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BIG TEN CONFERENCE MEDIA DAYS (WOMEN)

October 29, 2009

Pam Borton

CHICAGO, ILLINOIS

PAM BORTON: Well, it's great to be here, and it's an exciting time of the year just getting started with the basketball season. But I'm very excited about our team this year, our mindset and the way we were able to get a great first-round win last year in the NCAA Tournament, and that's going to carry over into the season this year.
We've got a great veteran group, two fifth-year seniors, other seniors that have logged a lot of minutes and played every single game since we started at Minnesota. So we've got a veteran with the return of Kiara Buford, who made the All Rookie Team last year. She's playing very well, also, as well as Jackie Voigt, who was a freshman last year, a sophomore this year, and she started every game as a freshman. We're excited about the veterans and the returners that we have with the addition of our exciting freshman class.

Q. Coaches picked you to finish third, media says fourth in the Big Ten poll. Can you talk about that? Were you surprised by that at all?
PAM BORTON: I don't think I was surprised at it. We're returning a veteran team. I think the teams ahead of us are pretty obvious for preseason picks with Michigan State returning five to seven seniors and Ohio State with the Defensive, Rookie and Player of the Year all returning on their team, as well. I think a lot of people have a lot of respect for our program, and the four returners from our team and basically how we finished last year.
I'm not surprised, but we'd like to be in that No. 1 slot by the end of the season, but it's going to be a battle every single night. You can finish anywhere in the Big Ten because it's such a very competitive conference.

Q. You worked to put together a pretty competitive schedule in the non-conference portion of the season. Can you just talk about the value of that, and how do you think that's going to help your team once Big Ten play begins.
PAM BORTON: Well, I think we have a team this year that we were able to put that schedule together. You know, I'd be interested to see if we've got the toughest non-conference schedule in the Big Ten in looking at it with the trip to the Bahamas with TCU, and we play the winner of Xavier and Kansas. We've got Iowa State, which is always a very competitive game. Some of the teams that we play, like Lamar had 20 wins last year, and this is a very, very -- we're at Maryland. I mean, the list goes on.
I think we've got a team that we were able to put that together. It's probably the toughest non-conference schedule in the eight years I've been here. So hopefully it will prepare us and not wear us out before the Big Ten starts.

Q. The roster is composed of about four sophomores and three freshmen, but it also has five seniors and you mentioned it's a veteran team. Is that going to impact the play of the lower classmen?
PAM BORTON: I think it's impacted their play already in practice. Our younger kids are learning at a faster rate. We've got more leaders on the floor. Just a lot of great mentors and role models from our veterans.
I think when you have a team full of a lot of younger kids, I think you learn at a slower pace maybe than with a team with a veteran -- there's more teachers on the court, and the younger players have to learn quicker. At some point during your preseason here you've got to move on as a team, and your younger kids have to catch up because we've got to get ready for games. I think when you put younger kids in that type of situation, they either have to figure it out quick or they don't figure it out, and usually you've got a couple kids that figure it out and you can bring them along for the beginning of the season.
You know, it's an interesting dynamic. This is probably the first time since I've been in coaching that I've had this many veterans and returners returning to a team with this many young kids, as well, and so it's an interesting dynamic, which is a lot of fun.

Q. Can you just talk about Jackie and Kiara and sort of what you're expecting this year, especially with Emily Fox being gone.
PAM BORTON: Well, I expect Jackie and Kiara to be way better than they were last year. Jackie started every game for us and was -- and I felt like if we didn't have Jackie last year, it would have been tough for us to win basketball games, and the same with Kiara. Kiara came off the bench and I think she averaged 20 to 22 minutes a game, helped us win big games as a freshman on the road, really stepped up throughout the year, and I think it's pretty unusual for a freshman to be able to do that in a league like this, to come in and be an impact player.
Kiara right now, I can see her in that starting position for Emily right now. If we had a game today, Kiara would be starting. Jackie has picked up her game, and she has gotten a lot stronger than last year, has really expanded her game, and so has Kiara. Their confidence level is just so different their second year just because they know what's going on, they've got it figured out. They don't have to think about the plays and learning the system, they can just get out there and play and just continue to grow as players.

Q. What do you expect out of your incoming recruiting class? Is this a class that can compete right away do you think, or is this something where maybe one, two, three years down the road you'll expect more of an impact from them?
PAM BORTON: Well, I think it depends on their learning curve and how quickly they pick things up. I think our guards in Leah Cotton and China Antoine, China will back up Brittany at the point, I think it gives us a little depth. Coming from junior college it's a little different. It's not this level and it's not high school. So she's somewhere in between, and I think she'll be able to give us some good backup minutes, especially at the beginning of the year, and her growing into that position and growing into the league. She's a very, very competitive -- very true point guard. It's been a long time since we've had a true point guard on our team.
And then Leah Cotton, she's probably the strongest player on our team. She's extremely explosive, can get to the rim, finish with contact. So it's been a long time since we've had a player like that on our team, as well. Again, she's going to go through a learning curve learning the system and everything that freshmen go through.
And then Katie Loberg is probably the most athletic post player we've had. She can run the floor like a guard, she's 6'4", she high jumped 5'10" in high school, so she's very athletic, just brings a whole different dimension to our team. We're hoping to play all three of those kids.
I think Amber our 6'7" is a little further away and needs some time to continue to develop, but she's got a bright future ahead of her.

Q. I heard the decision now that you guys are going to play 16 regular season games starting next year. Were you in favor of that, and what will that do for the overall league?
PAM BORTON: Well, I think we as women's basketball coaches wanted to get it down to a more manageable conference schedule instead of us beating each other up. I think I just saw the SEC just went to 16 games; they were at 14. So we did add a Big 10-Big 12 Challenge in conjunction with that, so we will be playing somebody else and not ourselves for another game, and I know they're working on something else. We're still going to play two very competitive games but somebody different, so we're not playing each other two or three times during the season, so I think it's a very positive thing.

End of FastScripts

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