NCAA WOMEN'S FINAL FOUR

April 2, 2005

Kristin Haynie

Joanne P. McCallie

Kelli Roehrig

JOANNE P. McCALLIE: Great. Obviously we're working hard and excited to return to Indy. This is a great city. We appreciate this city very much and their commitment to basketball overall and their commitment to the Big Ten tournament. So it is great to be back. Our team is working on getting better. We played some great teams. We were able to get better and move on which is a lot of fun. And we are definitely looking forward to the opportunity tomorrow night, I know again another great team. All the teams right now are very very good as you already know. And we're just working on increasing our ability to put more minutes together and going for that very difficult 40-minute performance and that's very hard to do, especially under the circumstances where there's this great defensive teams everywhere. So we're looking forward to that opportunity. And that's it.

KRISTIN HAYNIE: It's definitely a fun experience. It's every kid's dream to make it to the Final Four and to get here and it's just been a lot of fun. There's times where you have to be serious, but there's times to have fun too and our team is having fun and we're just ready to finally play a game tomorrow.

KELLI ROEHRIG: Kelli, I agree. (Laughter.)

KRISTIN HAYNIE: On the court? I love just making my teammates better and just passing the ball, making them look good. That's what I love to do.

KELLI ROEHRIG: I think it says a lot. Not just about Michigan State, but basketball, but about the whole university and we had a great season. And we deserve to be here. I think it says a lot to all the other teams out there that are striving to be great.

KRISTIN HAYNIE: Not at all. It's just another game. We have played great teams this season. We have had a great schedule and we're ready. It's just everyone's great and we're great, Tennessee is great, so it's going to be a great game tomorrow.

KELLI ROEHRIG: Yeah, pretty much the same. We have experience in tournaments too. Big Ten tournament, we never had gone that far. So look what we did there. So it doesn't -- I mean experience is great but we have experience so...

KELLI ROEHRIG: I really think our last two games are going to help us a lot in the rebounding standpoint of the game. Tennessee is a great rebounding team. And that's really going to be the key for us. To box out and the physical post players and guards that go in there, so we just got to really box out and key on rebounding.

KRISTIN HAYNIE: Tennessee is definitely, they have great defense, man-to-man they're physical. They love to grab and hold. We're used to that. I think the Big Ten is one of the toughest in the conference, we like those physical games. It's a blood battle, we love it and we're just going to go out and enjoy it.

KRISTIN HAYNIE: Coming out of the first half and the second half the Stanford game we got a great start and that's what Michigan State basketball is all about. It's fun when we do that. We just have to get that attack mentality and do the same thing tomorrow night.

KELLI ROEHRIG: We actually are pretty good friends. Kristin and I have grown up with their seniors as well and we will watch them tonight and we will be cheering for them. And I'm sure there will be many cell phone calls after they win, so...

KELLI ROEHRIG: Well, I think that, I mean, you know, they have a tradition. They really do. But the thing is with us is that when we step on the court it's us versus them. Michigan State of now versus Tennessee of now.

KRISTIN HAYNIE: Well, No. 1 thing is rebounding. That goes without saying, every game. We just have to be disciplined enough to box them out. They have great rebounders. They're athletic, they can jump so we got to really key on rebounding. Then stopping their transition is another important factor in the game.

JOANNE P. McCALLIE: I think it's a great thing. I think it brings even more awareness to women's basketball. To bring out different regions of the country and to introduce the game at this level with different institutions, I think it's a great thing. You can get more people involved if there's different teams getting after it and making it. Certainly it works both ways. The traditional teams like a Tennessee or a Connecticut, that's also helped put women's basketball on the map too, for what they have done. I think women's basketball has grown to a point now where now people are looking for more, so it's all a process, I guess. But if it benefits the sport, that's a great thing and if we can benefit the sport in some way, that's a big thing and that's a great thing.

JOANNE P. McCALLIE: That is not true.

JOANNE P. McCALLIE: She would kill me if she hears you say that.

JOANNE P. McCALLIE: First you have to do a little bit more background there. I had just been hired on at Michigan State. One thing I said to Kristin was, the best respect I could show you is to know your game. And a lot of people told me to sign Kristin sight unseen. Don't worry about watching her; just sign her. And I thought that was very superficial. And I said to her, if you can hang with me, give me some time to see you play, because remember I was hired in June -- March. Sorry. March. Wrong month. March, I was hired in March and I didn't get there until April. And I wasn't able to see Kristin play until really July. And so she came by the office and we talked and everything, and that was terrific. But I said, you know, I haven't seen you play. And then when I saw her play, I kind of looked at her like, I don't know. I mean it looks like you got a lot more than that. And when I saw her play and she came to our team camp in July -- I want to say this is late July now -- and then she did one of those triple-double things, and I said excuse me, we need to talk. (Laughter.) Because I finally was really able to see Kristin offer what she could offer. So I just felt strongly about not making real quick judgments and in going to Michigan State and letting her know that I understood her game. And I understood what she could do. She's been a starter ever since and it's been a really fun relationship.

