too much, obviously, because they had the big post presence inside.

We switched up between the little man and two-three. I think we stayed pretty consistent with that, and then the second half we just went all man, and I think just their offensive rebounding hurt us.

CARLIE LITTLEFIELD: I'll just add that our original plan was to have them shoot outside. And just credit to them, they hit shots. They hit some tough shots.

Q. This one is for both of y'all. Coach Banghart mentioned the crowd off the top. What was the atmosphere like for you inside the Coliseum tonight? Did it give you a little extra juice throughout the game?

CARLIE LITTLEFIELD: It was great to see so much Carolina Blue, and I think as soon as we ran out that second time for warmups and you really heard the crowd, I think that's when I noticed it the most.

But it was such an awesome environment to play in. We definitely -- I got some energy from the crowd as well and just really happy to see all that Carolina Blue in the stands, and I know we made them proud.

DEJA KELLY: Yeah, it was exciting, obviously, to see all these people coming out and supporting us. They knew that this was a big game. The crowd was loud. It was exciting. It was exciting when everything was going good for us as well, and they were still cheering when things weren't going as well.

So I think it's good to have their support. We've had it all season, so I'm really grateful that we had it today.

Q. I'm curious. In that third quarter there it felt like there were a couple of times that South Carolina could stretch things out, but you guys basically prevented that from happening. Did those moments feel like pressing moments for you, and if so or if not, how were you guys able to stay locked in enough to get the game back to a competitive game and give yourselves a chance to win late?

DEJA KELLY: We knew that it was going to be a game of runs. We knew that they were going to have theirs. We knew we were going to have ours. In the third quarter, I think that's where their rebounding kind of helped them get a little lead. But luckily, off of that, we just kept pushing. We kept trying to run as much as we could even off of their makes, their putbacks. That's what kept us pretty close.

CARLIE LITTLEFIELD: I'll just say that I just feel like we did what we've been doing all year, just hanging around with teams. They throw a punch. We threw one back. I just think this group is really relentless, and I think we showed that tonight too just by hanging around.

Q. Deja, Carlie, you both had some steals down low when you guys were crowding the paint. Was that extra aggression on defense a spontaneous thing, or did you come into the game planning on being extra aggressive when Boston was getting looks in the paint?

CARLIE LITTLEFIELD: Dealing with the size down low, we thought that was a joint responsibility for both our bigs and our guards. And so our big's job was to root her out as best as she could, make her put a few dribbles down, and our job was to swarm in and support our posts and try to get a few pokes.

Q. You guys had -- I call them Battier steals, where you kind of just keep your hand and you let the player raise up. I haven't seen you do that as much this year as you did in this game. Was that something you had an emphasis on in practice?

DEJA KELLY: It's a personnel thing. They have really good bigs inside. They give them the ball a lot. They are really -- can really score down there. So I think just as much help as we could have given our bigs as possible. I think that just getting our hands in there, trying to make a play on the ball, that was our main goal.

Q. Coach, I know it's maybe hard to look at the bigger picture right now, but when it comes down to it, this is your third year coaching this team. You made it to the Sweet 16, played very well against the No. 1 overall seed. How important is it to you or how special is it to know how successful this season has been?

COURTNEY BANGHART: Yeah, sometimes when you get an opportunity, you get some luck along the way, and we didn't really get that. I felt like we needed to make some roster changes. The hardest thing about this job is you get a new job, and you have to make big decisions right away. And all the decisions impact the rest that you have to make.

I just made a really strong decision that I was going to bring the right people here, staffing and recruiting-wise, and I wasn't going to take any shortcut on that. And however long that took, I was going to invest in, as I've always done, the people.

I know how much basketball means to North Carolina. I knew that. I knew how much women's basketball needs North Carolina, and it would have taken me a lot to leave Princeton. I think people who know me well were surprised I left, and to be honest, I was too.

For me to have an opportunity to lead a program like this and to have the right people on the right stage is always gratifying. So I think we've done a really good job. I think the right people are doing things the right way, and the big picture is always important. It's just I wish I could just -- I think it will be easier for me in a couple of days.

