BIG TEN CONFERENCE WOMEN'S BASKETBALL TOURNAMENT

March 2, 2022

Timothy Eatman

Osh Brown

Shug Dickson

Rutgers Scarlet Knights

Gainbridge Fieldhouse

Postgame Press Conference

Rutgers - 75, Penn State - 50.

THE MODERATOR: We'll start with an opening statement from coach.

TIMOTHY EATMAN: First of all I want to thank everybody for being here, the Big Ten. We got a chance to see Commissioner Warren earlier and I think he's doing an outstanding job for the Big Ten conference. And what they're doing for women's basketball is, I'm really, really happy to be a part of this league at this moment and time.

We felt like we played really well today. We played a good, very good Penn State team, but I thought we played with a lot of purpose on the offensive end. We shared the basketball very, very well and we got to the shots that we wanted to get to.

So I was really proud of our kids and really proud of this team, young ladies. I was really proud of them and just so happy for them because I know how much effort and work they have put into this season and so I'm really happy for them and proud of them.

THE MODERATOR: Questions for the student-athletes, please.

Q. Osh, when you started the game, I thought Robinson did a good job of getting you guys off on right foot scoring some points and she's she also distributed the ball. I think that helped you inside. You had a double double tonight. How important was her getting off helping you and helping Dickson and everyone else.

OSH BROWN: I think it was very important, especially she helped me get shots at the time. I feel like the first half they kind of had me a little bit because I was trying to take it off the drive and at the same time they was crashing me.

So once I realized that I kind of adjusted what I was doing out there. I think it definitely helped out for Shug because she's backing off or she's going to the hole no matter what. That's her first instinct so she did a good job on that.

Q. Shug, how about just the way your game has come along recently, 19 points today, nearly a triple double. What's been the difference for you? You had a roller coaster season and now so much has kind of smoothed out. What would you say is the difference for you that you're noticing?

SHUG DICKSON: I think it's just been because they have been on me a lot about scoring the basketball, stop passing first. So when I get out of that mindset I look to score a little more and then it opens up for my teammates. So, yeah, I think that's been my main focus lately.

Q. Coach Eatman, to hold a great player down like Makenna, the way you guys have three times this year. Could you describe what that takes, to hold down a great scorer sometimes you could do it for a couple games but a third game they're going to get you. Your team was able to hold down someone that is 7th in the nation in scoring. Describe what kind of work behind the scenes that it takes to be able to do that to hold someone down that is so explosive.

TIMOTHY EATMAN: The attention to details was important, but I thought that Shug did a great job on her the entire night. I think she was shocked that we gave her the assignment, but I believe in her and our staff believes in her, her defensive ability, and she did a great job of staying in front of her.

I thought the players who played the other two kids we gapped it very, very well and when we gapped it, she was trying to get in the lane, and I thought we was there and showed a presence.

We wanted to have two feet inside the lane every time she touched it and that you way Shug could feel comfortable that she could take away the jump shot and once you take away the jump shot and she had to get to the drive, I thought we was there.

They played a great defensive game. They played with great purpose. We kind of made a few adjustments. If you noticed Tyia Singleton was playing a guard in our five players playing the guard tonight to start the game out. And so by us being able to rotate off with that five, that put a bigger body inside the lane on her. But honestly, Shug did a great job of guarding her from the start.

Q. Shug, your play tonight that it looked like you all found each other really well, you distributed the ball. Do you think that's the best you passed the ball to each other all season long?

SHUG DICKSON: Actually I really do. When I can find my teammates and get scoring the ball it gets everybody going in a good rhythm. Again, I've just been focused on scoring the ball and when I score everybody else is going to be open.

Q. Osh, four of the last six games over 70 points now. These are all regulation games. Can you put into words just the difference in the offensive flow let's say for the last two, three weeks compared to let's say November and December when so many new faces were getting to learn it. How does it play out on the court that allows those numbers to go from struggling to get to 52 now you're at 70.

OSH BROWN: I just feel like it's like us coming together of the us putting those pieces that Coach Eatman, the rest of the assistant coaches brought together. There's eight newcomers, like we wasn't all going to click in the beginning of the season because it was a short amount of time in the summer. And it's finally clicking now and this is the perfect time too. It's not about how you start, it's about how you finish.

Q. Can you talk about that third quarter, coach, I think you had a 16-3 run to break the game wide open and secondly, you said rebounds, you out rebounded them 54-32, 24 bench points and second chance opportunities coach 11-7. If you could just talk about those categories as well.

