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SOUTHEASTERN CONFERENCE WOMEN'S TOURNAMENT


March 9, 2008


Van Chancellor

Quianna Chaney

Sylvia Fowles

Erica White


NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE

THE MODERATOR: Coach, an opening comment?
COACH CHANCELLOR: I thought that hats off to Tennessee, that they got a great team. I thought Coach Summit, her usual self, made a great sub tonight, putting Auguste in for the freshman to give them more defense and quickness, and I thought that was a great move.
I'm really proud of our team. I think they fought. I didn't play a lot of people tonight by design. They played as hard as they could. I'm really proud of our effort. We just come up a little bit short.
Ask the players questions.
THE MODERATOR: Questions for the players?

Q. You guys had plenty of ball to play still. What do you tell yourselves in the locker room with the NCAA Tournament coming your way?
SYLVIA FOWLES: Like Coach said, we're very proud of ourselves, we came out and fought for it, and you've just got to learn from these mistakes the last couple minutes, the mistakes that we made within the game and go back and correct them and get past this point and move forward. I'm looking forward to the NCAA Tournament.
QUIANNA CHANEY: I agree with Sylvia. You look at the mistakes you made and we've got some time before the tournament starts, and you go back home and improve, and you come back to the NCAA Tournament ready to play.

Q. Sylvia, before the game or after last night's game Candace said Tennessee was a different team from the last time you guys played them. Did you sense that they were a different team today? If so, what way?
SYLVIA FOWLES: I don't think so. I think they came out and did the same thing they did in the previous game. They crashed the boards, they played hard, and I don't think there's nothing changed about their team.
ERICA WHITE: I don't think they changed much, either. Tonight's game, we've seen each other all year, and this time of year it's just hard. I would say they just wanted it a little bit more, but different team? I don't see any difference.

Q. Lady Vols are a team you're going to want to see down the line for a little bit of redemption?
SYLVIA FOWLES: We ain't looking for pay back, but once we meet up again we'll do a whole lot better than what we did in this tournament?
ERICA WHITE: I agree.

Q. You say they wanted it more. Does that bother you? Is that something that will stay with you a little bit? Why do you think that was the case?
ERICA WHITE: Does that bother me? You know, Tennessee won. Tennessee is the SEC champion, so hats off to them. I look at my teammates and I look at the stats sheet, and I don't see any difference on that stats sheet too much. The only thing that I can think of, they had to have wanted it more than us. Maybe they prayed more last night, I don't know.

Q. Sylvia, how do you think you played tonight? You kind of got off to a slow start. Were you a little hyped up like you were talking about the other night?
SYLVIA FOWLES: I don't think I was hyped. I think I just was missing a couple jiffies, didn't get a couple of calls that I thought was fouls. You can't live in the past. You just have to come out and work hard, and I think I did that in the second half.

Q. What do either of you take from this game positive? Tell me something about that.
SYLVIA FOWLES: Just our ability of sticking around and coming out and playing hard and giving it our all. We all made a couple of mistakes, but just to stick around and play the way we did, I take that as a positive standpoint?

Q. You've played against Candace a lot of times. What was your impression of her play tonight?
SYLVIA FOWLES: Same thing, she's going to come out, she's going to bang and get her points. There's nothing you can do to stop her, you can only try to slow her down, and that's what we tried to do tonight?

Q. You guys won the regular season title ostensibly by beating them on their home court. Now they win the most recent title, the tournament. Which would you rather have?
SYLVIA FOWLES: Both (laughter). You sit here and you think about the things that you need to do and the things you did wrong, but for the most part I'm glad that we won the regular season.
THE MODERATOR: Thank you, players. For Coach?

Q. Did you see a different team today from Tennessee?
COACH CHANCELLOR: None whatsoever.

Q. At the end of the first, you guys had a lot of momentum going your way but then there were a few hollow possessions down there. Do you have feel that would have been the turning point and if you made a few of those buckets you could have come away with a W today?
COACH CHANCELLOR: I thought our missed free throws really hurt our momentum more than anything throughout the game. We had two or three times we could have really taken advantage of the situation. In a game like this you're hunting separation, and our missed free throws, I don't know about that. The rest of it was Tennessee's defense. They were pretty good today.
I would say there was a little difference between this game and the other game; probably their defense was better.

Q. When I talked to you yesterday you said home court advantage wouldn't play a factor here because you went into Knoxville and got that big-time W, but every time some momentum swung their way everybody in orange was up on their feet. Did that play a factor today?
COACH CHANCELLOR: Think that helped them. Up there we were able to remove the crowd from the game by the way we played. But we just never could -- we needed to make a play in the last three minutes to really kind of quiet their crowd, and we could not make it offensively or defensively. Part of that was because of how good they were.

Q. The shot that Parker hit, I think it was just under two minutes to go, shot clock was running down, she hit that jump shot. Is that one of the plays you look back on, just a great player making a big-time play?
COACH CHANCELLOR: That's the difference in the game, shot clock is down, the ball is outside with six, they're in disarray, they just throw it to her and she makes a play. I thought that was the difference in the basketball game.

Q. With 17 seconds left Quianna put up a shot. Was there miscommunication there or did you want her to shoot that that soon?
COACH CHANCELLOR: In Connecticut I took a time-out with a 17 seconds to go, ran a three-point play, and it didn't work. Tonight we thought we would let it run and hope to score and actually go for a two and score and call a time-out and foul. But didn't none of it work. So when it doesn't work, it's always on the coach. That was my fault.

Q. What positives do you draw from tonight going into the postseason?
COACH CHANCELLOR: Here's what I told our players after the game: If Tennessee is good enough to win a national championship, we are, too. We beat them at home, we had a great game here today. I don't see much difference in the two teams. That's what I see. Whatever they are, that's what I think they are. Wherever you put them, we're right there.

Q. Today was a record for an SEC tournament, over 12,000 fans. How good is that for the college basketball women's game?
COACH CHANCELLOR: I think it's great. Two of the greatest players to ever play the game, two Olympians, great game, great excitement. Great game if you don't care who wins or loses, except I do.
THE MODERATOR: Thank you, sir.

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