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WNBA FINALS: MERCURY v SHOCKSeptember 8, 2007Tangela SmithDiana TaurasiDETROIT MICHIGAN: Game Two KAREN KASE: We'll go right into questions for the players. Q. After the struggles in Game 1, how important was it for you personally to come out and have, get your touch back early tonight? DIANA TAURASI: I wasn't too focused on it. The way we played this year and the way we have gone about games, it's not just one person that gets us off. And Game 1, I struggled personally, but the team as a whole I thought we played well. Not good enough to win but we saw spurts of what we did during the year to kind of bring it over to Game 2. So today was just everybody feeling good, feeling confident and playing like that. Q. 30 point blow out, heading back to Phoenix, about how much of a momentum shift is this for you guys? DIANA TAURASI: It's huge. No matter what, in any series you want to at least get one on the road. And Detroit is a tough place to play at. They play really well here and the crowd gets into it. They heckle, they go after you hard. So to come here and play well and actually win the game, going back to Phoenix 1-1 is huge for our team. I really think it's going to be key. Q. Do you feel like you have to close it out there because they play so well? DIANA TAURASI: I think we're just going to have to take Game 3 right now. We can't look at it, well we got to win two in a row. Because you got to win one to win two. To win two in a row. So if that makes sense, right? So we got to win one first. Q. Coach talked about you providing some veteran leadership today, was there anything you tried to do specifically to get everybody calmed down after the first game? TANGELA SMITH: No, I think everybody was pretty much calm because we know that this is a five game series and one game, if it was a one game series, we should have been mad about it, but it's not and everybody stayed calm and we just went out there today and pretty much played our game plan and we just, we were more aggressive. Our defense was on point. So we just wanted to do that and stay calm on that. Q. Do you expect them to be mad in Game 3? Coach Laimbeer was saying they're going to come out mad because of what happened? DIANA TAURASI: Shoot, I would be mad. Q. You would be? DIANA TAURASI: After getting beat by 30, I would be furious. Q. Tangela, you were pumped up after those two threes, sorry that you had to come out? TANGELA SMITH: No, coach said that, didn't he. Coach said when you hit two shots, you got to come out. (Laughter.) No, I was just taking what was given to me and I think everybody on the team was doing the exact same thing. My teammates found me and I felt comfortable. So I just continued to shoot the ball. Fortunately it went in. Q. Both of you talk about Kelly Miller's role and what she does for you. DIANA TAURASI: Coach always talks about it, you got the four wheels, Cappie, Penny, Tangela, and me. Kelly really is the motor. She gets this team going. Every chance for them to kind of get into it, it was either Kelly Miller tip-in or Kelly Miller offensive rebound, defense rebound, she pushes the tempo. She does so much for us. She really is the, unsung hero. We get a lot of the credit, but it really is a lot of Kelly Miller that gets us, gets us our opportunities. So she's just amazing, she really is amazing. TANGELA SMITH: We definitely wouldn't be in this position without her. Because she's done so much to help this people. With the offensive rebounding, she sparks our defense too because she's always in the passing lanes. And I just feel that without Kelly we wouldn't be in the position that we are in now. Without all of our teammates, but definitely Kelly Miller. Q. You talked about defense. Major adjustments, minor adjustments? TANGELA SMITH: We pretty much stuck to what we usually do. We made some adjustments. But basically it's all about us and what we got to bring out there. When we come out there on the court we know we need to play aggressive and we know that just to go out there and just to try to bang with them, but whatever, whatever, we need to just do our game plan and go out there and do what we need to do. Q. Are you okay with a split? TANGELA SMITH: Are we okay with a split? DIANA TAURASI: It would have been nice to win two, but one is nice, I guess. TANGELA SMITH: Yeah. DIANA TAURASI: We'll take one. TANGELA SMITH: We're going home now. DIANA TAURASI: Got to buy coach some new shoes now. (Laughter.) Q. New shoes, how come? DIANA TAURASI: We're sitting there -- TANGELA SMITH: Ask him about that. DIANA TAURASI: We were sitting there, we look down and coach has got two different pairs of shoes on. So that was the talk of the -- that was our game plan is to get coach two matching shoes. TANGELA SMITH: A brand new pair of shoes. Q. Was it brown and break? TANGELA SMITH: No, they were two black shoes. DIANA TAURASI: One was gator leather and the other had a buckle penny loafer. It was weird. Q. What was it again? DIANA TAURASI: Never mind. Q. Gator? DIANA TAURASI: One was gator leather and the other was like a penny loafer type shoe. You know coach is a little old, we got to get him into style. Q. You don't think he may have done that on purpose? DIANA TAURASI: No, because he was as red as those chairs. He was all he was feeling the heat. Q. So some more poetry or music or something? DIANA TAURASI: He needs some fashion tips. We'll hook him up though. We'll get him ready for next year. KAREN KASE: Thanks a lot, ladies. End of FastScripts |
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