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BIG EAST CONFERENCE WOMEN'S BASKETBALL TOURNAMENTMarch 3, 2018Kurt GodlevskeKristen SpolyarWhitney JenningsChicago, Illinois KURT GODSLEVSKE: I thought as the game went on we did a much better job of keeping Providence out of the paint. That's reflective in their field goal percentage. So as the game went defensively we got stronger and did what we wanted to do coming into it. I think offensively it took us a little bit to figure out what exactly Providence was doing to us and what they were taking away. You have to give Whitney and Kristen and Tori a ton of credit, because they had to battle through a lot of physical play and make a lot of plays off of pick-and-roll situations which is where we tried to attack them and open them up. Very proud of our kids for sticking with it and grinding through it. It's a big win for us and hopefully our last overtime win. We don't want anymore of those. Q. At one point in the second half with 6:00 minutes to go you're trailing by 6 and Coach calls a timeout and you go on a mini run. What was the message in the timeout? What in your mind flipped the script for you guys? Because after that you really controlled the game. KRISTEN SPOLYAR: I think for us was just to execute our plays and stay in our tempo. We didn't want to get too sped up by them. So we did exactly that. We got into the hands of the people we wanted to shoot and we executed our offense. WHITNEY JENNINGS: Yeah, kind of going off what Kristen said, I mean, at the end of the third quarter heading into the fourth, we talked about how the first three or four minutes of the fourth quarter were important. I think we were down 5 going into the fourth. And we knew for us it all started on the defensive end to be able to get stops and push into transition. And like she said, to get it into the people's hands that we wanted the shots. Q. Kristen, you're a younger player and you came in here really young into the game. So what was that like? The pressure for you and how did you stay focused? KRISTEN SPOLYAR: I don't think there was ever any pressure. I think I expect that out of myself. I don't think of myself as a younger classman. But I think that's what my team expects out of me every night, so I want to give it my all and do exactly what I need for us to win. Q. Whitney, this team necessarily ranked one of the higher teams with assists (Indiscernible)? WHITNEY JENNINGS: Yeah, I mean, obviously on this team I have to be able to score the ball as well as get my teammates involved. So one thing that Providence was doing was coming off ball screens and they were putting all the focus on me which led me to be able to kick it to my teammates. I know Kristen was the recipient of several of those off the ball threes, as well as Sydney Buck. So, yeah, they just left them open and found them. Q. Kristen, you're coming off a season where you were injured, you were wearing the brace early in the season, at least in some of the games I covered. It didn't look like necessarily you were totally always acclimated with the offense. But now as the season has gone along, it's been your fourth 20-plus point game. Just talk a little about your evolution this year on the offensive side? I mean, you took 21 shots today, which I have never seep you take that many shots before. KRISTEN SPOLYAR: Thank you. Yeah, I mean, at the beginning of the season, of course, I had just gotten cleared to play. So I was still rehabbing. I was still working on just like my lateral quickness. It's just the little things in your game after you sustain that kind of injury that it takes away, and you just don't realize that. So I think each game in the year I got more confident and comfortable in myself. Of course, I worked obviously outside of practice and on stuff I needed to improve and just be more confident. So I think that's helped me. Like you said, just take more shots, be more comfortable and get back in my rhythm. WHITNEY JENNINGS: I think going off of that, our team is so confident in Kristen in scoring. She is the best pure scorer on our team. She can shoot it, she's so strong into the hole if she can post up. I mean, she knows that our team needs her to score every night. Q. This was a really big win for you guys, but moving on to tomorrow and playing the No. 1 seed in this tournament, how are you going to prepare for that? KURT GODSLEVSKE: You know, that makes it the tough part is having that short turn around. One of the things that we've been fortunate is to experience that in the non-conference playing down in that Florida tournament, having those short turnarounds where you don't necessarily get to get on the floor and walk through. We did a really nice job of that. But with that said, we're talking about Marquette who has weapons at almost every position on the floor, can score in multiple different ways. Defensively, I think you have to give Coach Kieger a huge tip of the cap. Defensively they've improved tremendously this year and make things difficult on you. For us, preparation is going to be key because, yeah, we have to do things a certain way and be able to defend them a certain way, and we have to execute some things on offense go. Ing back off of last game. But we're going to have to play well. I think that's going to be the more difficult thing is just the short turn around more so than the prep. Q. This is the third time playing Marquette, so there are not a lot of secrets between you guys. But the first time you played them on the road you probably could have come with a win in that game. It comes down to a buzzer beater with .8 left. What did you feel you did well and how do you replicate that tomorrow? KURT GODSLEVSKE: Well, the big difference was the second half. We became the more aggressive team in that ballgame. And what I mean by that is even though they bodied us up, we still set up our cuts, still attacked them at the rim. Ran our things. Got the ball where we wanted to get it in certain situations against certain match-ups. Even though it came down to that last thing, that last possession, we still had two possessions prior to that with a four-point lead. At that point in time in the year, even though we have a lot of maturity and a lot of seniority on the team, I think we were still figuring out how to win. That's kind of the climate and culture that we're at with our program. We've kind of dug and clawed and scratched our way out of where we started with this program. Now we're at the point where how do you beat those really good teams and you just cannot make those mistakes that we made down the stretch in the last minute, minute and a half with that four-point lead. It ended up costing us, so it was a really big learning experience for our girls. But at the same time, it gave us a lot of confidence because our girls believed that we can play with them. We're excited about that match-up, but like I said, we have pretty much have to catch lightning in a bottle to be able to compete with them because they have so many weapons and they're so strong. Q. (Indiscernible) in this environment, did you sense an extra sense of motivation and hunger? KURT GODSLEVSKE: For rebounding in particular? I don't know if we rebounded the ball as well statistically as we have maybe in other games. But a large part of that is Providence shot the ball extremely well. We gave them a little bit of help of how we were defending certain people and not following our game plan on certain people. But Providence shot the ball extremely well. As we went, their field goal percentages went down throughout the game and our rebounding started going up. Defensively, we've always been a pretty good rebounding team. It's just we don't get a lot of offensive second-chance opportunities. It's an area where we're going to continue to grow and work. I don't know if there will be that many against Marquette tomorrow, because, like I said, they do the little things of, sure, they competed against Notre Dame, and there is a reason they competed against Notre Dame. Q. So against a team like that, do you just get back in transition? Are you going to have that same mentality? KURT GODSLEVSKE: We're going to come into this game and try to make them shoot the ball from certain spots on the floor that we think give us the best chance to get those stops. It's one of the things that we've been preaching to our young ladies all year is they want to transition, they want to run and play fast. Yeah, it's a great way to play. But if you're grabbing the ball in the net all the time, you're not transitioning against anybody and not getting the opportunities you think you're getting. So defense is going to be a huge thing for us tomorrow, if we can get them in certain spots on the floor where we think we can be successful. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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