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BIG 12 CONFERENCE WOMEN'S MEDIA DAYSOctober 25, 2012Mike CareyDALLAS, TEXAS THE MODERATOR: Coach, your opening thoughts about the season? COACH CAREY: First of all, this is going to be a learning year for us, for myself and our coaching staff, plus our players. I know we're coming into a great conference. We know it's the highest RPI conference. We understand they won the national championship the last two years. We understand that 70% of the team's in the conference went postseason. Those things we do understand. But it's still going to be a learning year for us. I'm always asked, "What do you think about going to the Big 12?" And I always tell them let me tell you this time next year what I think about going to it. It's just going to be a learning process between the travel and the teams you're playing, the new arenas and those types of things. But we're very excited. We're very excited about being in the Big 12. I know our players are, and it will be a new challenge for our program. Q. You got a sense of what it's like at Baylor a couple years ago. But you were supposed to get an easier conference. You leave the Big East with UCONN and Notre Dame, and now you're in this one. Is there any comparison between the two? What is your experience like at Baylor? COACH CAREY: I'm really trying to forget the experience, to be honest with you at Baylor. Great team, great atmosphere. That is the other thing. To me, when I compare, you play everybody twice, home and away. I think that's unlike what we did in the Big East. The crowds in that part of the country and crowd attendance, that's going to be big. You all play in the same arenas like the men and women play in the same arenas, so that's going to be different for us. Where in the Big East, sometimes we played on arenas on campus. Sometimes the crowds were not that big. When you got to Connecticut, Notre Dame, Louisville, and those teams, but not all the teams. Where in the Big 12, we're going to face that night‑in, and night‑out on the road. But we understand that. You're exactly right. We get away from Connecticut, and now we're going to play Baylor and Oklahoma, and Texas, and all of these schools. It's just a great league. From top to bottom, like I said earlier, it's the number one RPI league in the country. Q. You're familiar with the tournament being split between men and women. I guess in the Big East it was played in Connecticut, correct? COACH CAREY: Yeah. Q. Just talk about your thoughts about what that did for the women's game by having it separate? This is the first time it's going to be done down here where men and women are apart. COACH CAREY: Well, I thought it was great. I really did. We played at Hartford, and Connecticut plays half their games at Hartford but it was a great crowd because of Connecticut. But I thought the crowds were great in postseason at the tournament play. Mostly because of Connecticut fans. But, yeah, it was a great atmosphere. It was a great tournament, and I understand it's going to be a great tournament. It's just there are a lot of surprises always at tournament play, and I expect this will be the thing. I don't think anybody plays half their games here on this court, so I think, yeah, it will be a little more neutral. Q. How have the players responded in practice the last few weeks, especially after Asya went down, more of Yaya this year. How's all of that coming together this year in the season? COACH CAREY: It's never a good time to have a player go down. Asya Bussie was our leading shot blocker, second leading rebounder, gave us size. But she went down in the second day of practice, and it's never good for that to happen. But at least it happened early, and the players have been able to respond and learn new roles. Where a lot of times we counted on Asya to do a lot of things and now somebody else has to pick that up. Since it was early, we are starting to learn roles. Our guards are being more aggressive. Yaya Dunning, like you said, has to pick up some of the slack, and other players on the team. Q. In that same vein though, Asya gave you a lot of size. This is a conference where there is an awful lot of size because teams have tried to recruit size to match‑up with Brittney Griner. What kind of challenge is it going forward in a league where you have so many talented post players? COACH CAREY: Well, it is. We felt good about coming in this year with our size and veterans in the post. But things like that happen. We have to move forward. We're very positive. We think players have picked up the slack. Compared between the Big East and the Big 12 personnelwise, I think the Big 12 is a lot bigger, where you had two or three big post players in the Big East where here you have two or three on each team. But we have to do what we do. We're going to get out and run, we're going to use our quickness. We're going to defend. We've just got to keep people off the board. We're not going to be as big as some of these teams. I always look at it both ways. If we're not as big, they have to guard us on the other end also, and hopefully we can pull some of the big players out from the paint and we can be effective at times also. Q. We talked a little with Bob last week up in Kansas City. But I wondered if you could describe how difficult this league is in a travel basis for you guys as far as having to bounce back and forth from West Virginia on the round robin schedule? COACH CAREY: First of all, the best thing is our administration provides charters for us. That is big for us not to have to go commercial, because you're going to spend a lot of time in the airport. It is going to be farther. It's going to be longer, but that's part of adjusting to the Big 12. We have to be smart about it. We have to be sure. We'll bring our academic people with us. We'll get back a little later. Sometimes that will be an hour later than we normally would. But we traveled in the Big East also. We're not going to use that for a reason not to be ready to play. We're looking forward to a league where everything's positive. Nothing is negative. It's going to be a learning experience for us this first year. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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