NCAA WOMEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP: FIRST ROUND - JAMES MADISON VS OHIO STATE

March 18, 2023

Sean O'Regan

Caroline Germond

Kiki Jefferson

Value City Arena

James Madison Dukes

Media Conference

Ohio State 80, James Madison 66

SEAN O'REGAN: Like really proud of my group, period. I thought we fought. I thought we came out the aggressor and I thought we put it on them pretty good to start. Eventually, I thought we ran out of gas a little bit. When you run out of gas against that press, it doesn't bode well for you. I'm really proud of what this group did today and all year long. I couldn't be prouder of them.

Q. You talk about running out of gas against the press and it seemed like probably late in the second quarter, did the game get more physical towards mid court? What were the factors as far as like the press not affecting you so much early in the game and then eventually causing a lot of turnovers?

SEAN O'REGAN: I'm going to tread lightly on that one a little bit. We were in severe foul trouble in the second quarter: Jamia had two; Peyton had two; Kseniia had two; Kobe had two. You're taking away really four starters in my mind.

So you're asking a different group to break the press a little bit more than they are used to. Claire didn't get as many represents as Kobe or Steph. Steph had two fouls, too. Don't forget that. I thought foul trouble affected it, one.

So now you're asking, where maybe we could get Kiki a break or we could get Caroline a break, we didn't have that luxury. They had to kind of play through that. And I still thought they did. We're going into the half up three, nine turnovers is too many but they only had four steals.

I thought we did a good job through it, and that's what a pressing team does. It might only take two minutes for it to be an 8-2 or 10-2 run and it just happens fast. But yeah, I don't think -- I don't think the -- I'll leave that alone.

Yeah, it gets physical in traps. It gets physical in traps. I just thought we were okay. I thought the run towards the second and then early third, I just thought we didn't have the same bounce to it. But I think foul trouble, and not to say we didn't foul, right, but foul trouble affects our rotation and who in the game. So that's what I think a little bit more of it was.

Q. We're across town last night and watched Purdue go on a run, and Dickinson answers, and that was sort of panic time in that game. You guys came back and took the lead after they went on their run but they didn't seem to have any panic. Was there something about the makeup of their team that they were built for this kind of game?

SEAN O'REGAN: I don't know. I don't know enough about their team.

KIKI JEFFERSON: I think we are built for it, too. They just beat us today. We are built for it.

SEAN O'REGAN: There's a lot of factors that go into not scoring more points than them but yeah, I don't know -- I don't know anything about Ohio State other than what it says on my scouting report.

Q. How difficult was their press to break, especially once they got on a run and the crowd started getting into it and it seemed like they were playing physical but at the same time, how hard was it at that point?

CAROLINE GERMOND: We were ready for that press. It's just like, they were aggressive, very aggressive and they are very long. So sometimes it's hard, like me being small, sometimes it's hard to see the floor.

But I think also our composure throughout the game was not as good as from the beginning with foul trouble and just like keep our energy on the same level for 40 minutes. So I think that's what got us, too.

Q. The women's game and this tournament has grown so much in my lifetime. You won't be able to play at a time when all the first, second round games will be played at neutral sites. Do you hope to live to see that day?

KIKI JEFFERSON: Yes.

Q. As a mid-major coach, even in their best seasons, mid-majors don't often get to host, would you like to see that eventually happen and neutral sites in the early rounds?

SEAN O'REGAN: You know, I haven't put much thought into it to be very honest with you. There's added -- there's a couple things I'll go with that.

This crowd is awesome. If this game is being played in Topeka, Kansas with the same teams, the crowd is not going to be as good, right. That's the fact of it. Now it's a distinct advantage, of course, for Ohio State, but the crowd is good.

Now, can you find a place like Pensacola, Florida where the Sunbelt Conference does it, which to me is off the chart, how they do it, where they do it. They have done it year after year. And now you have a fan base of people in Pensacola added with Ohio State, JMU fans and St. Johns and all that, right, where it's consistent, I think that's maybe your next step if you're going to go neutral. It has to be consistent; it can't be bouncing around.

Because you know, my experience has been neutral, right. My first year we were at ODU; we played Temple, right. My next year was at UVA, we played Oklahoma. That was fun for me. But we are also regional to those places where it's a three-our drive to ODU and an hour drive to Virginia. I can't say blanket, right, that's what it has to be.

In my mind, you think the same as the men, that's where all these upsets are happening and I do think if we play Ohio State on neutral floor, doesn't mean we beat Ohio State but it does level the field a little bit. You're not playing a road game. From my perspective, would it be better to play on a neutral floor? I don't know what's best for the game and I don't want to speak to that necessarily.

For right now, I know we were seeded 14th. My goal in my head is let's find a way not to be seeded 14th. If you get to 12, it's neutral. 12, 11, 10, all that stuff, it's neutral, right, for one round. But get to 12. That's my whole mindset, what can I control, and what I can control is who we schedule, would we beat, and if we can do those things, yeah, can we -- I think we can get to 12. We are not far off of 12.

