NCAA WOMEN'S FINAL FOUR

April 6, 2004

Geno Auriemma

Jessica Moore

Diana Taurasi

Barbara Turner

JESSICA MOORE: I think that the way that our offense was set up and the play that we were running, we did a great job of running it and really being patient and I think that I did a really good job of using the screens and they were just great screens and I just happened to get open.

DIANA TAURASI: Not really. What we learned from this year is in situations like that we have to rely on each other. And I tell you, I think our character came out the most when they cut it to two. They were making their runs and every time we needed a big play from someone, you know, we got it. Whether it was Barbara, Jessica, Willnett, and we got -- someone made a big play every single time we needed one.

BARBARA TURNER: Well, yeah, the biggest thing during the course of the game was just our rebounding. And once Jessica went out, it kind of just put a little pressure on myself to make the extra effort to get every rebound on the defensive end or every loose ball and just try to be involved in wherever the ball was at coming off the rim. And for the most part I think I did a good job of that in the second half.

DIANA TAURASI: Well I thought we had a handle on it when we were up 17. And those last three, four minutes they made a huge run and we didn't respond very well. And coming into the second half, we knew it was going to be a fight. Both teams scoring, making plays are and so until probably the last couple minutes, where we had a nice lead and we really -- defensively, we just did a great job in the last two, three minutes not letting them shoot 3s and no second shots.

DIANA TAURASI: It's been amazing. Coming in as a freshman, I never expected this at all. I know I can speak for Maria and Morgan. It's been unbelievable. You really, you just you don't know what to say. I still can't believe it. Three in a row? You just don't do that. That doesn't happen to every team, to every person. And the success of the program is just on the coaching staff, they get us prepared for every game, they know how to put that hunger in you when you get there and it shows in games like this.

DIANA TAURASI: Well, it's huge. That was probably the biggest play of the game. I don't know what the score was, but just the momentum out of that play of getting in there and knocking down the free throw was huge. And Willnett does that. The only thing that's sad about is that Willnett only does that once in a while, when she could probably do it every single game consistently, but that's why she has next year and her senior year, she will step up to that role and I think she will do it.

DIANA TAURASI: Where did it go? All the way up?

DIANA TAURASI: Well, you know what -- what was the first question? (Laughter.)

DIANA TAURASI: The feeling? You can't -- it's just, you know, tingly, um, I don't know, tingly. Feels tingly. You really feel light. You just -- tingly is the only word I can use.

DIANA TAURASI: It's history. I think being from the University of Connecticut, we always think of ourselves as a basketball school and this year I think we made a definitely impact on just nationwide of how prominent our programs are and the school. The school has a lot to do with it, President Austin and everyone, they put the effort into our coaches and then our coaches go get the best players and they have been able to be dominant in the last four, five years. And this kind of caps it off.

JESSICA MOORE: I really don't know what happened. The very first time that I fell, it was me and Spencer and something gave in the back of my knee. And it really wasn't that bad and then I just got up and then after that play it just really, I don't know, something back there just pulled. And it hurt really, really bad for a good, like, 15 minutes. And then when I just got it moving again then it really just came back to normal. It's nothing serious, I don't think.

BARBARA TURNER: Yeah, I think so. I think because in the first half, toward the end of the first half, when they made their run, we kind of got away from working the ball inside. When the defense collapsed and kick it back out and that's something that we really focused on in the second half. Early on was establishing our post game again and opening up things for our guards.

DIANA TAURASI: Tennessee's been great for so long and as a little kid, that's the team everyone looked at and hopefully now I mean I think we made it. I think we're the top program out there. I don't care what anyone says anymore. I don't care. (Laughter.)

GENO AURIEMMA: Yeah. We tried mixing it up a lot, but we went on a stretch in the second half where we were playing man to man for an awfully long time. And they were finding their rhythm and she was getting into a little bit of a groove and we changed things up a little bit and AB was part of that change. And then we gave them a little different look and it was just enough to kind of throw them off and get them out of their rhythm.

GENO AURIEMMA: Well, you know, I was thinking, the NCAA tournament is like the Ryder Cup in golf. You know, you watch the Ryder Cup of golf on TV. One guy's got a five-footer for par, the other guy's got a 40-footer for birdie, and the guy misses the five-footer and guy makes the 40-footer and the match changes. And the NCAA tournaments are like that. We were up 17 and they made a run and I'm thinking, we might not be able to get the momentum back. It was all, that's all we talked about at half-time was trying to get our focus back on what we wanted to do. But I did think at one point that we were going to have a real hard time defending them. And it was really important for us to play with the lead. If we could keep it at five, six, seven, then we can change some things. So that was a big key that they never took the lead and made us be defensive. And we were always able to be a little more proactive instead of reactive.

GENO AURIEMMA: Who said that?

