BIG 12 CONFERENCE WOMEN'S TOURNAMENT

March 12, 2005

Laurie Koehn

Deb Patterson

Kendra Wecker

COACH PATTERSON: Well, I just want to congratulate Baylor. They really played a great basketball game tonight. You know, just competed the game and situations with such confidence and intelligence and aggressiveness. They were very, very good in all aspects and truly played like champions tonight. You know, I thought we were a basketball team that played small spurts of quality basketball relative to who we're capable of being. But obviously in a game of this magnitude, that's not enough. And I thought that was the difference. Baylor was consistently good and we were very sporadic tonight.

KENDRA WECKER: You know, Megan obviously was a difference maker in the game, you know, by her numbers. I think when she went out, at that point, I mean, we still had the game within, you know, reasonable reach. But, you know, we came down and we turned the ball over a couple times on offense. They converted on the other end of the floor. We just weren't -- we just didn't take care of the ball. I mean, we had the game within three a couple times, four, I mean single digits. Coming off of a game like we did against Texas, I think, you know, we got -- we kept chipping away at that lead and we were within the ballgame. We just didn't do the things on offense we needed to, you know, maintain, you know, that edge that we had.

LAURIE KOEHN: You know, I guess they're just coming out and outplaying us the beginning of the game. You know, just not coming out with the amount of intensity we needed. You know, it's tough when you've got to come back from being down like that.

KENDRA WECKER: I think, you know, again tonight, they came out, they hit their first couple shots. We turned the ball over early a couple times. You know, we just didn't maintain that focus and commitment on the offensive end that we needed to. We let them get a couple offensive rebounds and put-backs and found ourselves, you know, in a hole early. But, you know, we kept chipping away, like I said. We were definitely very much in the ballgame, you know, in the second half.

KENDRA WECKER: You know, they played straight up man-to-man. You know, I don't think we got, you know, the post hits tonight that we needed to. But, you know, again, I didn't shoot the ball extremely well. I took some tough shots. You know, that's just the way the game goes. They are tough, you know, athletic defenders. When we're, you know, not executing offense and running plays through and making silly passes and turning the ball over, then it's hard to score.

LAURIE KOEHN: Yeah, like you said, that's when we were playing like we're capable of playing. We were executing offense and getting stops on defense. You know, when we get stops and run our offense like we were running, good things happen for us.

KENDRA WECKER: Yeah, just what Laurie said, and Coach P also said that. We played spurts of the game tonight really well. But we also had, you know, big segments where we didn't play well on the offensive end of the floor. You know, like I said, turned the ball over. Things just didn't -- you know, weren't flowing for us on offense like we would have liked.

LAURIE KOEHN: Well, obviously we're very concerned. I mean, she's a teammate, been our teammate for the past four years. Any time you see a teammate go down, you're concerned and worried. You just wish and hope the best for her. You know, we don't know anything at this point, so it's kind of hard. We're just going day to day.

KENDRA WECKER: Well, I mean, basically just the same what Laurie said. You know, we just need to move forward and keep competing. We have the NCAA tournament ahead of us. That's our main focus right now. I mean, we came in here today with high expectations, but even though we did lose, we have to come out of this excited and ready to go for the tournament.

KENDRA WECKER: Well, they're, I mean, obviously tough to defend. They're big, athletic girls and they go strong to the hole. They drive the ball well from the high posts. They post up on the block hard. They're tough to defend with one just defender. I mean, if you play behind them then, you know, there's a real good chance they're going to score the ball. We kind of took advantage of it when they were out of the game. That's kind of when we get our run. They came back in and Baylor's whole purpose I think was to get them two the ball in the low block. They established that post game again once they were in there.

LAURIE KOEHN: I think basically the same thing Kendra said. You know, like she said, with them out of there, it was a lot easier for us to get a post game going. When they came back in, it's a little tougher.

COACH PATTERSON: Well, you know, Sophia's obviously a great player. Just so athletic, strong, quick, you know, with their perimeter players playing as well as they are, shooting the ball at the rate that they have been through February and January, it forces you into a lot of one-on-one situations. You know, you've got to guard their perimeters. With the tandem of Young and Blackmon, you got to respect each of those two. So there's not a lot of area in which you can help right now against that team. That's one of the reasons, though, more likely than not, they'll be the No. 1 seed in the NCAA tournament. You know, they in my mind without question are one of the Top 4 teams in the country. They are that in large part because of their great post players, but also the balance that they're bringing to the floor and playing with right now. You know, you look at Sophia's line, she's got eight boards, she's eight for 16. You look at Kendra Wecker, she's five for 15 and 16 boards. Their production is similar. Kendra's is a little more versatile, Sophia's is more that power game down there on the block. I think the reality is that they're just a very effective basketball team now because you have to pay a lot of attention to them one-on-one. She is as explosive and dynamic of a player as you want to compete against, you know, not just on the first shot, but on the second shot and on her ability to put players into foul trouble.