TIMOTHY EATMAN: Well, we'll start with the rebounding. We felt like if we would get two people inside the lane every shot that we had an opportunity to get offensive rebounds. Because their center did a great job all season boxing out the first person. But the second rebounder was efficient for us. Can you imagine -- Osh was in the high post a lot of times, can you imagine a guard trying to box out Osh in the high post, that's like a win/win for us.

So once we had two people inside the lane it forced the center to guard, box the person out down low, it gave Osh an opportunity to go really go uncontested and get second chances because of the fact that there was not guards that was going to stay in front of her.

So we showed the kids the film during practice, during shoot around and we showed them that if they can just get two people inside the lane they're going to get the offensive rebounds. So, but the third quarter I thought what we did better. I thought Shug got us into our sets better in the second half. I thought when we came in at halftime, we recognized they was going to play some Tri 2, they was going to play some zone we got into one formation and we was able to run offense out of both, out of that formation whether it was a Tri 2 or whether it was a zone. And when we was able to do that we felt like we was more efficient. They played with great purpose, they move the basketball and we got to the spots that we needed to. But that's the biggest thing for us, it was more efficient because we was able to play out of one set.

I do want to say this before the student-athletes leave because they don't hear me say this enough. These young ladies has worked extremely hard. The time and effort that they put into their craft, to get better, it just shows the resilience of them as people more than basketball players because they could have quit a long time ago, but they kept their heads down, focused on what they needed to get accomplished, and I'm so happy for them because they're reaping some of the benefits of all the work they put in this entire year.

THE MODERATOR: All right. We'll now take questions for coach.

Q. Indiana tomorrow. I think your game earlier in the season against them was cancelled, so you haven't played them yet. Have you even looked at their game film yet or just focused solely on Penn State so far and then tonight you'll be doing your homework on Indiana?

TIMOTHY EATMAN: Well, first of all, Indiana's a great basketball team and we have seen them because the game was cancelled at the last minute, it wasn't cancelled like a week in advance, so we went through preparation to get ready for Indiana.

So they're great. 1 through 5, 1 through 5 can score the basketball. 1 through 5 can handle the basketball. 1 through 5 can pass the basketball. We're going to have our hands full because we're going to have to play with great purpose on the defensive end and we're going to have to be very efficient on the offensive end.

But they're a tremendous basketball team. They're well coached. They have their center back in the game now, back in the flow, when she's been out for the last, she had been out for like a couple weeks. And when she was out a couple weeks they had a couple freshmen that stepped up and gained valuable minutes. So now they're able to rotate her back into the lineup and now they got better experience with those two young ladies that probably wouldn't have got that much experience if she had still been there, but now they have been able to weather the storm. For them to be a fifth seed, that tells you how great the Big Ten conference was this season. Because that's, they're one of the top-10 teams in the country.

Q. It's the Big Ten tournament, I got to ask the question: How is Vivian doing? Any time you have the Big Ten tournament and Rutgers you got to think about Vivian.

TIMOTHY EATMAN: Well she just called. Just got off the phone with her right before we walked in here. She was so proud of the players and so proud of the effort that the coaching staff gave.

She's always coach. She's always going to be on top of us to make sure -- and she says just the right things at the right time.

She reminded me, she said, Don't forget you won the game. Celebrate with the team. I know you got to go back and get your head down and focus on the next team, but realize that you won and that I'm so proud of you.

So she's doing terrific, can't wait until she gets back. I'm so happy I can move back over another seat so she can come back. But just thankful for her. She's just a tremendous trailblazer for the Big Ten conference. Just a wonderful person. I always tell people she's a better person than she is a basketball coach. So that's her being a person when she picks up the phone to call you right after the game is over.

Q. Seems like once the team was able to break their 2-3 zone that everything kind of just took off with the energy really kind of sparking. Did you feel like that energy kind of go up another level once the offense was starting to click a little bit more?

TIMOTHY EATMAN: Well the thing that Rutgers has always been and Coach Stringer is always proud of is our defense. To be honest about this team, they need to score to play great defense. In the past Rutgers team has always said we're going to rely on our defense, but even if we didn't score we had enough toughness to go back down on the other end to guard and say, we'll get you on this end so we can get a run-out.

This team needs to score offensively to be good defensively. And that's a change for us. But it's a change that we have embraced. The thing that we tried to do, you got to realize this, on their staff is a former Rutgers player. So everything we run, they already know. So we tried to change the formations up of things, so we could get to the same shots, but we had to try to do it a little bit different.

And we went into our spread formation and our spread formation we got to the same hits that we would normally get to, but it made us a little bit more unpredictable. Because they knew every call, like we called four guard, she's telling her team where to go. But we ran it, ran those same patterns but then out of different formations and we got to the same shots.