BIG EAST CONFERENCE WOMEN'S BASKETBALL TOURNAMENT

March 8, 2025

Darnell Haney

Kelsey Ransom

Mohegan Sun Arena

Georgetown Hoyas

Postgame Media Conference

Creighton 72, Georgetown 70

THE MODERATOR: Joining us Head Coach Darnell Haney, student-athlete Kelsey Ransom. We'll start with an opening statement from Coach.

DARNELL HANEY: First off, hello, everyone. I want to give glory to my God and the father. He's done an amazing job with these young women in our program, and he's helped us tremendously in all aspects.

I am extremely proud of our group. This group played their butts off. We were able to get through a tremendous amount of adversity, right, as a group, and I'm just proud of them.

Proud of this young woman that's next to me. The legacy she's left at Georgetown University is one of a kind. There's no doubt in my mind she's, what do they say, first-ballot Hall of Famer. She's done a tremendous job for this program.

She's done a tremendous job for this conference. She represents our program in just a great way, man. She's left a legacy, a big-time legacy here. I'm proud of her and the woman she's become. Not just the basketball player. The young woman she's become.

She showed these young people that we have in our group, she showed them how to be an upstanding ambassador for this university, and I'm extremely proud of her for that.

THE MODERATOR: Questions for Kelsey.

Q. Over the years, you and Lauren in particular, because you guys match up with each other a lot positionally, have gone through a lot of wars back and forth. What was it like to go through just one more where it was just punch for punch down the stretch?

KELSEY RANSOM: She's a fantastic player, three-level scorer. I'll see her at the next level, so it won't be the last time we see each other.

It's fantastic having good competition in front of you, and that's what you practice for, and that's the best type of games when you have great players to guard and great players who are guarding you.

It's an honor to go out there and play against anybody, but a great team like Creighton and the great players on that team, it's fun. It's a great time to showcase who you are as a basketball player, who you are as a leader. As people who have been here for five years, it's kind of rare now in college basketball. I respect her so much and her game. Again, I'll see her soon.

Q. How much confidence did you guys have not only as the game got on and you started knocking down shots, but carry-over from last year's matchup, the thrilling win yesterday, just that you guys could hang in there tonight no matter when Creighton was on offensively or whatever was happening?

KELSEY RANSOM: We have the utmost confidence in our team coming to this tournament, and we just ran out of time. Give us ten extra minutes, and who knows what could have happened. 1 through 13, we go out there with the mission to win, and we have goals that we try to hit.

And so you have confidence in your -- you rest on your laurels and what you practice and the baseline stuff that you've instilled. Going in there knowing that it's about who has the fresh legs, who can get the shots up in the fourth quarter, and you just got to rest on what you know.

That's our defense and scout, and that's just who we are.

Q. How would you describe these last two matchups with Creighton here? They have been real battles right down to the wire, both of them.

KELSEY RANSOM: Two great programs. Two fantastically coached teams. It's a chess match. I can't even imagine what he has to go through mentally.

Again, it's fun. That's a fantastic team. It's a different style of play we don't see too often, so it's fantastic to prepare for them. It tests us as a young group, testing our freshmen to be able to communicate, being able to go out there, play without fouling, playing again against a team that has played together for five years as well.

That matchup last year and this year, same high intensity, same going on runs back and forth. As a basketball player it was a really fun game to be a part of. Not the outcome we wanted, but the 40 minutes that it was was the most mentally locked in physically and emotionally, and you wouldn't trade that for anything.

Q. You spoke about the next level. You're playing in a WNBA arena. Is that on your mind when you walked in here that, hey, this is what I want for the next step in my life?

KELSEY RANSOM: As it gets closer and closer, you think about it. It becomes more realistic. Obviously staying present and being where my feet are and trying to be where I am, wearing the Georgetown uniform.

But knowing that I'm playing and my career is going to come to an end here, that I will be probably in this arena at some point in the coming months or, you know, within the next year.

Q. You played another 40 minutes tonight and left everything out there. You seem like someone who just enjoys hooping. Can you just speak to your joy and love of the game of basketball?

KELSEY RANSOM: I don't know. I just like it. You keep doing it as long as it's fun, and that's why I want to keep playing until my body tells me I can't.