JOANNE P. McCALLIE: I don't know. I think that -- I don't think it's overly important for anyone to do anything in that regard. I just think that you got four great teams here. And they're all independent of each other. And I think it's -- I hope the games are terrific. I guess the most important thing is the quality of competition and the battles out there. And that's a pretty key ingredient, getting people to watch the games and I think that's the biggest issue. I don't think people totally care like an underdog has to win it. I think that's great. But I think that that's not really the point. As long as people are exposed to the game, tune in to the game and are educated about the teams that are here and how the teams got here. I think that's important.

JOANNE P. McCALLIE: Well, beating UCONN by 16 in front of 15,000 people, beating Notre Dame at Notre Dame in front of 7,000 people in overtime, beating Ohio State in front of 14,000, to me our schedule has prepared these kids. We're not even in Knoxville. I would picture the game like you're playing at Knoxville, like you completely have all things going against you. And then what are you going to do after that? I just think that this team needs, deserves credit for the schedule they played, and how they did with the schedule they played. They beat Minnesota three times. That's an incredible thing, I think. Tennessee is a great team. But at the same time these other teams are really, really good too. So I just feel like they have been through a lot and they're always respectful but really excited to play everybody and it's pretty much poetic justice that we would play Tennessee, given the schedule we have had this year. It kind of, you know, why not bring on such a great program, and so that's just -- it seems fitting, really.

JOANNE P. McCALLIE: Well, she's gotten so healthy now first of all. Because we have had two years of bad health. So she's gotten completely healthy. She has just improved in I think every area. Her anticipation has -- everything about her game, her ball handling, anticipation, her passing, her ability to run the fast break, her three-point shooting, her assist-to-turnover ratio, I don't think there's an area of her game that hasn't taken leaps and bounds, particularly as she's gone through her senior year. And this is definitely, if you want to call it a breakout year or whatever, but it's a phenomenal year based on the close games that she has directed and led. Her IQ in decision-making is something you cannot teach people very easily.

JOANNE P. McCALLIE: Well, we definitely -- it really started in the summer. It was the summer commitment and workouts which gave me an indication that they might get serious. And what I mean by that is we have two gyms connecting, the guy's gym and our gym and usually there's all these guys playing and this summer it was equally busy; guys, gals, all through the summer. And so we had fun with our poster, we put out a poster that said "driven" and it had an Indy theme to it and we put that poster out in September and October. And the ladies looked at it like, yeah, we all thought about Indy but you put it out there and then you sort of go to work. And so as the year went on, I think that there are games that were significant, Notre Dame was very significant to us. Being able to come back from being seven down with 40 seconds left, having that resiliency. So that was kind of a game and then we continued to move along and have games along the way that were just we played steady and we continued to get better. So I think as coaches we were really intrigued by the summer, and we really thought absolutely we could do it and then the evidence kept coming in as we played games. So it was kind of a slow thing and it's worked out great and here we are.

JOANNE P. McCALLIE: Well, Michigan State was a unique story and I was being recruited by Michigan State, led by Shelly Applebaum was in the room, our SWA and Clarence Underwood at that time, and the men were going on the 2000 National Championship with Mateen and all them. And the best thing I could do to tell you the very short story it was the people that made the difference. I was pregnant with my second child, so there were definitely constraints in my life. And they recruited me very methodically, led by Shelly and many, many phone calls. Somewhat stalking us weekly -- just kidding, Shelly. So they just did everything very professionally and very organized and different people would call. They worked very hard to call me on my off day, for example, because of conflicts of interest, they showed tremendous professionalism throughout. And it really was one of those things where I signed on to Michigan State sight unseen. When they flew out to see me at Maine, at the time they did, I mean they had many choices of who they would bring. And they brought a jet of 10 to 12 people up to do a presentation. And I thought, I mean they could have brought two people, I suppose, and it was quite overwhelming to me and my husband. My husband was met with great discussion with the vice president at Michigan State, Fred Poston, we communicated and it just seemed like absolutely the right thing. I didn't even know what Michigan State looked like. I couldn't remember it because when I played there all we did was see the inside of Jenison. So I didn't know anything about it but people told me it was beautiful. I was quite happy when I got there to find out that they were right.

