NCAA WOMEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP FINAL FOUR: UCONN VS STANFORD

March 31, 2022

Tara VanDerveer

Haley Jones

Lexie Hull

Ashten Prechtel

Target Center

Stanford Cardinal

Semi-Final Media Conference

TARA VANDERVEER: We're really excited to be here.

Q. Just a fun question. Haley, a group of us were talking and we were curious, who has the coolest hair in women's basketball, you, Aliyah Boston, Aaliyah Edwards. I think Te-Hina Paopao just in the conversation, as well.

HALEY JONES: That's a great question. I feel all of our hair is so different, to be honest. I don't want to take the easy way out. But I think Aaliyah Edwards is very consistent with her same heat that she has with the purple and yellow. I stick with this, and I think it's different in the ponytail. And then Aliyah likes to switch it up on us, so it's all really dope and I think it's great. I think we have a similar audience with who we will have followings of with young women, young boys, but also we appeal to the young Black girls. So to see us all with different types of natural hairstyles, protective hairstyles, I think it says a lot, and us being on such a big stage is really great for that.

Q. Haley, I want to go back to 2018 and the U-17 team that you played on for USA Basketball. The majority of that team is here. Everyone is represented. All the coaches have played USA Basketball, coached USA Basketball. Can you talk about that experience, what it meant to you, what it was like to be on that team, and what's it like competing against those players here now?

HALEY JONES: Yeah, that team was really good. I mean, that was the first USA team I was ever on, so it was really special for that reason, and getting to put on the USA jersey and wear it across your chest for the first time is really special. But you look back at that team and you Azzi, Paige, me, Aliyah, Fran, Haley, we're all here. So we were pretty good.

And to show that we've all kind of -- nobody really slowed down from that time and we're all still pushing and here and we all get to compete on this stage really speaks numbers to how good that team was and how we all are individually. So it's cool to see everybody here and we're all really good friends. So cheering them on but also want to beat them, as well. It's increased competition, I think.

Q. Tara, meeting with Geno once again; you guys are the two winningest coaches in the game, both likely to become the winningest coaches in not just the women's game but the entire game. Could you just speak to your relationship with Geno? Is it a rivalry? Obviously there's a lot of longevity there.

TARA VANDERVEER: You know, we have been competing for a long time, playing against each other. I think it goes back to actually when he was at Virginia as an assistant coach coaching Dawn Staley, so the three of us are here. But he's done a great job at Connecticut. They have had tremendous success. I've learned a lot from competing against them.

I would say -- you know, Geno likes to kind of get in little battles with people. Maybe it was Pat when Pat was alive, or Muffet, but I don't know. I like him, and I think we get along really well. I've never felt that we were adversaries in a negative way but more competitors in a very good way.

Q. Haley, can you talk about your philosophy as your role as a facilitator, not only on the floor but off the floor? Obviously you're kind of a connector, you bring people together, whether it's TikTok videos, Electric Slide lessons, all the ways you facilitate for this team?

HALEY JONES: I mean, philosophy is definitely a new word for me. I don't think I've ever thought of myself in that way. But I think I just like to incorporate different people into everything that I'm doing. Or just as a team we're really close, so it makes it really easy when everybody wants to hang out all the time.

If we're doing something -- we like to do something new all the time. But I think just growing up, my mom always talked about being someone who includes others. You would never want to be on the outskirts of a group or be the one excluded, so I try not to ever be that type of person.

But I mean, I think the team makes it really easy. They're all really great to hang out with, and Tara was a great learner the other day so we kind of got to switch roles.

But I think the team makes it really easy, and I've had more of a leadership role on the team this year, which I've tried to learn from Lexie, Anna, and Alyssa how they did it last year and the year before, so I've been trying to learn from that and figure out my own style as we go, I guess.

Q. Tara, on what unique challenges Connecticut presents, and specifically Bueckers since she's been back and obviously had a big game in the regional final. How do you contend with that?

TARA VANDERVEER: You know, Paige Bueckers is a really talented player. She is not a one-dimensional or what I'd say is a one-trick pony. She has a lot of different -- a great skill set. She's a tremendous passer, scorer. I think she can do it all.

At this level on every team you have those kind of players, so you just have to work as hard as you can not to let her do what she really likes to do. I think that's the name of the game, that you're always trying to do against everybody, but you have to do it very well to be successful against her because she's that good.

Q. Lexie, talk about Bueckers, as well, and also how much last year's run and winning the championship do you think helps this year's team, having been through this stage and everything that goes with it.

