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BIG TEN CONFERENCE WOMEN'S TOURNAMENTMarch 3, 2011Kendall HackneyAmy JaeschkeJoe McKeownINDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA Northwestern – 53 THE MODERATOR: We'll let Coach McKeown give his opening statement and then we'll open it up for the players, student-athletes. COACH MCKEOWN: When you coach a long time, you've been in a lot of tournaments, you realize you're going to have bad stretches, bad halves. And sometimes it's good to get that out of your system if you're fortunate enough to win the basketball game. And it was ugly for a while, it was sloppy, but I thought our team did a tremendous job of playing the last three minutes like a tournament team. Took care of everything. We really closed the game out. I was really proud how we closed the game out well. We had some stretches in between that were shaky, and Minnesota is one of the most dangerous teams in the Big Ten. So I'm just glad. You just want to move on. You're not worried about who missed a shot or who got in foul trouble tonight. You just play. And really excited about being able to play tomorrow. THE MODERATOR: Questions for the student-athletes. Q. Amy, can you just talk about what the battle was like in the post? Obviously there were plenty of misses to fight for rebounds on. AMY JAESCHKE: Yeah. I think the Minnesota players are very physical down low. So they make it really hard to play against them offensively, and they really crash hard for boards and stuff. So it was a tough assignment for us tonight, but they did a good job. Q. Amy, can you talk a little bit about the emotion of this game, in particular towards the end of the game you did a 3-point play and you did a chest bump over there. And what was going on there and what was running through your mind? AMY JAESCHKE: As a senior class we talk a lot to the younger girls on the team about things we want to accomplish before we leave the program, and one of them was to win the first round of the Big Ten tournament. We'd never done it before. So really at that point we were riding on emotions wanting to win that game. So I think that's where the chest bump came in. Q. Kendall, for a lot of players, a pretty slow offensive game, but you managed to have -- obviously getting 22 points tonight. Can you talk about what enabled you to have success while others were maybe struggling to get their looks? KENDALL HACKNEY: Today I thought we rotated the ball well. And I was open. Coach always tells us to shoot, just keep shooting, even though I may have taken some bad shots. But moving on from that, you know, my teammates just got me back in it and they told me not to stop, keep shooting because they know I'm not -- I try to be confident in my shot, and so those are all my teammates just working to get me the ball, and it was a great team effort tonight. Q. Amy, can you talk about the difference between this year's game and last year's Big Ten tournament game, because last year you guys fell behind to Michigan and were behind pretty much the entire contest. This year it's you guys who really take control of the game. What was it to have the lead and fight them off the rest of the game? AMY JAESCHKE: It was definitely a different feel before the game started. Everybody was really high energy. And I think that was what was the difference in the game is; that we came out ready to fight and we were going to fight for 40 minutes. Even though it got ugly at some points, we just had the energy and we had the drive to win this game. Q. Amy, you held Loberg 12 for 1 shooting from the floor tonight. Can you just talk about what you think made you successful in limiting her abilities to finish her shots? AMY JAESCHKE: The first time we played her, she let me out. She had a great game. So I took it personally last time we played and this time we played of not to let her get any easy shots or easy -- any open looks. And I think every single coach has told me at least 17 times not to leave my feet and not to go for any of her fakes. I think they engrained it in my head and I tried to stay down as much as I could tonight. Q. Kendall, I already asked Amy this, but you're fairly new to the program. Sophomore year. What does it mean to you to get this Big Ten tournament win, the first time in Northwestern in 11 years? KENDALL HACKNEY: It's huge, really for our seniors. They've worked so hard and they've set a great example for us to follow in this program. So really this win -- we're not satisfied. We still have three more games left. That's our goal. And we've just got to keep fighting and we're just playing great team basketball. And it's a really big win for the program, but we have to keep going, keep fighting. THE MODERATOR: Thank you. Questions for Coach. Q. Coach, if you're told before the game, you -- a team would shoot 36 percent and you'd have 21 turnovers, do you think that the outcome of that game would be a win? COACH MCKEOWN: Yes. Q. I was wondering if you could talk a little bit about last year's Big Ten tournament game and what this means in context for you guys to jump out to the early lead this time around and establish control? COACH MCKEOWN: I'd rather not. I want to talk about tomorrow. I don't want to talk about last year. We've got new players, new people. Q. In that case, what can you say about Michigan State? You guys came close last time you were with them in East Lansing for pretty much 35 minutes of the game, and they kind of slipped away from you -- COACH MCKEOWN: I'm sorry, can you repeat that. Q. Against Michigan State, I was wondering if you could talk, last time you really competed with them pretty strong in East Lansing for the first 35 minutes. What are your impressions going into that game? Your team has clearly showed they can be competitive against the Spartans. COACH MCKEOWN: What we're trying to do is move forward with not being satisfied with winning a game. And because the more you say that, the more people hear that, the more people talk to players about that. I think there's a tendency to become satisfied, and we're trying to overcome that. So the biggest thing that I want to talk about is playing tomorrow night against Michigan State, who is a great team, who is a regular season champion. I don't know what they're ranked in the country, top 10, top whatever. But it's a great matchup. It's an exciting time. I think our players really should be -- it's what you play for. So I think this will be a fun game. It will be a fun game to play in. You kind of have nothing-to-lose type attitude. And just go out and play. Q. Can you talk about the defensive effort tonight, holdin |
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