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NCAA WOMEN'S REGIONALS SEMIFINALS & FINALS: LOUISVILLEApril 1, 2014Lexie BrownBrenda FreseKatie RutanAlyssa ThomasLOUISVILLE, KENTUCKY Maryland – 76 BRENDA FRESE: Well, what a great game, just a phenomenal environment. I know the fans probably didn't enjoy the outcome, but you can't ask for a better game when you talk about the fans and how many were here. Obviously two teams you saw battle. Coach Walz and his team battled for 40 minutes when it comes down to a possession, but I think the biggest thing for our team, what I'm so proud of is the fact that we had to grow as a team to get to this point, and to be able to see all of the lessons that we had learned, the sacrificing, just being prepared for your moment, to be able to see it unfold before your very eyes is going to be something that each and every one of us is going to remember for a lifetime. Only appropriate, obviously, with everything that Alyssa has done for this team and this program, that we take her and our five seniors to be able to go to Nashville. Q. Alyssa, with as much as you accomplished in your career, now you can add a Final Four. What does that mean to you personally? ALYSSA THOMAS: Oh, man, something that I've been wanting for four years, but we're not done yet. We've still got two more games, and hopefully we can get this national championship. Q. Alyssa, Brenda mentioned the great environment that was here tonight. Was the environment kind of everything you expected it to be, taking into account how the environment was in the regional semifinal there? Is that something you weren't surprised when you saw? ALYSSA THOMAS: Yeah, we weren't surprised at all. It was everything we expected and what we wanted. We wanted to be the people that were cutting the nets down at the end, and we just wanted to silence the crowd. Q. Can you talk about that final few seconds, particularly when Shoni Schimmel gets that last shot up? What were you thinking and your thoughts when you saw it bounce off? KATIE RUTAN: Well, we chose to double her, but they threw a great pass and she got that. Just thank God Mincy was there to contest that because that ball went up and I'm pretty sure that ball took about 25 minutes to go through the air. But then just seeing it just bounce out, I mean, and then the buzzer hit, I don't have words. Like I just‑‑ my whole life went blank for a second. ALYSSA THOMAS: I think it was probably the longest three seconds, and I spent that three seconds on the ground watching the shot go up. I was just glad to see it hit the rim and go out. LEXIE BROWN: I mean, they said it all. She had hitback‑to‑back crazy‑wild clutch shots, so for her to‑‑ it was a great look, and all I could do was pray that it didn't go in, but when that buzzer sounded I went running to go jump on the first teammate I could find. Q. Lexie, did Coach say anything to you to prepare you for the crowd and the noise and how do you drown it out with so many thousands of fans screaming at you? LEXIE BROWN: She just said to stay poised. The crowd will feed off of your body language, so if you show them that they're bothering you, they're going to bother you. The only thing that you can do to silence them is to score and to get stops, and that's what we did. Q. Alyssa, you're playing a familiar opponent in Notre Dame. Does it help a little you know who you're playing and probably have a couple scouting reports from a couple months ago? ALYSSA THOMAS: It does, especially we had them at home, and we let it slip away. We let them get up early on us before, but we're a different team now, and we're looking forward to the match‑up. Q. Katie, four threes for today. Was there any indication going into the game that you were feeling good about your stroke? KATIE RUTAN: I had a good shootaround and a good coach with Coach B and Coach Atkins and Coach Langley before the game and Sue, and so my mindset was if I saw an opening I was going to take it. I play every game like it's my last, and I'm going to do anything I can. It takes a lot to step up and hit those threes in a game like this with a crowd like that, but those are moments that you live for, so that's all I could think about was seeing that ball go through the net. Q. For Alyssa and Lexie, the first half Louisville's defense, what was discussed in the locker room in terms of really trying to beat that in the second half and really trying to overcome that? LEXIE BROWN: We just had to kind of settle down. I think we were playing into what they wanted, which was a lot of junk defense and a lot of extra physicality that was unnecessary, but we kind of had to get our minds right, slow down, get back to our game, run transition and get stops. ALYSSA THOMAS: We're just getting set up on the offensive end and they were swiping at the ball, and we just had to cut down on the turnovers and try to capitalize and score. Q. Lexie, Brenda mentioned that this team has grown throughout the season, and four of your past six losses have come on the road, some of them in hostile environments, especially the Duke match‑up. What do you think has grown about this team to be able to pull out a win in front of such a big crowd in such a