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NCAA WOMEN'S NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPDecember 18, 2013Hannah AllisonHaley EckermanJerritt ElliottBailey WebsterSEATTLE, WASHINGTON THE MODERATOR: We are joined by Jerritt Elliott and Bailey Webster, Hannah Allison and Haley Eckerman. COACH ELLIOTT: We're excited to be here in Seattle. I want to thank everybody that's involved in this tournament and helping this become a great event. Obviously the caliber of play here is at the highest level. We've been here before and we're really excited about the opportunity to take on Wisconsin tomorrow night. We know that it's going to be a big battle. And we feel good about the way our team is playing, especially after last week being on the road at Nebraska and playing the way we performed at such a high level in front of such a big and great crowd. THE MODERATOR: Questions? Q. The top three seeds make it to the tournament and the No. 12 seed. It could be perceived you caught a break by drawing Wisconsin as your opponent here in the Final Four. What would be your response? COACH ELLIOTT: I think my response is this tournament is getting better and better every year. Michigan made it through last year, and we went to five games. And it was 8‑all in Game 5. Our focus as a program has always been‑‑ and I tell the team right when the draw comes out, we don't care where we go. Some days you get good draws and bad draws. I thought we got a good draw going to Nebraska, the No. 1 seed. All we care about is the opponent in front of us and let those advance, we'll see who we play next. We haven't been concerned about the bracket in the last probably eight years of the program that I've been associated with it. We have one team we're focused on, and Wisconsin is playing well right now. We're going to respect them. We know what they can do. They've got an amazing setter. They're very efficient right now. And we've just got to be prepared to play Texas volleyball, because it's an opportunity that they'll remember the rest of their lives. Q. Coach, can you state for us some of the keys to the match tomorrow? COACH ELLIOTT: Playing efficiently. I think one of the things we did at Nebraska is we were very in tune, our focus and our routines were really good. We managed our game extremely well. We'll know and we'll prepare them the same way that we've gone through reports all season with them. They will be prepared to go out there and understand what Wisconsin is going to do. But this is a game of adjustments, and we'll be ready to think on our feet should that be. But more important, we've got to‑‑ the key to this is going out and playing at the level you're capable of consistently over the period of the match and not get too high or too low and just play with steady demeanor. Q. Hannah, can you talk about the two women alongside you, and also Campbell. Seems like you guys have so many weapons, and just as a setter what that's like to have these guys alongside you? HANNAH ALLISON: It's a huge advantage as a setter to have so many options. Great hitters all the way around. I really can't make a bad choice as far as who to set the ball to. I think the great thing about that is that we can think more about strategy and who to set at what time depending on what the other team gives you defensively. So I think that allows us to not worry about who we have to avoid or try to go to when they're hot but really just being very versatile as an offense and having a lot of weapons is a huge thing for us. Q. Haley, almost every team will say there was a point in the season when they realized who they were. Sometimes it's after a big win. Sometimes it's after a loss. It's something coming together. Could you tell us what that moment might have been for your team? And, Coach, could you respond to that when she's finished? HALEY ECKERMAN: I think we talk about that a lot. Each game we know we get better. And I don't know‑‑ I can't think of one specific. I know for sure Nebraska, with the postseason, was the biggest for us, we started out right away with a huge punch and just fought and kind of took control of the game and didn't let others control how we played. And I think that was the biggest for us, and that's how we're basing our games off now. Q. What about that 3‑0 loss to Arizona State early on? HALEY ECKERMAN: I think that's one of them. That's when we realized we needed to change something. So no matter how we played, who we were playing against, it didn't matter; we needed to come out tough. And we knew everyone was going to play their toughest against us and we had a huge target on our back. So I think we took some teams a little too lightly sometimes and that's when we dropped a set or when we realized, especially at Nebraska again, that we can fight and we don't need to drop that set to be great. Q. Jerritt, would you comment on that, was there a point in this season your team sort of became who they eventually are now? COACH ELLIOTT: Well, yeah, we went through the preseason and had a tough schedule, obviously the toughest in the country. We're so deep in so many positions that everybody was vying for starting spots. I did a lot of experimenting with a lot of different lineups. And one of the biggest changes is what you mentioned with Arizona State, when we lost that game, we had been debating as a staff whether to play Chiaka or not. Maybe in the past I've made some mistakes with Lauren Paolini and Rachael Adams and thought they could do some things to help us out by the end of the year and they played sparingly. Then by their senior year they're one of the best players in the country. We wanted to make sure we did a thorough job understanding that. After that match, she had been playing steady all preseason and then all during the first three weeks of the season. We said we're going to give her a shot. And we tried a lineup with her in it. It's not what we're in now, but she showed us what she could do. And so we became more of a unit in terms of where we could score in different higher percentages and kill percentage and managing our game. But I think Haley hit it on the dot with the Nebraska match. This is a team that's been growing, and one of the