Q. Courtney, there were times in the second half where it seemed like things just weren't working for you offensively, but Deja just kind of just kept going and kept attacking and going at the basket and using her moves. Can you just talk about what you saw from her tonight, what she gave you guys?

COURTNEY BANGHART: She's just fearless. We talk about as a program and individually with them that you don't get anywhere in life by crossing your fingers and hoping. There's an element of (indiscernible) success requires especially as the lights get bigger.

The way she prepares, the way she -- I mean, we watch film a lot together, and she lets me speak the truth to her. So if she's dribbling too much or if she's not letting it leave her hands, she makes an immediate adjustment, and she lets me help her in game as well.

Her poise -- this is a bunch of sophomores running around, and that takes an enormous amount of poise and toughness. Deja was big all tournament. She was big all year, as you know, because you cover us, but Deja Kelly is a really good basketball player.

Q. To sort of follow up with what you said, you have sophomores running around out there, and in the big picture, how important was it to get to this point and for them to see this part of the tournament, this level of competition to carry that next year considering the number of faces are you going to have back next year?

COURTNEY BANGHART: It's huge. This is a big stage. I told them that you get here because of how you handle your business along the way. I said it's really hard to make a Sweet 16 even when you are awesome. You can ask all the awesome teams that aren't in it, right?

Being here, it just makes you even more hungry. It gives you more experience. Experience is, as we all know in life, really important. It lets the guys that are out, our rookies see it and feel it even though they didn't play it.

I've told them before that you have seen me give this thing my best, and I need it from you. I need your head and your heart, as I've needed all year. And they got to prove that if you give that in December, if you give that in June, if you give that on a Saturday, you're going to have a really good tournament run.

Q. It seemed like Alyssa never really got an offensive rhythm all game. What was it that South Carolina was doing that sort of got her off kilter?

COURTNEY BANGHART: It's going to bother her, which she's going to be a problem next year because that is going to bother her like no one's business. I'm surprised that -- if there were hoops, she would be on them right now.

I think the size and athleticism that they play with at the four, Alyssa is having to play the four due to some injuries, and that challenged her. It's going to make her have to be more skilled with the basketball, with her footwork, with her dribble, with her change of pace. She's got to be able to change her levels.

She's a year away. She needs another year of development to handle an equal athlete because, in her credit, she doesn't have a lot of equal athletes in her life. Good thing she has a coach who's played against a lot of people that are better than her. So I had to find a way. For her, she'll just have to continue to work on her skill work, which she'll do.

Q. Obviously, you were close in the fourth quarter there, but Boston seemed to take over the game, and you had a good plan for her, but how much was her dominance on the offensive glass the key to what she was able to do in the fourth quarter there?

COURTNEY BANGHART: Unbelievable. It's a great team. Great player to have on your team because the basket must look like an ocean because it's either -- it either goes in or she gets it.

She's just a premier player. She's generational in that way with how her body has transformed. She's powerful and strong. She has kind of dancer footwork. She's relentless.

She's an excellent -- I wish she was old enough to go to the pro. I would be sitting in the front row celebrating her to be drafted because I think I've seen enough. I had one chance, and I've seen enough of Aliyah Boston, but mad respect for just a really good kid too.

Q. Just could you talk a little bit about Carlie and how have you seen her growth from her freshman year at Princeton until now?

COURTNEY BANGHART: Carlie, we're still waiting for the Ivy League to do the right thing. That poor kid doesn't even know if her season -- if her career is over, her collegiate career. I think that is actually a story because look what she's been able to do with so much unknown. She's seen so many kids post like "I'm coming back for my COVID year," and she has to just be like, "I'm trying do that, but I have a game to play."

Obviously, you have team moments that are sacred to your team, but -- and we had that after this game, but I think the thing that I can certainly share is I just said thank you. The kid has trusted me. She's battled for me. You guys saw the warrior that she's been all year and the teammate.

And there's a huge part of our team that's -- she's showed what that -- what toughness and relentlessness means. She's showed it every day so that now, when this team continues to mature and grow, you don't forget that thing. You don't forget Jaelynn's leadership or Carlie's relentlessness. They're going to be huge pieces of this program's success even moving forward.

