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BIG TEN CONFERENCE WOMEN'S MEDIA DAYOctober 31, 2013Matt BollantCHICAGO, ILLINOIS THE MODERATOR: Our final coach is Illinois head coach Matt Bollant, leading Illinois to the NIT Finals and 19 wins, returning six letter winners and three starters from last year's squad. Coach? MATT BOLLANT: Exciting time of year and certainly one of the hopes we had in coming here is teaching our kids how to practice the right way. We talked about that last fall and certainly our team gave us kinda what they knew and what they could. But our practice integrity now is night and day better than it was last year at this time, offensively, defensively, how we play, how we practice, how we prepare is much more to what we believe championship culture will look right. We are teaching our kids how to get better each and every day. Our practices have been intense and competitive and we challenged our kids and they have grown. Each day they go beyond their limits and they grow and they know that they're stronger and tougher and you can see the confidence growing in them which is exciting for our program. We're young. We have 7 of our 14 players are new players, but it's exciting for the future and our returning players are just better basketball players. Their feel for the game is much better than it was last year at this time. Their ability to pass and shoot, defensively, their understanding of the system is better. So we believe good things will happen. We lost two good seniors last year in Karisma and Adrienne, but I believe overall our team is going to have a good year and we're excited for the future of what we can do and we're starting to practice the right way and if you can practice right it's going to lead to playing right. We will see how we are, but the way we practice is going to lead to good things. It's just a matter of time. Q. Coach Miller has seven freshmen coming in and eight new players, but who among the younger players are standing out for you right now and may be able to help you the quickest and how fast did you want them to help you quickly? MATT BOLLANT: Sarah Livingston and Jacqui Grant have been going back and forth, 6‑2, 6‑3, with good length so those two are battling for the 5. Mckenzie Piper would be in that mix, but she had a concussion two weeks ago and that slowed her a little bit and we're hoping to get her back and see where she is at with that. Those two are both going to play. One of the things our system is difficult for big players because we pressure the ball so hard and switch 1 through 5, so it's difficult for those players to adjust. It's not an easy development. It's hard for big post players to play in our system right away but both those kids have done extremely well. They're learning and developing. I'm not sure they're feeling like that every day because they're getting stretched and our practices are tougher than what they will face in a game and I told them it's just a matter of time that they will be great basketball players. Taylor Gleason was runner‑up Miss Basketball in Michigan, and she has had a great fall. Ashley McConnell, a kid from Chicago here that came in and has surprised us with how well she has done, quickly she has learned so very good. One of the injuries, Kennedy Cattenhead tore her ACL this summer and she was with Bolingbrook and was going to play but we will red shirt her. Mikaala Shackelford had a scope on her knee and has been out for six weeks. Those two I think we'll see, depending on the knee and how that develops, but the other freshmen are doing well. Kyley Simmons, starting point guard at Missouri for two years, she has been great and what we hoped she would bring she has in building our cultures and teaching our kids to play the right way. She played for a great AAU program that taught her how to do things and she has been exactly what we hoped for in building our culture and teaching our kids how to practice and play right. Q. Coach, last year depth was a big concern especially with the higher tempo that you wanted to play. Talk about getting those new players in and how that's helping your depth this year? MATT BOLLANT: Certainly our depth is better than it was last year. I think returning players‑‑ one of the things we take a lot of pride‑‑ I have a great staff, I really do, I'm fortunate to have amazing assistants. One of the things we take great pride is in the development of our players and Taylor Tuck is a much better basketball player, all of the three here today, Amber Moore, Ivory Crawford and Sarah Hartwell, all of those are better players. Sarah didn't get to play in games so you can see that in them and our returning players doing well and adding the freshmen to the mix. We believe we will be 7, 8 or 9 deep and when we went to the bench we weren't as good last year. We're hoping to have better play coming off the bench this year, we're probably a year away from having the depth we want to have. But we will see how the kids developing and you're never as deep‑‑ you start the year you feel like, gosh, we have 8, 9, 10 kids ready to go and then you start guarding the guys and you realize the kid is not quite ready and the speed of the game affects the players. We're deeper than last year and we will know once we get to the games how the freshmen will do but they're capable and talented. And to have returning players having a better feel for the game and all of our returning players are much better than they were last year at this time and that's a complement to my staff and the great assistants I have. Q.  With your defense and the rules instituted this year, is that beneficial for the ten‑second backcourt rule? And what about the contact on the ball‑handler‑type stuff in terms of switching you do and how aggressive your defense is. Can you address that? MATT BOLLANT: Last year the buzz defense gave us a big lift. We set the Big Ten record for forced turnover and that was mainly the buzz. We played more buzz than we wanted to because our man defense wasn't where it needed to be and we didn't feel as confident in that. I think the combination of the two is really good. Certainly the rules are going to affect us a little bit but in the buzz, if we do it right we shouldn't foul much in the buzz at all because we're playing passing lanes and one of the reasons we go to the buzz is because we don't foul as much in that. I think you will see us use that, we're going to use 2‑2‑1, extend the back pressure and the best thing we have is good athletes and they're quick. We want to make it a full‑court game, play faster than anybody else in the Big Ten and we believe we can do that. When a team wants to play slow it's not easy to pick up the tempo and the 10‑second rule will help us and the buzz as well, it's hard to hold the ball against the buzz. We're working hard not to use our hands and keep people in front. We scrimmaged Dayton last week and it wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. Either we did a good job with our hand or maybe the refs didn't call it that night, but it wasn't a factor in that game. I think the combination of the two is really good. We believe our system is as good as any, better than most and our system will help us win championships and do the right thing. THE MODERATOR: Coach, thank you for your time and best of luck this season. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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