things we have as a program is we've set a standard now. Five out of the last six Final Fours is something that's going to be hard to live up to for future teams. When you're used to winning, you're always the one that's‑‑ you're the one that's always being attacked. And I guess against Nebraska was probably the first time I felt like we felt like we were the underdogs, and we took a lot of pride going into that match. You could see it on their face. You could hear it in the hotel with them screaming before the match. The bus ride was extremely quiet. You could see in their eyes they were coming to play and compete. I told them this is something that we've been working on all season. I told them this on Monday. We kind of reviewed some of the points that made us successful against Nebraska. I said one of the things we're always trying to do is continue to learn about our identity and who we are. The biggest thing we did in that game is we felt threatened. We came out. Our focus was better throughout an entire match, and now they understand that. And I think they learn from that and they're going to come out and understand that Wisconsin's a good team and we've got to understand that and come out and compete like we did from the very first point against Nebraska. Q. What have you seen about Wisconsin in the NCAA Tournament and how would you describe them as a team? COACH ELLIOTT: Well, I think coaching staff has done a really good job in their first year. They've got a lot of belief in what they're doing and their systems and have been growing as well. They had a lot of injuries throughout the year. I know they finished seventh in the conference, but that doesn't mean that's the team we're facing tonight because they had so many different injuries. Carlini, their setter, is very special, moves the ball around, poses some matchup issues with her dumping ability. They've got an undersized outside hitter that took 63 swings against their last opponent and can cause a lot of havoc by tooling the block and those things. There's some things they can do to keep us off balance. But they're not going to be able to do anything we haven't seen. I don't think we'll do anything they haven't seen, with the physicality they've had in their conference. Again, it comes back down to routines and knowing what they're tendencies are and making adjustments. Because this game is ‑‑ as I said, you've got to make adjustments in this game. Should we be able to do that, then hopefully we'll be out on top. If not, then Wisconsin will come out on top. Q. Bailey, what's it been like carrying that target, if you will? I guess you could use a more positive word, but being the defending national champions, if you could talk about what that's been like all year. And also Coach did throw a tough a nonconference schedule at you guys, and did some experimenting. Were you ever worried at that point, or did you kind of know what he was doing in terms of putting you guys in tougher positions? BAILEY WEBSTER: Well, I think that, for your first question, I think naturally people assume it's probably a lot of pressure on us as a team and it's probably a lot internally with having been defending champions, but I think we handled it very well. It was never brought up or talked about in the locker room or on the court. We were mature enough to understand that this is entirely a new season and what you did last year had nothing to do with what you can do this year. I think we focused on that and we focused on each match. And I think we knew if we laid down and got comfortable, especially in the Big 12 Conference, there could be a possibility we could lose. We never took one match for granted and we never took our winnings for granted, and I think that we did a good job understanding that. It's not pressure, it's just being mature enough to realize what you did last year has nothing to do with what you do this year. And your second question? Q. I know you guys, you know, you were doing a 6‑2 for a while and I know it was sort of deciding exactly what your look was going to be. Probably maybe had something to do with the loss there at Arizona State. Did you look at that and say this is a learning thing because we're working different people in and, that's kind of what he was having you do in the nonconference; it was more important to learn than maybe to even win all your matches? BAILEY WEBSTER: I think it's important for players, me being one of the players, to understand that's not my job to worry about that. And I think when we did lose to Arizona State, I wasn't really thinking about all that because I knew if I came to Texas I believed in what the coaching staff is doing and it's in their hands. And I knew whatever decision they made, it would be best for the team. So I think us and the rest of the players are just focused on taking care of our business and doing what we need to do because during that match a lot of us were also inconsistent. So we needed to regroup and worry about ourselves and get back on track to help the coaches out with the decisions. Q. Coach, I thought last year in the matchup against Oregon was as well as you could have played. Have you had a match like that this year, or would you consider the match you played against Nebraska, especially with what was on the line, that same caliber? COACH ELLIOTT: We've played some games where we've been really good like that. But Nebraska was the complete match where we could put everything together, I think. We've had good 3‑0 wins. And when I look at that, I'm looking more at what their focus is and the routines are and point runs we're going on. We had three hitting errors and 73 attempts. There's some things that we do in practice every day to try to manage that and teach them how to manage their game. But to hit on Bailey's‑‑ to understand what they're going after, this is not the Stanley Cup and not trying to go and keep that Cup. They're trying to go out and earn another one. When you get your team in that mindset, I think that's the key to what we're doing. And we feel good about what our lineup is now after‑‑ I think the seniors know better than anybody that every preseason I'm trying a bunch of different lineups. This is not the