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BIG TEN CONFERENCE WOMEN'S TOURNAMENTMarch 2, 2012Lisa BluderSamantha LogicKamille WahlinINDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA Nebraska – 80 THE MODERATOR: Now joined by head coach Lisa Bluder and Kamille Wahlin and Samantha Logic. COACH BLUDER: I want to congratulate Nebraska. I thought they played very good, especially the second half. And it's like we got up eight or nine and they just turned it on. It's like that's when they turned on the engines at that point, and really did a great job defensively and on the boards. Outrebounded us by 10. And we can't afford giving up those opportunities. And Lindsey Moore and Jordan Hooper were outstanding in the second half. THE MODERATOR: Questions for the student‑athletes. Q. Kamille, did you need to get more scoring, bigger advantage when Hooper was out in the first half? When Hooper was out sitting on the bench with fouls, did you guys need to get more points in the first half? KAMILLE WAHLIN: Yeah, obviously she brings a presence to them offensively and defensively, she's good at rebounding, and we wanted to try and extend that lead. But they have a deep bench. And, unfortunately, they made that 3 at the end also in the first half and cut the lead again. They're a deep team. And when their top player goes out, they're able to have other players step up. Q. You guys are 1‑and‑6 against ranked teams. How concerning is that heading into the tournament where you're going to be playing good competition? COACH BLUDER: I think we're 2‑and‑6, win over St. Johns and Purdue. Not taking any of those away from us, sorry. KAMILLE WAHLIN: It is a bit of a concern, I guess, but it's one of those things where at the beginning of the year we weren't playing quite as well as a team. We were still trying to find our identity. Today unfortunately we didn't step up in the second half. So it's one of those things where we still have to learn from those top teams and learn how they play and learnat the same time we have two weeks here where we have to get ready and hopefully for the NCAA tournament, and it's one of those things where you can't focus on it too much but you have to learn from it more than anything. Q. Sam, what happened in the second half? You had the eight‑point lead and then things turned pretty quickly. SAMANTHA LOGIC: Yeah, I think that we lost some intensity on the defensive end. Lindsey Moore just hit some big shots for them, and I think that it deflated us a little bit. But we can't let that happen. I mean, Moore and Hooper, especially, they're going to hit shots. We just had to bounce back from it. And we just didn't this time. Q. Kamille, was there a sense with your guys' history with Nebraska, the way they come on in the second half, was it kind of a "here we go again" type feeling in the second half? KAMILLE WAHLIN: You know, they just seemed to be a team where they step up at the right moments. And it's kind of one of those things where we knew it was coming in the second half. We knew in the locker room. We said, hey, we've got to continue to play hard, continue to battle. Even when they got that lead a little bit, it's one of those things where we just kept trying to get ourselves out of the hole. We went cold from the field. And they're pushing it hard in transition, and it was kind of one of those things that felt like deja vu again. But it's just the way it goes. Q. Lincoln, the zone in the second half that you guys went to gave them trouble. Here it didn't seem to give them as much trouble in the second half. Did they do anything differently, or was it just a case of shots going in as opposed to them not going in in Lincoln? KAMILLE WAHLIN: I felt with Hooper back in there they attacked the high post really well. They also hit the short corner and drove to the basket extremely well. And by them getting those in‑the‑paint shots is what opened up their zone a lot. We didn't clog the paint as well and we didn't defend that high post I felt like as good as we did in the first half. So they definitely I think made some switches where they were going to attack with Hooper in the short corner and the high post when she was back in the second half. THE MODERATOR: Thank you. Questions for Coach. Q. Coach, is Nebraska just a tough matchup for you guys? COACH BLUDER: Not an easy match up for us because they don't have that true five. There's not a way that Morgan is going to guard Hooper. She's really a guard and a post body. And so she's just kind of some strange hybrid that's out there that's very, very hard to defend. So we don't match up very well against them. And that's why our zone was really pretty good at their place in the second half. And it just wasn't as effective tonight. But they were more prepared for it. Q. Coach, Kamille and Sam both had big first halves and Nebraska kind of changed the way they threw the defense at them. Could you talk about how that affected them? COACH BLUDER: I thought the second half we didn't run our offense as well as we did the first half. Now, I'm sure some of that has got to do with Nebraska. And they intensified their denial in keeping track of our shooters and such. And part of it is us getting away from our system. We felt like kind of panicked a little bit when they closed the gap on us and then got ahead of us. I felt like we got away from what was working for us in the first half. And we have a couple of freshmen on the floor. That's what happens when you have freshmen on the floor. But I also want to‑‑ I think Nebraska does a really good job on the defensive end. Q. This is the first loss in about a month. COACH BLUDER: I don't like it. Q. How do you feel about this team's chances assuming you make the Dance and what do you think are your chances you will make the NCAA tournament? COACH BLUDER: I think we have very good chances of making the tournament. Our RPI is good. I don't think this loss is going to take us that far down into the RPI. We were in the 30s this week. Usually when you're in the 30s, it's pretty good. Good chance. We're in one of the toughest women's basketball conferences in America. We tied for second in that conference. We played well down the stretch. That's something that people look for. And we played very well down the stretch. We proved we could play without Jaime. I think that was important for us. So I feel very good about our chances. I think we'll have a good contingency from the Big Ten representing us in the NCAA tournament. Q. How big do you think the momentum changer was that play where at the end of the half where she dribbles it off her foot and Lindsey goes down and hits a 3 at the buzzer? COACH BLUDER: That probably got into the psyche of our players a little bit. But we started off the second half okay.  I felt we were resilient through that getting up 8 through the second half. To me it was when they hit the back‑to‑back‑to‑back 3s. That was pretty tough. And when‑‑ I have to find my glasses to even see. When Hailie Sample hits a 3, is that her only one of the year? That's kind of tough. THE MODERATOR: Thank you, Coach. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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