LEXIE HULL: I think last year's tournament just because it was so different than this year, it makes this year kind of feel like the first time for, I think, our freshmen, sophomores, and juniors. This is the first time they are playing in front of packed stadiums, arenas, and traveling from location to location, so I think that part is new for everybody.

But I'm excited for Friday's game and to compete against Paige and UConn because we know that they have a very strong offensive team. And like Tara said, Paige has a lot of things up her sleeve. Try not to let her do what she wants to do on Friday.

Q. Tara, I've heard your staff sometimes calls you Video VanDerveer. I'm curious, in the realm of what you do as a head coach, I'm curious where watching film ranks and what you love to do. And I know it's kind of an unfair question, but in an average season how many hours of film do you think you watch?

TARA VANDERVEER: Well, I personally watch a lot. I watch -- we film every practice, so I watch every practice. I watch during the summer.

I like to -- one of the fun parts of the game for me is the puzzle, to put together a strategy for how our team should play, how our team should defend. If I have a game on at home, say I'm watching the Warriors, I have a laptop with our game on or our upcoming opponent. I would say I probably watch, I don't know, three or four hours a day.

And then with our team, we watch a little bit with our team, too.

Q. Haley and Tara, this is an epic matchup, UConn and Stanford. In the broad sense, what do you think of this rivalry? Is this an East Coast-West Coast grudge match? Does it bother you UConn gets all this East Coast media attention? How do you see this playing out?

HALEY JONES: Yeah, I mean, I think that UConn/Stanford kind of bi-coastal rivalry is a longstanding tradition. I've watched big games between the two of them so to be part of that is really special. But I think each program you have Hall of Fame coaches, the two winningest coaches of all times; all these All-Americans, Olympians, WNBA players come from both these programs. So to be a part of that is huge.

But we have a lot of cross-country rivalries now. We have the South Carolina one, we have the UConn one. But to play on this stage in the Final Four will be really fun. They have great players. They have a great team. And I think that we have great players and a great team, as well.

I think the match-ups will be interesting. I think there will be individual battles. I think there will be defensive team battles, but I'm just really excited to kind of be a part of that legacy, I guess.

TARA VANDERVEER: You know, I think it is a fun east-west rivalry. There definitely is probably an East Coast bias. You're sleeping when we're playing a lot back east. But we get to go back to beautiful California. So I wouldn't trade that.

When I'm looking at the weather and I'm seeing the snowstorms in Hartford or Storrs, I'm like, I'm going to the cool swimming and it's outside.

Q. For Tara and Lexie, you mentioned the other day when we were in Spokane that you had played Maryland and you had played Texas earlier this season and you liked that. You already had a scouting report, you already knew maybe what they were going to do. You all have not played UConn this year. I don't think you played them last year ever, either. So this is the first time you're going to get to see Paige. When you talk about you like putting the puzzle pieces together, do you like it more that you haven't played them? Are you excited for that, that this gets to be your first scout on them in a while?

TARA VANDERVEER: I like it better when we have played them.

Q. Why?

TARA VANDERVEER: You know, just that you see -- sometimes on tape you can't really judge people as much, but when you play against someone, you can see who guards someone better, what you look like against them in person, so I like it better when we have played a team.

But we're playing them tomorrow, so nobody asked me.

LEXIE HULL: I think as a team we're excited to play them. We know that it's going to be a tough game, and I think we are excited for that challenge and excited to compete against one of the best teams in the country.

Yeah, I think more than anything, even though we haven't played them, we're looking forward to it.

Q. I wanted to ask, Lexie touched on it a little bit, what has this year been like as the defending champs and getting everybody's best every single night, and how does that kind of play in coming into this week? What experiences can you draw on that you guys learned from last year?

HALEY JONES: I think being the defending champs, everybody comes at you with everything that they have. You're never going to get an off-night from any other team. I think every other team rises to the occasion when they play us, which in the end makes us better by having this great competition every single night. I think having this target on our back, we like having it because we love competing. We're a very competitive team.

Every game is a challenge, and like Tara says, it's a different puzzle every night with who's stepping up. I think we've learned a lot this season with having different people step up in different games, people having different roles on the team than they did last year. Like Anna Wilson and Lacie, I can't speak to just the amount of growth that they've had just at the point guard position. But I think we've grown a lot this year being the defending champs, so coming into this week, we're ready for the competition, and we know what it took last year. But it's going to take even more with that target, and I think we welcome that competition and we're excited to rise to the occasion.

