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NCAA WOMEN'S FINAL FOUR


March 30, 1997


Aubrey Eblin

Wendy Larry

Clarisse Machanguana

Ticha Penicheiro


CINCINNATI, OHIO

WENDY LARRY: First let me just say that I think Tennessee, with pressure, certainly took us totally out of it, and as physical as our basketball team is, we were definitely outmuscled, and sincere congratulations to Pat and the phenomenal job that she did with the basketball team. They effectively finished tonight, and we were unable to really defensively do much to keep them from scoring.

Q. Ticha, could you talk a little bit about the difference between the first half and second half and what you were better able to do in the second half?

TICHA PENICHEIRO: In the first half we were intimidated with the pressure Tennessee was putting on us. We turned the ball over way too much and it had a lot to do with the defense. In the second half we were more relaxed and played our game and, unfortunately, it wasn't good enough to win the game.

Q. Ticha, what was the difference with Elzy on you this game, and last game when she guarded you, you had 25 points?

TICHA PENICHEIRO: Last game she was guarding me, and Elzy is much bigger, has longer arms and I wasn't able to penetrate as well as I did in the first game. She didn't guard me the first game. If she did, it was for a couple of minutes. Really, it was more now.

Q. Ticha, they seemed to change up on you in the first half and had about 3 or 4 different people on you. Did they seem to be a little fresh coming at you?

TICHA PENICHEIRO: I think it was a new strategy. Everybody there was playing and they were all good defenders and they were coming fresh and I was getting tired as the game was going on. I turned the ball over too much and that had a lot to do with it.

Q. Clarisse, how much did it mean emotionally, and also, in terms of changing the tempo of the game, when Mery fouled out?

CLARISSE MACHANGUANA: Well, Mery is a great defensive player. Of course, great at defense. In situations such as that, you can't put your head down. I thought we got together and kept on fighting. Mery is important but we had to keep on fighting.

Q. Clarisse, talk about the physical aspect of the game. They didn't call a lot of fouls in either half, and it seemed like there was a lot of banging going on inside.

CLARISSE MACHANGUANA: It was a physical game but I think that happens to all tournaments. It has to be physical, and I don't exactly think it was the physical game that made a difference. It was because we didn't finish as much as we should.

Q. Ticha, in the second half, could you talk emotionally, when you guys took the lead, and what you were thinking at that time and just about how you came back. It is the second game in a row that you guys did come back like that.

TICHA PENICHEIRO: This team never gave up, but for as many points as we were down, we tried to fight on the floor. In the half time we were talking about coming back. When we played Stanford we were down 15 and came back and won the game. We knew it was possible. In the first time against Tennessee we were down by ten and we won by 11. We just played hard. We had to live for a couple of seconds and Tennessee is a hard, tough team, and Coach Summitt and the players, what can I say, they play a great game.

Q. You talked about the 3 pointer and the 4 point play. It seemed like you got it back. But did it hurt you on the other end?

AUBREY EBLIN: I think that to tie up the game and have the first lead and it gave us better momentum. It just wasn't enough.

Q. That was pretty much the question I had, also. But I guess you described the spark on that shot, and that was like the first lead that you guys had. Also, did you plan on the shot before that?

AUBREY EBLIN: I sure did. I just wanted to get the shot before time ran out.

DEBBIE BYRNE: No further questions for the players. We will release them and begin to take your questions for Coach Larry. Ladies, thank you very much.

Q. Coach, can you talk about the defense that Tennessee put on you, any surprises?

WENDY LARRY: Under the circumstances, with the battle that we fought on Friday, I think that Pat's plan to wear Ticha down was great. She was fatigued, doesn't turn the ball over 11 times in three home games, let alone one home again. Initially it took her totally out of the first half.

Q. Coach, when you had to put Mery back in the game with about nine minutes left, was that a --

WENDY LARRY: We had a discussion with Mery about trying to stay on the floor. We were going to try to rotate her a little bit. It helped defensively. But what she did out there was kind of a physical push and shove match.

Q. The three guard offense, did that hurt you down on the other end?

WENDY LARRY: No question. We had to go to the offense to try to get back into the game. Unless we had the ball, we couldn't get our defense set back on.

Q. When you were in the tournament the last couple of weeks, you had a lot of games like this one when you had to dig down deep. Does there come a point where the team runs out of emotional energy from playing from behind and having to fight so hard each game?

WENDY LARRY: We talked about emotionally and our basketball team can mature a lot in that regard. But I would say that some of the games that we have played, even the game Friday night, was just as exhausting. Tennessee was able to rotate a lot of players against Notre Dame. We, unfortunately, were not able to do quite as much of a rotation. I think fatigue was also a factor down the stretch. I don't think we had anything left.

Q. One of the things you did so well against Stanford was picking up the defensive pressure, creating even more turnovers. Is it fatigue that you weren't as effective against Tennessee?

WENDY LARRY: I don't think we were recognizing our personnel very well. There were times that we made very crucial mental errors defensively. I will give a prime example. Kyra Elzy is a great penetrating perimeter player. We were aware of that. On two occasions, defensively in the perimeter, we pressured her to go to the rim instead of containing her. We don't usually make those defensive mental errors.

Q. Wendy, what has Pat done to get so much out of this team? Hard work, of course. But what from your perspective has she done so well?

WENDY LARRY: First of all, she got a great deal of experience. She has kids that have been here before. In her senior class, in her junior class. That's a great deal of pluses for Tennessee. But there is nobody on the Old Dominion roster except Wendy who was assistant at a National Championship game. So what has she done? She has taken a group of experienced players and she has brought the talented younger players along, and they believed. She said it best. They were pretenders initially and now they were contenders down the stretch.

Q. Coach, can you talk about the progress of Aubrey since she has been with your program and you saw her play in high school.

WENDY LARRY: Aubrey worked very, very hard this summer and changed her body from a high school athlete to a collegiate athlete. She is a much stronger athlete now than she was a year ago and worked very hard. She has to work on different dimensions of her game, and she knows that. I'm sure she will be doing that in the summer.

Q. Coach, can you just talk again about Holdsclaw's specialty down the stretch. She had about ten points in the last six and-a-half minutes or so.

WENDY LARRY: In our zone, we got caught so hot by Pashen that there wasn't anybody within five feet of Chamique. It was just critical errors on our part. Not to say she didn't receive the finish. She did that well all night.

Q. Coach, after this is all over, what will you tell your players after the season?

WENDY LARRY: We talked about being proud of what they accomplished. We challenged the junior class. We have a tremendous class of seniors who have led this team a very long way. And now we challenged our junior class to take this and decide what they wanted to do with it.

Q. Wendy, your contract is up with Old Dominion. You're obviously now a very attractive candidate for a lot of other schools. Can you speak to your future, where you might be next year?

WENDY LARRY: I really don't have any comment.

DEBBIE BYRNE: That was the final question. Thanks very much. This ends the Old Dominion press conference. Tennessee will be in momentarily.

End of FastScripts....

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