GENO AURIEMMA: You know, it's funny, because in '95 there was -- any time you have a lot of seniors on your team, not a lot but special seniors on your team, there's always this feeling like you just -- you know, I remember being overcome with tremendous emotion for the fact that Rebecca Lobo and Pam Webber were graduating and winning a national championship in their last game. And I do remember, when you shake hands with everybody after the game and do all that stuff, I just sat down in a chair and just kind of shook my head, saying, you know, I can't believe this. You know. And I found myself doing that for all five of them. They're all -- they all kind of take a lot out of you, like D was saying. You have almost like an out-of-body experience. You feel like you're not even you anymore.

GENO AURIEMMA: She always does. Ann always does. You could tell how aggressive she was going to be just in the opening minutes of the game. And there was a point in the second half where she posted a kid up and turned and scored, and that wasn't something that we called for, she just did that on her own. And for her to do that, she made that huge 3, when I took D out of the game, that's the way Ann plays. Ann is a big-game player. And she's had some of her best nights when D hasn't been all world. I think she's auditioning for next year, you know. She doesn't want Barbara to take all the shots.

GENO AURIEMMA: Yeah, the first half was a little bit misleading. Because it seemed like every ball that was a 50/50 ball, they got. And they scored on a bunch of those. So they really got 7 offensive rebounds and they got four that were, could have gone either way. And then the second half it happened too a couple times. But I thought the second half, we did a much, much better job of keeping a body on them and that's the most difficult thing to do against Tennessee. But the key, I think, like last year, is not giving up points off of second shots. And I don't know that we did -- I don't know that we gave up a lot of points on second shots.

GENO AURIEMMA: Not really. Because she didn't play on championship teams. But you saw the competitiveness and you saw the drive that she had. But it was a little misguided, you know. She is from California. So it was more individually directed towards scoring points and not feeling like she had a good cast around her, so what's the point? And when she played some AAU ball, I think she enjoyed that. But it wasn't until she got to Connecticut and Shea Ralph kind of whacked her a couple times the first week of practice, and then everything changed for Diana. I think she got a sense of this is what it's going to be like at the University of Connecticut. It's not going to be which team makes the most 3s, you know. And then we start playing the games and she just turns it on like nobody I've ever seen. And that's why she is who she is. She's just different. She's unique. And maybe she knew when she came out of high school, but I didn't. I didn't.

GENO AURIEMMA: Not if you go by recruiting. They just signed like the first 15 players on the All-America team. So I guess when it comes to winning, we are but when it comes to recruiting, they are. You know, that's kind of a -- you know, I don't know that somebody's going to say, well, who is the best basketball program in America? Like there's only room for one. I don't buy that. I don't feel this need to be the program and everybody else is second. I'm not one of those greedy types that I want everything and I don't want you to have anything. I'm comfortable with where we are and I'm comfortable with Tennessee being right there where they are and I would be comfortable in the next couple years if they start winning championships and we finish second, because I also understand that that's the nature of this game. This is our run. This is our time right now. '96, '97, '98, when they won three in a row, and we didn't get to the Finals, well, we got to the semifinals in '96, it was their time. And it changed for them. And it's going to change for us.

GENO AURIEMMA: Yeah. Playing at Connecticut is really, really demanding. There's a lot of interest in the program. There's a lot of people that support us and want to win. And there's a tremendous amount of, I think, responsibility, I think, that the kids carry around. And I think it got to them this year a little bit. I think the Duke game stun them a little bit, you know, and I don't know that we recovered very nicely from that, but once the season ended and all we had to do was focus on three weekends in March, that became, like, a real easy thing to do, because the journey leading up to that was very, very, very difficult. Very difficult. Because when you're the defending national champions, that's a lot different than if you're a bunch of kids trying to prove that you're really good. They had to defend it every night. And it's hard to do that. Especially now, you know, when teams are better. But the last three weeks, they made believers out of everybody. Anybody who doubted them, anybody, you know, "Connecticut's vulnerable," of course we're vulnerable, everybody is. It's just remarkable that they were able to do what they did under the circumstances that they did it in. To be 18, 19 years old and to be able to do that, you know, in front of all those people and national television audience and all that, that's pretty remarkable that these kids can do that.

GENO AURIEMMA: We did it in the first half and we didn't have any success. We got the first couple buckets, Barbara got a couple buckets, I think, and then, you know, we started making a couple threes and we got shot happy, you know. All of a sudden we got out of what we wanted to do when we got the big lead. And we came in in the second half with a plan, hey, the ball has to go in the lane. I think we can get to them. I don't think Barbara's an easy match-up. I don't think Jessica's an easy match-up. But we didn't give them a chance in the first half. And in the second half, some of the rebounds that Jessica and Barbara got, they were amazing. And like somebody pointed out, Willnett's three-point play, that was huge. Huge. And, you know, those are the kinds of things that turn games around. We're not the biggest team, obviously, we're not the most physical team, and we don't have an Ashley Robinson or a Fluker or, you know, we don't have that kind of size. So it was more of a -- you know, we had to work really, really hard to get that. They're tough, those kids. Those Tennessee kids are tough. Really tough.

GENO AURIEMMA: Thank you.