hostile environment? LEXIE BROWN: I just think we've got a renewed focus. We really have come together as a team these past couple weeks. We've been spending a lot of time with each other. We've been really getting our chemistry right on the court and practices we've been working hard for each other and we just have this new‑found trust and now we have a common goal and we've reached it, so now we can only go up from here. Q. Lexie, you were like ice at the foul line down the stretch. I'd like to ask you how you felt that pressure, if you were thinking about it and that sort of thing, and I'd like to ask Alyssa and Katie what it was like for you to watch your freshman guard at the line in a clutch moment like that. LEXIE BROWN: Free throws are free shots. It's really about focus. You've got to tune out the crowd. I think the best thing that Coach B would bring us a stroke called free throw ladder, and it's the same kind of pressure in practice, but instead of not scoring any points you got 15, 20 line sprints. I would take the pressure in a game over free throw ladder any day. ALYSSA THOMAS: We have complete confidence in our freshmen. I mean, they're in the game in the tight minutes and making plays for us. I wouldn't have it any other way. KATIE RUTAN: I agree with Alyssa. As Lexie is my shooting partner, I have to give her a little extra moments, but if the ball is in Lexie's hand I'm more than confident than anything. I don't think she's a freshman anymore. She doesn't play like this. She doesn't hold herself as it. To see her on the line, I just knew it was two easy points, and I knew she was going to hit it no doubt. Q. Take us through what you said to your team to kind of prepare them for the crowd out there and the hostile environment. BRENDA FRESE: You know, the last couple days I can't say enough for our staff in terms of the teamwork and obviously all season in terms of what our staff has done to prepare this team. You know, we really got them to buy into welcoming the environment, embracing it, being excited, being able to silence them, being able to get them to boo against you, and really just enjoy it. If this was three months ago we wouldn't have been prepared or been in this place, but just to see this team grow, the trust level, the confidence level was really special to be able to watch. Q. There's a chance if Carolina holds on this could be a very similar situation with three ACC teams you've already played. Does it help you to play familiar teams that you already know, sort of take some of that out of it? BRENDA FRESE: Yeah, you know, there was a lot of déjà‑vu going on these last couple days. I've already had that feeling in terms of feeling that us and Carolina could advance, three ACC teams. It brings back special memories obviously from 2006. And really the teamwork is the same, when you talk about your players and your staff and your support staff, very similar to '06 in terms of just being lined up together. Q. I know you said before that everyone knows your name now after you beat Tennessee. Clearly everyone is talking the UConn‑Notre Dame match‑up for the championship game. It's the hype, it's already been said that's what's happening. Does it make it easier, you guys are there, there isn't the pressure with the underdog in that game? BRENDA FRESE: I love it. I love it.  It's par for the course. You know, continue to talk and we'll just try to fly under the radar and just be who we are. Nobody expected us to be able to walk in here in front of 15,000‑plus fans to be able to pull off this upset. It's easy to say that a team should win on their home court, but this team just keeps believing and they just keep staying grounded, and we'll just continue to be true to ourselves. Q. The game was so fast‑paced throughout, there was a lot of turnovers from both teams. You guys had 15 turnovers in the first half. When a game is going back and forth like that so quickly, what do you say to your team to kind of calm their nerves or make sure you guys get more solid possessions throughout a game? BRENDA FRESE: I think one of the biggest adjustments that we made as a staff was at halftime when we settled our team down, and then really getting‑‑ every time‑out we went into talking about ball reversals and being patient. I thought we were too quick to get the first pass, to be able to go attack, to go have aggressive pressure that was going on the ball. Making them have to defend for a longer period of time, the ball reversals, the screening action we had taking place off the ball reversals was huge. Q. The kids said what was going through their head the last three seconds. What was going through your head? Did you think of fouling? BRENDA FRESE: There was. Even leading up to that when Alyssa was at the foul line, our staff talked about‑‑ when I saw her two threes that went in, absolutely that was my thought, do we foul? Took it into the huddle with the team, asked them. It's their team. They're going to decide the end, and they chose not to foul. They wanted to go straight up in terms of what they were doing. Obviously it paid off for us. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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