Q. Lexie, you kind of touched on it, but there was so many differences to this year's tournament and one of those huge ones is the NCAA's effort towards equalizing the experience for the women's tournament as much as the men's. I'm wondering how much of that you've really felt and why that's so important for you guys?

LEXIE HULL: I think we've definitely noticed more attention brought to it. Right when we got off the plane there was a welcoming party, which was really cool.

I think it's important because women's sports are important, and equality is important. We appreciate the effort that's been put in place to make that better.

We're looking forward to just the continued effort for that.

Q. Haley, when you mentioned the Stanford-UConn rivalry, these teams met up thrice in the Final Four including in national title game when you were a child. What do you remember from those games and those match-ups as they've gone head to head?

HALEY JONES: I'll be honest, I don't remember any of those games, but sounds great. I hope we won most of them. I don't know what the outcomes were. But I guess it'll be the fourth time we've met in the Final Four.

Yeah, I'm just -- I think the rivalry is great, and we don't really need a lot -- we haven't played since I've been here. This will be the first time that I've matched up against UConn and I think most of us have, right. So I think we're just really excited to play another great team.

I think we've played a lot of great teams this season. Our preseason was hard, the Pac-12 season is always difficult, so to play another great team on this stage and being these kind of two big powerhouses on each coast is really exciting, and we're just happy to be a part of it.

Q. Coach, you mentioned how you liked playing a team in the regular season. You used to play UConn every year from like 2007 or 2014 and played them last in 2017. Any thought of trying to renew that since you seem to be on the big stage every year, playing them in the regular season? And, secondly, you mentioned how you watch so much video. With UConn is it tougher to watch them in a sense because they had so many pieces missing throughout the year and they finally have everyone back to figure out what to watch to see who's going to be playing you tomorrow night?

TARA VANDERVEER: Well, as far as playing them again, we're always open to scheduling, and it would be fun to at least go to a tournament that they're at. We were in the Bahamas, and I think they were down there, too, but maybe a different island or something. We're always excited to play great competition.

As far as video goes, yeah, they did miss a big -- they're a very different team without Paige, so I always say I probably focused on the games when the people were healthy.

Q. For the student-athletes, with all the pomp and circumstance and the good and bad of social media nowadays, how do you stay focused and stay -- how do you enjoy the moment, and how do you stay focused on your end mission?

ASHTEN PRECHTEL: For me, most of it is just being present like when we're in practice and stuff. The social media and all that comes afterwards, so it's like second to that especially during this time of year. For me I just try to focus on practice and work on that first, and then in my free time, then I might use social media. It just depends.

LEXIE HULL: Yeah, I think Ashten is totally right about social media doesn't win games. Likes, followers don't win games. It's what we do on the court and in practice and in our free time that will help us prepare for winning games, winning championships.

I think for us just playing in the moment, playing within ourselves, and having fun together on the court is more important than anything else.

HALEY JONES: I would agree with what they said. I think Lexie hit it right on the mark, that social media doesn't win you anything really. We're a very competitive team as we've all said, but we're here to win. So I think social media is going to say what it's going to say and it's going to post people's highlights and whatnot and people are going to have their opinions about you or how you play. But I think it really comes down to what you think of yourself and your support system.

I know we all have very close ties with our families, so at the end of the day, I'm not checking social media after the game. I'm running out to the court to go give my mom a hug and see what she has to say about how I played or how the team did or talk to my brother on the phone. And then you'll go to social media and you're going to post what you're going to post, you're going to read what you're going to read. But it really comes down to your opinion about yourself and the people closest to you and what they have to say about you.

Q. Coach, you talked about the challenge that Paige presents, but what do you see as the other challenges that UConn presents for you guys?

TARA VANDERVEER: I mean, you're not going to get here without having a balanced team. So they have everything that you need: Paige; Azzi Fudd is a great shooter; Christyn Williams, No. 1 player in the country coming out of high school; three of their perimeter players are the No. 1 players in the country. They're skilled. They're talented. They play well together. Inside they've got Ododa, they've got Edwards, they're physical, they rebound. It's always a total package at this point. It's not one player.

They bring in -- obviously their situation changed a little bit with the injury, but they bring people off the bench that are very capable, too. We know that we will have to play a complete game, and that's what we've been focusing on, getting ready for the game.

Q. Ashten, you hit some pretty big shots in the tournament last year for your team. When you're coming off the bench, can you just talk about staying ready and being ready to come in at that moment in a really big game and being able to hit big shots?

