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WNBA FINALS: FEVER v MERCURY

September 29, 2009

Corey Gaines

PHOENIX, ARIZONA: Game One

Mercury -120
Fever - 116

THE MODERATOR: Coach, start with an opening statement and then we will go into questions.
COREY GAINES: Well, if you didn't like women's basketball, I think you do now! It's an exciting game for people to watch on TV. I think the first game is always the toughest game. Indiana came out strong, they shot the ball well, they picked up the pace. Some of their scorers who hadn't been scoring before started scoring. What people don't know is they always ask me, why do teams score so many points on you? And Coach Westhead, that's my mentor, who I have learned from, what you don't know is if we shoot the ball 80 times the other team shoots the ball 80 times it's not you make it and take it, it is not a pick-up game. So what happens is when we score the basket they get the ball back, if we score 90 times they will shoot the ball 90 times, that's why they score too many points, you can't shoot the ball so many times and people always ask me, why do they score so many points, that's why, I'm an econ guy, it's just simple math, if you make more shots you get more shots, that's how it is. This is a type of game I feel we can win, uptempo, a lot of points, we practice that way, we train that way. They played a great game but we got 'em in the end. Questions.

Q. Lin thought they said the difference in the game was the second-chance points, you guys getting key rebounds and keeping them from getting back in there.
COREY GAINES: We did boxout, Diana down the stretch had some -- which I call "go get" rebounds, she went and got it, didn't matter who was there, who was in front of her, she went up and got it. If they could have pounded those baskets back in, second chance points it would have hurt us, because if we don't get push we don't get easy baskets in the flow. Have to do a better job on the boards for sure. Sometimes the stats lie. You can't go by that because we won a championship without rebounding the ball well, it's more than that.

Q. Coach, did you know this was the highest scoring game in WNBA history?
COREY GAINES: No, didn't thanks. Didn't know that at all. I can say this much, I'm from L.A. and there's a person in L.A. who I think he's a broadcaster for the Clippers, he has this saying "first one to 100 wins" and as soon as we scored 100 points I was like "oh, we got that game and Diana was at the line and missed a free-throw, they had 99, they could have scored first but that type of point output helps us because in the end it's about scoring and that's what we do.

Q. Did this remind you of days at LMU?
COREY GAINES: No, not quite yet, we were putting up 167, 182, we put up some big numbers.

Q. Coach, what were the things you talk to your team about as far as the focus that you wanted for the second half?
COREY GAINES: Well, limit the turnovers, because what happens is they score on turnovers, and we had to get back because everyone there is a defensive team, if you saw they were trying to push the ball out and get early shots, so they weren't running their offense, they were trying to get down early, get us up early with a pass into the post, penetrate and get into the lane on us. So I told them we had to get back, defend the paint and play solid defense.

Q. Can you talk about the lineup you chose to go with late in the fourth quarter there, the lineup that turned things around for you guys.
COREY GAINES: It was D.B., it was Nicole Ohlde, the one with Cappie, Penny and Diana. I felt that Cappie got a rest in the first half because she was in foul trouble so I knew she had fresh legs and Cappie is a combo guard, she's more than a combo guard, she is the type of player that can attack from any angle, she doesn't need a position, so if I had her on the ball and ran drags up late in the offense she would get into the lane or be able to create her own shot without thinking about it.
So I went with her at the point and Nicole Ohlde was bigger than Tangela because they were trying to get the ball inside and Nicole Ohlde can bang with Brown down low and Penny was scoring so well I knew their defense would have to play honest with Diana, not that we can't score but it's a different type of score with Cappie.

Q. Can you talk about Temeka Johnson's ability to shoot from the outside and how it's been lying dormant all these past years and it's a bust-out season for her.
COREY GAINES: I feel she has always been able to shoot that way, and I can't speak for other coaches who had her, they may have wanted her to do the traditional point guard role, get the scorers in the right position, so maybe that's what she was told to do. First thing I told her, whatever you learned before in basketball throw that out the window because we don't do that here. I want her to be a scoring threat, if you shoot the 3 shoot the three, don't worry about it. It's funny how if you give someone confidence they shoot the ball better. And that's all scoring is is confidence, I told her we traded for you, I believe in you, shoot the ball, the worst thing that happens is you miss, so what? She's always had that, I'm for sure not a shooting coach. She's always had that.

Q. Did Ebony Hoffman surprise you tonight?
COREY GAINES: Yes, she did, I've been watching her and she was struggling the last they know games of the year, I watched the playoff games against Detroit and the whole time in our shootaround I was saying she's a little off, maybe we can cheat off her a little bit, it by the me, she had some big shoots. She's a great shooter she just had a streak of missing some shots. She's always been a great shooter.

Q. Can you talk about Penny Taylor's night tonight.
COREY GAINES: Penny helped us because Cappie had 1 or 2 points at halftime and as we know Penny is one of the top players in the world, she can definitely score and she had 18 at half, I think she had 18 at half, Penny came out and she was feeling it, so that's a luxury, I could rest Cappie, foul trouble and go with Penny. It's a different type of attack but it gets points on the board. We need Penny.

Q. Coach, it seemed like it didn't matter what happened before overtime, Cappie and D were in foul trouble, but in overtime they took over and even though they didn't do so well before that it seemed like it didn't trouble them at all.
COREY GAINES: That's the type of players they are. We were running sets that maybe were too crowded, called "gets" pick-and-rolls, so I took those off, we ran 2 H's, anybody that watches the game tape would know what we were doing and we gave them more space to work with, it was a different look for them and it gave them a better chance to score the ball and I know Cappie, D, and Penny, there is no such thing as "pressure" they played in big games all their lives, they played in Europe big games, college big games and WNBA before, so I have a lot of faith in them.

End of FastScripts

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