first year we've tried that. Maybe I'm a little crazy in my head, but I'm trying to learn as much as I can about this wonderful group of talent that I have, and solidify that and we work hard to that. This group‑‑ what I take pride in right now, what the legacy that this team and the senior class is going to leave, you forget they're 18 to 22 years old. And the pressures of traveling and academics and midterms and lacking sleep, and it's hard to prepare on a daily basis. And every team we're playing, it's a National Championship match. And they did a tremendous job over the last two years knowing what the routines are. The captains have led really good sessions. They've talked about how to prepare. And they've gotten good at understanding how to prepare for matches. That's where we're at today. And we'll take that no differently. We'll treat Wisconsin no differently than we've treated any team this season. Q. It's pretty good getting Stanley Cup and crazy in my head at the same time. Would you assess the Washington‑Penn State match for us, please? COACH ELLIOTT: I would love to. I haven't seen enough film on Washington yet. We've watched ‑‑ obviously I think both of those teams are pretty patterned in what they do, like all of us right now. You have tendencies who you're going to go to. Deja and Ariel Scott will have a lot of swings. I think (indiscernible) will have a lot of swings. Some of the percentages that Washington's getting to certain players is going to be there. It's going to be a battle. People ask me who is going to win. I have no idea. I'm not‑‑ to tell you the truth, I'm not really concerned about it. I'm more concerned about Wisconsin and what we're doing. So we're spending lots of time evaluating them and what we can do to be good, because we've got to take care of that match. Q. You guys have played with Nebraska a lot. So kind of talking about noise level. Obviously this is sort of a home court advantage for Washington. So what do you do to kind of drown that out and stay in communication with each other to drive out the noise? BAILEY WEBSTER: I think that we just need to, like Jerritt said, we need to focus on our routines. I think we have enough players that have been through situations and crowds like this, that I really honestly don't hear the crowd. I think what we need to focus on is what's going on the court. And once you're able to do that, you also need to focus on playing the way you did to get you here. And that has nothing to do with the crowd, who's there, who's watching. And when we get everybody on the same page, the entire team on that page, then the crowd becomes irrelevant. COACH ELLIOTT: We put them in situations and we scheduled really tough. They've been through a lot. I'll tell you, you know you have a great team when they embrace playing in front of a crowd. They were excited to play at Nebraska. Most teams would go in there and be nervous. They weren't nervous at all. We've been better statistically on the road in front of big crowds than we have been at home, for whatever reason, whether it's pressure at home and trying to please our fans. But we've been significantly better on the road in front of big crowds when we are the enemy, because I think the group has a tremendous amount of pride and they take their adrenalin level to a different level and they can focus at a different level. Q. When you win a National Championship, have that success, you still are looking for individual improvement for your kids coming back. Can you talk especially about the three here, what they've done this year to become even better players than they were last year? COACH ELLIOTT: They've had to become better. We lost what I thought was a for sure All‑American last year in Sha'Dare. She wasn't awarded that, but she was the glue to our team. Then we lost Nicole Dalton, who is not talked about a lot, too. We lost two of our primary passers that really kept us in system. We had a lot more of a first ball kill on sliding last year, and then we had to depend on these three to be able to keep the offense going. Hannah's had to adjust to a freshman middle blocker to get both of our middle blockers better at that, and then mixing up the offense a little bit more. So Bailey's range had to really improve. Blocking had to improve some, which she's done. And our volleyball IQ has continued to grow. I think Hannah has become a lot more comfortable in terms of who she is and what she does as a leader for our team, and it bodes well for us because she can play her game and know what we need to do and have good conversations with our coaching staff, which has been critical. Haley's had to become a six‑rotation player. Her numbers weren't as good earlier in the season because we put so much more responsibility on passing, digging and hitting out of the back court and all those areas, and now she's more comfortable doing that and, as you saw against Nebraska, has become a efficient passer and defender for us. All three of them had to do that. You need improvement. We've had to get better at maybe the out of system game, which we're hitting balls behind the ten foot line because our passing hasn't been as efficient as it was last year. It's still good enough. What's amazing is our hitting percentage is probably better whenwe're out of system ‑‑ it is better when we're out of system as compared to when we're in system. And that's a tribute to Hannah's setting and the other two taking great swings and great choices to manage their game. Q. Hannah, have you seen much of Carlini? She's a Big Ten Freshman of the Year, I believe. Big, tall, setter, talented kid. Have you had a chance to see much of her, or what your thoughts are of her? HANNAH ALLISON: She's a freshman; I'm a senior. So the overlap of knowing the younger players gets fewer and fewer. But I respect her as a setter and obviously what we've seen on film. So, yeah. Q. (Off microphone)? COACH ELLIOTT: She's a nice setter, moves the ball around. She's got great location. She plays at a very mature level, and she's able to create great swings for her players consistently. THE MODERATOR: Thank you. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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