I think it's an inch of a line. You know, weren't perfect this year. We lose to Georgia Southern twice, we lose to Coastal, Marshall. Those teams are not Top-50 teams and we lose to them and it dropped us down a little bit.

Went a lot of different ways with that question, right. I don't know the answer for women's basketball in general. I know that atmosphere is good basketball atmosphere. I enjoy that. That to me is fun. It didn't get in my bones. It's like, this is fun. This is what it's supposed to be. I would rather that over an empty gym any day of the week, any day.

Q. What do these two players sitting up there mean to this team?

SEAN O'REGAN: Look, individually, two extremely different people to me in my life, okay. I've known Kiki for seven years. I mean, Kiki has come watch my daughter play basketball. Like she's been family in my life for a long time, okay. To me, she's exactly what I want this program built on, which is an enthusiastic basketball mind. I mean, you talk about loyal, right. Like always been family, always wanted that relationship. The amount of time and discussions we've had, it means -- I can't even explain how much this one means to me right here, okay.

And my point in telling you that in that way is that I've known Caroline, my first phone call with Caroline was, May? May. And I think it's absolutely unbelievable what she's done for this program and myself and her teammates since she got here in August. August. So it's eight months. And that's what this is becoming.

But I've had a grad transfer come in before and it doesn't have that much impact. And so I can't say my level of appreciation enough in word. I'm not good enough with words. Pretty good at math. I'm not as good with words. But her approach, how hard she works, her -- never in a bad mood, workmanship mentality, team first; it permeates through the whole thing. I'm indebted to both of them for very, very different ways for the rest of my life, period.

These two changed this culture back to where it should be, period, no doubt about it. This one has been family for like five years (Kiki) and she is now, there's no doubt in my mind. I don't care, she could be outside of Paris, France and call me and say, "I need some help"; it's like, there we go, I'll get on that six-and-a-half-hour flight and I'll be there, in a heartbeat, in a heartbeat.

Because this program belongs right here, and these two spearheaded it to get back here. I'm forever indebted to both of them for that.

Q. You hear that, what is it like to hear that, especially getting this program back to the NCAA Tournament and where it used to be and now where they want it to stay?

KIKI JEFFERSON: I just think it's what Coach O deserves. It's never a bad day with him. He always wants the best for us, whether that's on the court or off the court. I'm hurt that the outcome was this but like he said, it's family. Coach O has been my guy for four years.

CAROLINE GERMOND: What she said, I'm so grateful I've been part of this journey. James Madison was what I was looking form. Thank you, Coach O, for trusting me every day. And thanks to my teammates, in such a short time, they make me smile every day, so that's really good.

Q. JMU the past three seasons that just ended when they weren't supposed to. Obviously tough moment, emotional moment but what's it feel like to have played it through and played it out for the first time in a while?

KIKI JEFFERSON: It feels good. We proved a lot of people wrong. Whether they was on our side or not, we proved them wrong. Like I said, it's what Coach O deserves. He doesn't get everything he deserves. He doesn't get the recognition he deserves. But if y'all seen his eyes in the morning, it's like he hasn't slept, and we knew whatever game plan he had, we were going to buy into it because that's what he thought it was good; okay we are going to do it. That's with all the coaches, that's with everything about JMU.

SEAN O'REGAN: It's what it's supposed to be. I did think -- I called -- I don't want to say his name but I don't -- I called a friend, let's say a friend. Right before we played down at Elon in the conference tournament two years ago. Tucker, our starting center at the time who had just had back-to-back games of 20-plus against Delaware at home tore her ACL at Drexel. I called and said, hey, Tucker for tore ACL. He was like, "Man, you're snake-bitten."

And for a second, I was like, am I snake bitten? Because it seems like we got all these really good teams; and it just can't Lexie Barrier and Kamiah Smalls breaking their hands in back-to-back games, I never heard of stuff like that before.

Yeah, you think about that for, what do they say, a New York minute. You think about it for a New York minute and then you get back to work and put your hard hat on.

I'm just really happy our team, I believe -- I really believe, like, belongs here, like every single year. I think we get great student athletes. I think we treat them right, okay. Our administration down treats them the right way. We don't hold anything back. We feed them right. We give them gear. We do everything in my mind, right. So when we get high-level student athletes and you treat them right, yeah, this is where we should be playing every year.

So yeah, I don't want to say that I'm snake bitten, I'm not; but to me this is where it's supposed to be. We're here. What I wanted to explain to them was like, take a minute and understand why you got here and how you got here, because it's hard to do. It's really, really hard to do.

So take a second, let it seep in what it took to get here, because you're going to have to did it again next year. You're going to have to reset yourself and it's going to be a new cast of characters and we have to get back right here because this is where we belong and hopefully you earned yourself a higher seed because now you know what it is. You've tasted it. You've tasted this.

I firmly believe in life, you can't have sweet without sour. Can we had our sour this was sweet, being here watt sweet and by the way the sit of Columbus was awesome. Our hotel was awesome. Treated us really, really well for the record. Shout out Columbus.