ASHTEN PRECHTEL: For sure. I mean, the most important thing for me is just to be ready whenever we need it, and I think that's the case for everyone on our team. I think that everyone, even people who don't get the chance to play, all have the capability to do the same thing. It's just a matter of staying ready and being ready to go in when your name is called.

That's just something that I try to do and focus on, and sometimes it works out.

Q. One of the recommendations in the Kaplan report was perhaps considering the idea of putting the men's and women's Final Fours together in the same location. And now that you're here in Minneapolis and they're getting started down in New Orleans, I'm just wondering what you think of that idea in the future of potentially combining them.

TARA VANDERVEER: Well, I think the Kaplan report was very valuable. I thought they had a lot of great, great recommendations. But I would probably disagree with that and just say that -- I know they look at maybe tennis, how men's and women's tennis is together and things like that. But I think right now, we're in a good place and our tournament is really growing. Ratings are up on television. We just have to keep, I think, in the direction that we're going and keep doing what we're doing.

HALEY JONES: I mean, I think I'd have to agree with Tara. I don't think I really know what the reasoning is for bringing both tournaments together. I think that they both stand on their own, and I think women's basketball specifically has been growing at a crazy fast rate in recent years. But it's always had its following, and the people who love women's basketball are going to come to the Final Four.

This is our first Final Four really in front of people, so I'm excited to see the turnout. I know I went to the one in Tampa and it was like a sold-out crowd, so I really don't think that you need to bring us to stand with the men's basketball team. I think with the men's basketball program, I think that we can do it on our own, and we have in years past, and I think that going forward it's only just going to continue to grow.

Q. Tara, we're celebrating the 50th anniversary of Title IX this summer, and at USA Today we did a data breakdown and we found out a lot of schools are still spending considerably more money on their men's teams than women's teams. I wonder what you think of the state of women's basketball. I know Stanford is a private school so we can't get those numbers, but you are a huge advocate of women and I know a lot of coaches come to you and ask for advice. What do you tell them when they say they're not investing in my program, how do I fix that?

TARA VANDERVEER: You know, it's really disappointing, and it's really discouraging to think that 50 years after Title IX, a federal law, that the law, number one, is not being enforced. It is sad for, I think, the women and the programs, and it's not just women. Some of the coaches are men, too. It's a law, and why isn't the law enforced?

I think that's something that's really disappointing. Like when we went through the situation last year -- I think the Kaplan report has brought attention to the disparity between what happened last year in the tournament, and I know we're trying to fix that.

But I think it's all of our jobs. We all have either sisters, daughters, nieces, women that are suffering because they're not getting the resources or they're not getting the support that they deserve.

I call it hot dogs for the girls and steak for the boys.

It will be a great time when you don't need Title IX. But unfortunately in our world, there's discrimination still against people, women, and we need to keep battling.

Q. Along those lines, I wanted to ask a question about evolution, maybe even going back to Idaho or Ohio State. What was the commitment to women's basketball to you then, and how has that evolved?

TARA VANDERVEER: Well, that's a great question. When I was -- I never planned to go into coaching because my coach was a graduate student. There weren't coaching jobs when I came out of college. I planned to go to law school.

But I took a year off, and I helped coach my sister's team, and I really fell in love with the whole coaching thing. And then I went to graduate school, I volunteer coached my first two years at Ohio State.

My job at Idaho was a full-time job. I was really excited. It paid me $13,000 a year, and it was a great job. I loved it.

When I was offered the job at Ohio State, I called one of my friends who knew a lot about Ohio State, and I said, I'm not going to Ohio State unless they pay me $20,000, and my friend said, they will never do that. I said, then I'm not going.

But when I first went to Idaho we didn't have practice gear, and it was so different. It was just so different. Whether it was -- when I played, I bought my own shoes. We laundered our own uniforms. Just getting all the little things, fighting for resources of being in the big gym, having a weight room, having a trainer. It's night and day, and our team can't relate to it at all. They would have no idea what it was really like.

When I tell a story to young eight-year-old girls at basketball camp about no basketball camp, no scholarships, the difference is one little eight-year-old looks at me and says, "no," and I don't know how to explain it to her. I say to the other eight-year-olds, can you explain it, and another eight-year-old goes, "sexism." At eight years old.

The changes are so different, just having the resources and support that we have at Stanford and that we're experiencing here at the Final Four.

I just want our team to remember two little words sometimes, thank you. People have fought so hard for the opportunity to be up here and to have all of you here and to have a sold-out crowd. I think it's really exciting.

