|
|||
|
|||
|
 |
|
|
SOUTHEASTERN CONFERENCE WOMEN'S TOURNAMENTMarch 7, 2013Nikki CaldwellTheresa PlaisanceAdrienne WebbDULUTH, GEORGIA LSU – 65 THE MODERATOR: We are now joined by LSU head coach Nikki Caldwell, and student athletes Adrienne Webb and Teresa Plaisance. Coach, if you want to start with an opening comment. COACH CALDWELL: Well, I was glad that the buzzer finally sounded. I thought if there was a few more minutes, the way that Auburn really fought back, how hard they played, the outcome of the game definitely could have been different. But I was proud of our team for hanging in there. We talked about the things that we got to be better at immediately. But this team is a team that has shown determination and has shown that even with their backs against the wall, in a serious and clutch situation, they were able to pull out a win. THE MODERATOR: We'll take questions for the student‑athletes. Q. Adrienne, can you talk about the three‑pointer that you hit that seemed to stop their momentum. ADRIENNE WEBB: Well, I know that we needed a basket at that time and at that moment. I just thought in the back of my mind, I have to make this shot. This is a momentum changer. They were coming back on us. But we still had the lead. This will put us up even more, give us that momentum to push through and get the stop on the defensive end. Just seeing it go through the net really gave me, Okay, we got to get this stop, we got to get this stop. Q. How frustrating was it at the end of the game not to be able to score points? ADRIENNE WEBB: It's frustrating when you can't put the ball in the basket. We were getting looks. It's frustrating when the ball plays on the rim a little and then comes out. We composed ourselves enough to knock down our free throws but also get stops on the other end towards the end. THE MODERATOR: We'll take questions for coach. Q. It seemed like it was a tale of two halves. Talk about your team's resolve. COACH CALDWELL: Well, we knew in the second half that Auburn was going to come back and really get after us. They did just that. I thought their 1‑2‑2 interrupted us. They were able to get some turnovers, easy transition baskets. Our inability to take care of the basketball gave them the momentum they needed. Our team, we've come off of a nice little stretch here, a nice high, if you will, when you think about what we've been able to do over a two‑and‑a‑half, three‑week span. As a coach, you worry about, Is your team going to have enough in them to come back? That's always been our case. But I felt as though even though we were playing the last three minutes of the game, we had a little bit of a cushion. Up until that point, we were doing some really nice things on the defensive end where we weren't scoring and neither were they. Once their pressure got to us, they started to make their run. But our team is learning. We're still growing. We're learning how to play in situations where we're up and then be able to still hold off a great team like Auburn. Q. Could you talk about playing Georgia a little bit, the victory that started this streak a month ago. COACH CALDWELL: Well, Georgia is a team that we are very familiar with, as they are with us. When you play a team twice, it's always difficult to come back and try to get that second win. It's going to be a tough matchup for us. We did some good things. We were home. We had just came off of a loss to Tennessee that we felt if we'd have done some things we could have controlled that one. So our team had a different motivation about them going into the Georgia game about a month ago. The big question mark is going to be, which LSU team is going to show up? Is it going to be the team that reeled off these victories of late or the team that's just happy to be here? Q. Theresa, late in the game you were getting some looks, they were making plays. Was it kind of surreal the way the game was unfolding? THERESA PLAISANCE: That's just a testament to Auburn's play. They fought to the very last seconds of the game. When things weren't going our way, we weren't doing the little things to turn it around and help it go our way. Buckling down on defense. She got that shot over me, like two seconds left on the shot clock. Just little things like that we have to control over and change those things to help our game turn around and help us for the betterment. Q. Coach, I know earlier this year you had some very difficult stretches. As you look back on it, what would you say are the things that have gotten better to cause you to be in a position where you are today? COACH CALDWELL: Well, when you bring a new group together, we've got four freshmen at the time, we've got really three players who saw a lot of minutes the previous year, everybody's trying to find their way. We were trying to, what is our cohesion? The one difference is this team has been a team of late, where we've been unselfish, sharing the basketball, supporting each other on the defensive end. We started to like playing defense where we're not overextended, not overrotating our defense, so our rebounding coverage became better. When we're rebounding the basketball, a better defensive team, we feel offensively we have enough weapons that we can put some points on the board. Those are the things that, as of late, I saw a big difference. It really started at South Carolina. Even though we lost that game, that's when I thought our team was really turning the corner as far as being a team. Q. Talk about the spark Pedersen gave you off the bench. COACH CALDWELL: Anne Pedersen is a player that has just accepted her role for this team. There's games where she has not played. There's games where she's had limited minutes. Today, this was an opportunity for her to shine. Her teammates did a great job of finding her, getting her those open looks. More importantly, Anne was playing to her strengths. When she does that, she definitely is a plus for us, she's a positive, and she can help us. I thought once we broke their press, she had some good looks along the baseline, she knocked those shots down. Those were key for us. We only have eight players. So when your name is called, the accountability factor is even more so because you can't keep looking down the bench and looking down the bench. Q. Did the big lead work against you? You're trying to conserve energy playing four games in four days. COACH CALDWELL: That plagues a lot of teams. We are the team that was Auburn. We were the team that would get down by 9, 10, 11 points, have to fight and claw our way back, but we wouldn't have enough in the tank to finish off a game. So we understand that mentality, how you really have got to not get yourself in that hole. So we're on the flipside of that which is new for us. We don't really get up on teams a lot and maintain leads. We typically play possession by possession and go down the last four minutes. This is good for them. I've played this way, too. So it's good for me to revisit it. This group is learning. As I said earlier, they're growing. Everything we've been faced with, they've taken what they need from each game and used it in the next. THE MODERATOR: Thank you very much. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
|
||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
About ASAP Sports •
FastScripts Archive •
Recent Interviews •
Captioning •
Upcoming Events •
Contact Us
FastScripts | Events Covered | Our Clients | Other Services | ASAP in the News | Site Map | Job Opportunities | Links |
|
ASAP Sports, Inc. | T: 1.212 385 0297
|