COACH PATTERSON: I mean, yeah, you just obviously have to be prepared to compete the full 40. And I think when we started the game, we really gave up too much early on the perimeter. I thought that was big. And then we gave up, you know, some baskets in rebounding put-back situations. And combining those two I think put us on our heels. It's something that, you know, really requires that you're climbing back up the hill, so to speak. I think you play the odds a little bit. You have to test out Baylor and see what the situation is with their perimeters early in the game. You know, if you're going to give them a little bit of ground to try to help with Sophia and Steffanie, you measure are they going to make you pay, do they have the hot hand. And what we found tonight as we started the game was that they did. You know, Scott shot the ball well, Whitaker shot the ball well early. I think in the early phase of the game, it's sort of like boxers figuring out and measuring one another. And they were very hot early, and we were not answering on the offensive end. I felt that was the biggest difference in the basketball game. I mean, we were very ineffective. We were very sloppy. We were very poor on the offensive end the first 20 minutes. You know, defensively at the end of the first half, I felt like we could be a lot better the second 20. And for moments, we were. But that's not enough to beat a team the caliber of Baylor.

COACH PATTERSON: I really believe that is about us. I thought we were very poor with our ball distribution, our cuts tonight, our overall execution. And I thought the same thing when we competed against Baylor in Waco. Certainly they're a great defensive basketball team. But I don't believe that that is as much a function of Kendra Wecker and who's guarding her in that one-on-one match-up as it is as a basketball team, we were not effective in putting enough pressure on their defense at all positions on the floor to open up easier scoring opportunities for Kendra. The way we play, it requires that a player like Kendra can become a great scorer because others are shouldering the load. You know, what we saw tonight was not enough of that from our perimeters. You know, aside from Megan Mahoney, I thought our perimeter play was very lacking. That puts all kinds of pressure on your post players - Kendra being one of them. It's a tough game.

COACH PATTERSON: No. I just know that her ankle's wrapped up right now, and that's all I know.

COACH PATTERSON: Well, tonight I wasn't comfortable with her shot selection in all minutes, but I really wasn't comfortable with the shot selection of our team in general. I wouldn't just point at Laurie with that. You know, tonight she obviously struggled. I thought she got some open looks, and they didn't drop for her. But I thought overall our decision making relative to the shots we settled for versus the kind of shots we should be willing to work to get was very poor. And I think that was a huge factor in this basketball game.

COACH PATTERSON: That was definitely a big momentum play for them. I mean, it's five on four. We had ourselves in a position prior to that incident where we were making a run. I thought we had a great deal of momentum, then they go up five on four and score, and it's a 3-point play. So that was a huge, huge play in the overall scope of the game. But we did get it back to four again. As was true all night long, we were extremely inconsistent. We didn't value our possessions and execute like you need to in crunch time. And in situations where a team like Baylor is going to hold you to the highest standard of execution, we didn't answer.

COACH PATTERSON: Well, she's obviously done a tremendous job at Baylor rebuilding the program and bringing it to national prominence. She's done a tremendous job recruiting and developing the players in the program. You know, you don't become a top five program unless you're doing some fabulous things, you and your staff. It's obvious that Baylor's playing with a great deal of confidence. There's a great deal of talent. They are playing to their strengths. It's just a great story and it's a great basketball team. They are very, very resilient and they've got a lot of answers. You know, so much of that is from I think the great job that Kim and her staff have done in recruiting the kind of players that she believes in and that fit perfectly in their system and then developing those players to a very high level.

COACH PATTERSON: Number one, no one's made her try to put any weight on her ankle. Right now it's just kind of iced and wrapped and elevated. I would expect that, you know, that would probably be the pattern through the course of the evening at the very least. And then relative to the seeding, it's anybody's guess when it comes to seeding. I feel like at this point in the tournament, you take what you're given and you head, you know, straight into it and go as aggressive and as strong as you can. We'll see.

COACH PATTERSON: Thank you.