The ability to just wake up every day and have two working legs that allow me to run really fast and to lift. And you find joy in every aspect of getting better. That's conditioning. That's lifting. That's film.

You just immerse yourself in the experience of becoming a better basketball player. That's when games like this become fun because you've prepped for it for so many months.

I just find a lot of joy in that. I find a lot of joy with my teammates and the preparation we've had. Summer kicked our butts, but that's what got us here.

The game of basketball has given me so much, so it's only right that I give it my all. If it's 40 minutes, if it's 2 minutes, whatever it needs.

Q. Just curious what this season -- I mean, really the last 12 months have meant to you. You guys went through really just an unprecedented tragedy, and then you get Georgetown to the Big East tournament finals last year. The Sportsmanship Award is kind of like the award the coaches give to the players that they respect the most in the conference. I'm curious what this last 12 months has meant to you as finishing out your college basketball career?

KELSEY RANSOM: Oh, man. Last 12 months have been fantastic, honestly, and I'm grateful for every single second of it. Every single day I'm learning something about myself or somebody else or something about the world. Sorry.

I've learned so much gratitude and being present in the moment and to lean on people around you. It's very rare to have a group of people that want the best for you genuinely, and I have found that in my home at Georgetown.

Staying in my fifth year, there was no question that this was the place I was supposed to be. My coaching staff and Coach Haney gave me everything I needed, and I wanted to give them everything I had.

And the last year has just been the most joyous and rewarding year of my life because you have people who are living through love with you and want to see you be better, and you want to see them be better.

That's not always the case everywhere you are at. So I have made fantastic relationships. The last 12 months have given me so much that extends past today. It will be at my wedding, at my teammates' weddings, and years and years to come.

I'm very, very grateful that I'm with people who love me and that I love them. A loss like this doesn't deter our relationships, and we will be with each other forever.

THE MODERATOR: Kelsey, thank you so much.

KELSEY RANSOM: Thank you, guys. It's been fantastic. I love you all.

THE MODERATOR: Questions for Coach.

Q. I kind of want to start where she left off.

DARNELL HANEY: It's who she is.

Q. I don't think we touch on those stories enough. We always talk about what's wrong with everything in terms of the sport. With her just sticking around, she was -- her profile was really high last March. She could have kind of just opened the doors and gone anywhere she wanted. What did it mean to kind of have her just as the tip of your spear this year?

DARNELL HANEY: I'm going to be honest with you. As soon as we got off the plane after the Big East tournament last year, I told Kelsey Ransom, we have to have lunch. Let's go to the cafeteria. Let's have some lunch, man. Because it was imperative that we did whatever we had to do to make sure we gave our best effort to get her back here.

It wasn't just because she could play basketball. You just heard who she is, man. That's her heart and soul, and she gives her heart and soul on the floor. She gives her heart and soul into -- she puts everything she has into her team, into the people she loves, into the people that love her. It's just a testament to who she is that she came back, the person she is.

We've got a lot of people that, you know, they go in this climate that we're in right now, you got a lot of people that are, you know, trying to throw money people's way, right? And she understands that that's not what it's about. The Georgetown education and being around people that love you and being around people that aren't going to use you for putting the ball in the basket only, right, is where you need to be. It's a great job.

I want to just give a shout-out to her parents and her support group and her support system that surround her because that's what they're feeding her every single day. So it's just a testament to who that young woman is. Like I said, in my opinion, she's a first ballot Hall of Famer.

She's one of the best players to ever play at Georgetown, if not -- arguably she's in the top two or three in my opinion. You have Brunson who was tremendous. You have Sugar Rodgers, who was tremendous, and then you got Kelsey Ransom.

There's no doubt in my mind the impact she's made on my life, the impact she's made on my family, the impact she's made at this university. It's tremendous.

To speak to that, we were at Thanksgiving dinner at my house this year, and my wife, you know, we might want to go out, have a date night or something. Guess who the first one to volunteer to babysit? It's just who she is, man. Great individual. Great just person.

In my mind she's a WNBA player. Not because she's just super skilled. She's just going to will you to win.

You want somebody that's a winner that's going to come in here and get you wins, that's going to get you to do the things that it takes -- she got in there and rebound. She almost had a triple-double tonight.

So it's just a testament to who she is and her family and everything about that young woman, man, is tremendous. Proud of her.