JOANNE P. McCALLIE: It just wasn't the right fit. I know as an alum that sounds like a very strange thing so say but the overall commitment piece was huge to me and I was able to look and talk to Shelly and everyone at Michigan State and say, you know, you want to commit like the men and here the men are winning a national championship. And I just felt that commitment so largely from Michigan State.

JOANNE P. McCALLIE: She's our sixth starter. We don't have five, we have six starters. And Rene has started games come off the bench but her value to this team right now has been that incredible energy off the bench. She's a tremendous player, gives us great defensive and offensive energy and just gives us a competitive, oh, just a competitive boost that is really good for our team. And so that's why she's been coming off the bench. But we are a team of six starters, she's a terrific person, very passionate about what she does and who she is and terrific family, I could talk a long time about Rene. She's something special and I knew it when I saw her play immediately I was absolutely thrilled at her frame and her body and of course then I got to know her so well and that's been a really a really positive recruiting story.

JOANNE P. McCALLIE: Hey, now, thank you for doing that homework. Wow. That was a good game. I think we lost by three, and I just was fired up. I was fired up to play Tennessee, and I don't know, I was kind of knocking down a few and, the way I look at it is we didn't even have the three-point shot back at that time. So if we got a three-point shot instead of 20 points it could have been 28, could have been 30. But I saw Tennessee note and I couldn't help myself, I circled it and showed to the players and said, you can't beat this. Well, what can you do? (Laughter.)

JOANNE P. McCALLIE: First of all, Al brings so much to our staff regardless of any connection he might have. He has to be one of the greatest basketball minds I've had the pleasure of being around. It has been so much fun to work with Al. I can't begin to tell you. I would of to talk to you a long time. But so I can't say enough about Al and his just his overall influence and he's allowed me to be more rested, more focused, by having such strength from him, it's been a wonderful thing. From the standpoint of Semeka. Semeka is a player turned coach shows she's learning and growing and she definitely has insights about Tennessee. And of course Al has coached, many coaching insights about Tennessee. But I think that at this point in time there is such a thing as information overload. And for us it's all -- it's been about us all year. We have never overdone any opponent that we have played. And we certainly will not stop now. So we have done our normal whatever scouting thing, and that's what we're going to do. Because it's about us, we know what we have to do, we respect their strengths, and that's what we're going to keep it.

JOANNE P. McCALLIE: Yes, yes. Some of them are here as a matter of fact. And many of them were at Connecticut. When we came back to Connecticut we had this huge contingent of former Maine players, which was terrific to see every one of them. My time at Maine was absolutely phenomenal. It was an eight-year run, filled with beating lots of teams; Alabama, when they were ranked 10th in country and we were so thrilled to bring that to the arena. I could go -- by the way, Cindy Blodgett was a freshman and had 30 in that game. So I got lots of stories about Maine. Cindy has emailed me recently, has kept in touch, has played professionally. She's a terrific person. I'm in contact with a lot of those players just for obvious reasons, people getting married, and so forth, I mean doing what -- getting new jobs, going to law school. Things of that nature. But I speak very fondly because Maine was a special opportunity for me. I was 26 years old, when I was hired there. Mike Plasick was the AD, and he believed in me as a young coach which I really am grateful for that he did that. And I was so grateful that Michigan State came along when they did because I was ready to go. I mean it was time. We had done something very special and it was time to move on. So it's a neat story, it really worked out great. I think that I waved to Ellen Garrity a former Maine player as I was just at practice and there's a bunch of others, but I haven't seen them yet. Because you know we're in the cocoon, we're part of the circus, so...

JOANNE P. McCALLIE: It's kind of funny, you always hope things can just go as they have for us. But all I can really remember is just wanting so badly to get things pointed in the right direction. And I can remember my first year thinking, I just can't stand this. I can't stand this. I just can't stand it. No NCAA tournament, no nothing. And I just remember being very motivated and very, surrounded by wonderful people, wonderful staff that have all gone on and become head coaches or whatever, and I just remember being very motivated about doing better and growing the program. And that's all I can really tell you. I had no particular year and I think it's probably come pretty fast. This is pretty fast. It's just, it has a lot to do with the players. Has a lot to do with Kristin Haynie, Kelli Roehrig, Liz Shimek and Lindsay Bowen; those four are very key to what's happening right now.