Q. Tara, where are the biggest areas of growth that you've seen Haley and Cam take, in particular this year, not just to help you get back to this stage but perhaps even be better than you were last year? And, Haley, if you could answer the areas of growth where you've seen yourself develop. And also for Cam as well, as her teammate.

TARA VANDERVEER: Well, I think starting with Haley, Haley is an incredibly talented basketball player. She just has great vision. Sometimes she really might see things that other people don't even know that are happening.

I think what she's done is she's taking care of the ball better. She's made better decisions. I think that's a big part of her development. Her three-point shoot -- developing her three-point shot, her focus. She controls the game a lot because she can have the ball in her hands, and she doesn't have to be -- she's a very unselfish player. She's always been very unselfish, but she also knows when to take her shots and to assert herself on the game.

I think Cam is also another incredibly talented player. She has great hands. She runs the floor really well. She can score facing the basket, with her back to the basket. She's a fearless, fearless player. She can rebound.

I think the only thing that stops Cam is when she gets too aggressive and fouls, and if she can stay in the game without fouling, then there's no stopping her.

I know Ashten guards her every day in practice, and it's like, she can go left, she can go right, she can shoot. I mean, she's tough.

But if she's on the bench, then she's not effective.

HALEY JONES: Like Tara said, I think Cam is an extremely talented player. I think that she does everything out there. She's playing back to the basket, she can face up and hit her shot. I think her 3 ball this year has really kind of spread the floor in a lot of different ways, but not just for the rest of the team but also for her, and now she can draft from the wing, now we can get -- her defender's got to guard her out there so now we're getting back to our cuts, which we didn't really get last year.

So I think her game has expanded so much from last season, and I think a lot of it comes from her confidence level is a lot up. And I think she knows that we have that confidence in her, so she's able to go out there and do her thing every night.

I think for me, Tara said, I think, my decision making has improved a lot and shot selection. I know we're still working on turnovers, but we're getting there. I think that I like to do everything out there, so continuing to work on that all-around game is what I continue to work on.

Q. Tara, you mentioned, I think it was last week, that you'd like to see the women's tournament use a similar distribution model that the men use. Wondering if you could explain why you think that's important and if that's going to encourage more schools to invest in women's basketball.

TARA VANDERVEER: Great question. The unit structure that is used for the NCAA men's tournament I think does generate a lot of support on individual campuses to have a great team and to support that team.

I do believe that we should incorporate a unit structure over the next maybe 10 years having there be financial reward for the teams being successful, and I think that that would help the resources on each campus.

Can I just go on a little tangent? I think most of you know that I just want to give a pitch for the three-point challenge, and if anyone doesn't know about it, I'm going to donate $10 for every three-pointer made in the whole women's basketball tournament. And I want to encourage all of the really highly paid reporters that are sitting in this room (laughter) to do the same thing. But really encourage our coaches, especially our men's and women's coaches, to do the same thing. It's for humanitarian aid for Ukraine.

Q. You won the championship last season; what has changed about this team since then, and what has made you all better?

ASHTEN PRECHTEL: I mean, we're a completely different team than last year, and I think that for us, we're just -- we have a lot of the same returners, but there's a lot of new people. So we've been working all season to be inclusive and basically combine everyone into the team we have now. I think we've done a really good job of that, and we're figuring out all of our roles and stuff.

I mean, I think that compared to last year, we're in a really good spot this year for the tournament.

LEXIE HULL: I think we're better this year because I think everyone has grown so much individually and collectively. Playing with basically the same team for an extra year, we just, our chemistry grows, finding each other on offense, back door cuts. I think we're just playing better and better together every practice, every game.

Also we've just grown closer, and we love playing together even more than we did last year. That's hard to believe. But yeah, I think that's just the extra time, the extra year, and the extra year of playing has helped us get better.

HALEY JONES: Yeah, I echo what the both of them said, but specifically Lexie talking about having an extra year with the same girls and then the additions that we made, I think we have more of a cohesive unit this year than we had last year so that adds to our wanting to stay together as long as we can. We only have four days left if we win tomorrow, so we really want to have those four days rather than two.

I mean, we're going to do everything we can to be able to keep playing together as long as we can, and I think just that cohesion allows us to play so well together on the court. But also things don't always go our way, and so when we do get in those rough games and tough times and we're down, we've got to make a comeback, whatever it is, I think we never turn on one another.

And I think that's something really special about our team is even in a Maryland-type game and we're losing our lead and people are stressing out, you're able to come back to one another as friends and people first and really relate to them and express yourself and what confidence you have in one another. I think that's what really sets us apart as a team going into this tournament.