|
|||
|
|||
|
 |
|
|
SOUTHEASTERN CONFERENCE WOMEN'S TOURNAMENTMarch 8, 2014Gary BlairCourtney WalkerCourtney WilliamsDULUTH, GEORGIA Tennessee – 86 THE MODERATOR: Coach, make an opening comment, then we'll open it up for questions. COACH BLAIR: The country just saw a championship basketball game. To play at the level we played at and only turn the ball over seven times, the level that Tennessee played at, that's what the SEC is all about. Same with the first game with Kentucky and South Carolina. I hope you realize how good all four of us are going to be next year, how good the league is going to be next year. The two CWs here, they put on a show. We had to do what we're capable of. When the two touch fouls were called early on Karla, we didn't have that inside presence. That's what really hurt us there. I had to protect her through the second half. As a result, my backup post got four fouls I think in the first half, but I had to play her. It's all part of the growing process. We've got to learn how to stay out of foul trouble and play defense before our girl gets the ball, not after she gets the ball. Our first‑shot defense was as good as anybody's. It's the second shot and the third shot that we couldn't keep them off the boards. 26‑4 in second‑chance points. That's got to stop. I heard that they work on rebounding every day. Well, maybe that's what the rest of all of us in the country. But I've seen Tennessee rebound like that ever since 1980. That's just a trademark. Give 'em credit. If I'm not mistaken, you Tennessee folks can look in the record book, I might have the record when I was at Arkansas. I think you had 39 offensive rebounds on me one ballgame. I think I'm probably in the record book. I'm not proud of it. How about these three guards, along with Jordan Jones? Think about it. They're just sophomores. You don't see them on any USA teams. They should have been. They're pretty damn good. They know what a correct jump shot is all about. They know how to play hard. They were running on fumes because she could rotate her bench in, and it was doing better. My bench didn't have their normal good ballgame. That was 40 minutes and 39. It would have been 40 minutes for Jordan. But we've got to have that inside game. Hopefully when we get to the playoffs, we'll have Karla out of foul trouble, maybe a little bit more mature Rachel in there, then hopefully we can make a run this year. Last year we won it all here. We played well in Georgia. We played well here. We've got nothing to hold our hats about. We played a damn good ballgame. They played a better four minutes than we did at the end. But that four minutes, the reason why it was tied at 75 was because of their rebounding. They did a great job. Appreciate the effort. The crowd was good. Hospitality was good. The SEC showed why the top four teams all showed up to play a championship game. I hope Tennessee has a little bit left for tomorrow because Kentucky and Tennessee, that's a classic matchup. THE MODERATOR: Questions. Q. The score was definitely different than it was the first time you played this season. What was different about this game? Courtney and Courtney knocking down their shots? COACH BLAIR: I think getting off to a good start, scoring in transition, making them miss early. Simmons didn't have a particularly good game. 3‑17. Walker was on her. She's a good free throw shooter. She's such a threat. The difference? We just played a whole lot better this time. First time around in College Station, Tennessee came in with their A game, we came in with our C game. Nothing in particular, the team just gets better. We're just the same team. Love my team. I'd love to see them again. We see them again, that means we're probably in the Final Four. I'd love to play Tennessee again. We got a lot of basketball and a lot of teaching to do before that. Q. You mentioned the touch fouls. The NCAA recently released the statistics related to the change in rules and emphasis this year. They reflected there's been a 1.5% improvement in field goal percentage, which was the purpose of that. There's been more than a 10% increase in personal fouls and 15% in disqualifications for personal fouls. Given what you just went through here tonight, do you think the price has been too high for that small increase in field goal shooting? COACH BLAIR: I think we're confusing the basketball fans, okay? If Texas A&M is playing a members game on Saturday afternoon, they see the game completely called one way, then on Sunday afternoon they see our game completely called a different way, it's the growing pains we're going to have to have for the first couple years, okay? But right now the fans are confused. That's when sometimes you get the touch fouls.  