Q. I apologize in advance for bringing up a bad subject.

COURTNEY BANGHART: Aliyah Boston again?

Q. How frustrating was it to get stop after stop after stop and have her keep getting the ball, putting it back in?

COURTNEY BANGHART: Whether it was frustrating or -- I'm a basketball fan. It's a thing of beauty as well. Obviously, I've watched South Carolina as a fan. I've watched them on film in preparation. It's not only us that it's happening to, right?

She was an absolute problem. Let's put it that way. We knew that it would take -- we would have to make threes and take care of the basketball because we just don't have the size and physicality yet. She's so strong with her lower body.

It wasn't -- a bad subject is when they shoot 56% at halftime from three. That is the stuff you can't bring up. That is a bummer. But Aliyah Boston going for 20-20 isn't surprising anybody in this room.

Q. But you brought it up.

COURTNEY BANGHART: Fair, fair. That means I don't have to answer it.

Q. I will not ask about their three-point percentage. I do want to ask about their defense in the second quarter. It felt like they changed to more switching. You struggled in that quarter. Was that about the strategy or just shots off, or what happened in that quarter?

COURTNEY BANGHART: I think when we didn't make some looks open. We didn't make some looks. We started to -- drive on top of drives is what I call it. If someone drives, they make the defense contract and then they pass it to someone, and that person drives as well. I always say make a team play well defensively to stop you.

When you drive into the defense, the defenders are now in there. They're are not even doing the right thing necessarily, and then you have driven right back into where they are. We just kind of had a little too many drives on drives I think because everyone was trying to help.

You get that a little bit with the inexperience that we live with, but I always say you can't celebrate the good and rip on the bad. Young team that are still growing. I don't get to -- I prefer them not to drive on drives, but I also appreciate what they do for me. We'll love them through that.

Q. I'm just curious, from your vantage point, what you just saw for 40 minutes, what is it going to take for a team to be able to knock that South Carolina team off?

COURTNEY BANGHART: Who they play next? A team that shoots a ton of threes. Whoever they play is going to shoot a ton of threes.

You're going to have to deal with Boston, clearly. We didn't beat them, so you should ask Kentucky or somebody else, but I think that our game is really healthy. So I will tell you I will not be surprised of any result I see in any of these Sweet 16, Elite Eight, or Final Four games. I have to say even five years ago I wouldn't have been able to say that.

As a big of a basketball fan I am, I can't promise that eight years ago I was watching until the Final Four unless I had to for my own film purposes and to learn.

But I think no disrespect to South Carolina. Like I said, they beat us, so we -- I shouldn't being the one to answer how to beat them. I think the health in our game is that Dawn knows she has to go out and beat whoever she plays next, and there's going to be -- they're going to space the floor a little bit more. They're going to have the same problem with Aliyah as everybody else.

Threes for twos, there's a tough trade-off, right? Making there's I think is part of it. I think you can expose them in the run games. You play that much size, you're going to have to -- we only played, what, seven, eight guys, and we were able to run out even in the fourth quarter. That's -- I haven't seen Stanford live, but South Carolina is a really good basketball team. It will be fun to watch, and I have faith that the right team will be standing at the end, and I don't know who that is yet.

Q. Your team played South Carolina really close. A lot of teams haven't been able to do that. Some things were going well for you. You guys were shooting 46% roughly from the field. I just want to know what you think are some things that your team did especially well in today's game?

COURTNEY BANGHART: I think we made it a possession game. That's hard to do when a team is -- you're working so hard, and they get a no-board putback, right? We made a commitment early in the season, and then again, of course, many times, every time we played, that if it requires possession by possession, we got it. If it requires a run, we got it. If it requires holding Arizona to ten minutes of no scoring, we got it.

I think my guys are just -- they stick with the process. They have an enormous amount of trust and respect for how hard it is, and they're willing to put the work in both inside the lines and in practice.

I hate to be cliche, and you guys know me well enough to know I don't. I'm not cliche. It's like that's a team I see every day. I'm glad you guys got to see them. I've been kind of saying I think we're better than people thought all year long, and we'll just keep trying to prove it.