But really, they're letting the post players kill each other a lot of times in there. They're more particular on keeping the thing. So the teams that win the Final Four are the same teams that won the Final Four in 1980, L.A. Tech, Old Dominion, USC. You will win the Final Four on smart guard play and post players being able to finish under there, and you better have some backups. Their backups were a little bit better than mine today. But were they touch fouls? They were not hand‑checking fouls, okay? I would have to see the tape. You had good officials on the ballgame. At the same time I think the officials are confused because I really believe once the NCAA tournament starts, you're not going to see very many hand‑checking calls being called. The better officials can call advantage, disadvantage. When you get deep in the NCAA, you've eliminated all the medium officials. You've got nothing but the best officials. They do a good job of controlling the game. We haven't had a problem in this whole tournament. This was a well‑called basketball tournament. You haven't seen any technicals, coaches being ballistic. There's no crying in basketball, unless you're a coach (laughter). Q. Just to follow up on that, you talked about the importance of the rebounding. They were plus 22 on you in rebounding. You were plus 10 on the personal fouls, most of them on your bigs. To what extent did the foul situation contribute to the rebounding advantage? COACH BLAIR: My guards not blocking out from the high post. Here is another thing that will really scare you. Look who was our leading rebounding? My point guard was six. I didn't have another starter get five. The next closest one was four, okay? That's on us. That's not on the officials. That's on us. That's good for Tennessee for what they did. When your point guard is getting six defensive boards, she was tired. She didn't block out a couple times. Carter hit a couple open jumpers on her. That's the way it is. My kids were dead tired. I didn't have the depth to be able to rest them and let Tennessee get out to a 10‑point game. I had to roll the dice. If we would have won this ballgame, which I thought we were, I don't know what we would have had left for tomorrow, but we might have had to borrow a few of you sportswriters for tomorrow. I don't like that option at all because none of you look athletic, have a jump shot. You just got a little pencil (laughter). Q. Either Courtneys, you had tremendous success on the road in the SEC, 7‑1. This being virtually a road game with the crowd so in favor of Tennessee, did you feed off that? COURTNEY: We've been playing good on the road all season. I think it comes with toughness, not worrying about the crowd really. We know here they had a big crowd because they're close to Tennessee. We just tried to block the crowd out, play our game. When Jordan hit that big three, our bench was over there cheering. They were cheering the whole game. That's good. That's our crowd. COACH BLAIR: You're seeing 80% zone defenses across the country because of the new rules. That's why your shooting percentage is up. It has nothing to do with hand‑checking. We're so worried about fouls, it's the openness. It's the zone defenses. That's why you're going to shoot better. Why do we shoot better? It's because we take the threes we need to take. That's the most threes we've shot probably in two months, 12. We want to attack the elbows and try to get that second chance in case we do miss. Q. First time since 2007 you aren't in a conference championship game. Talk about switching conferences, still playing Texas A&M basketball from conference to conference. COACH BLAIR: First, go back to 2006. We've been in a semifinal game now for nine straight years. That's a pretty damn good record, too. So, yeah, we're not in the championship game. That hurts. But, baby, we help decide who wins it because that's who we are. Switching leagues, they were both good leagues, okay? Why does one league have to be better, unless you're talking about football? Why does one league have to be better? The Big 12 was good during our time because that was during the Griner era, Kelsey Bone, Danielle Adams, all the great players. Now look how good the league is going to be next year. You see what South Carolina has recruited? Kentucky? I've got another 6'5" coming in that's going to be pretty doggone good. This league is going to get better and better, the way it was from '93 to '03. That's when you had six Hall of Fame coaches. These coaches are working hard on the recruiting trips. It doesn't matter who's the best or who has the highest RPI. Who is going to get it done in the playoffs? Then you've got bragging rights. Q. First time you guys aren't in a final in a few years. With that being said, your season is not over yet, with the NCAAs ahead of you. What do you tell your team now that the conference tournament is done? How do you get them ready for the NCAA tournament? COACH BLAIR: First, this was the NCAAs. This is the way we played this whole tournament. We play it because this is the type of teams that you're going to have to beat to get to the Final Four or to be able to beat in the Sweet 16. Who we see, this is NCAAs. If you go in with that mindset, it takes nine games to win it all. We're going to try to do it. I remember a couple years ago, Jim Calhoun did 11 because he had to win five, then he had to win six to win it all. We're going to go back. First we're going to rest. Hopefully Jordan is going to be okay. She was dehydrated. She got hit in the head. The doctors come running and all that stuff. But, hey, she'll be ready to go. We have spring break next week. The regular students are on spring break. We'll be in the gym trying to rest up, get smarter by watching video, work on the skill set, the little things, try to develop my bench during this time. We'll be ready 'cause we're hosting again for the third year in a row. We're very proud of it. Why are we hosting? We put butts in seats and we know how to host championships. Our administration does a great job. Hopefully we'll have another six, seven, eight thousand coming up, whoever we're going to play. I hope they let me choose who we're going to play, but probably not. 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
|