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MOUNTAIN WEST CONFERENCE WOMEN'S TOURNAMENT


March 7, 2012


Ashley Colbert

Jeff Mittie

Natalie Ventress


LAS VEGAS, NEVADA

Wyoming – 61
TCU – 44


THE MODERATOR:  We're ready to begin with TCU.
Coach, if we could start with you, give us a brief statement on today's game.
COACH MITTIE:  Well, I thought Wyoming was much better than us today.  I don't think with the way our conference has been this year, I don't think anybody can play bad and is so talented they're going to win.  And in some cases over the year teams have been so talented that you could do that.
You cannot in this tournament, with the youth of the entire league, have a bad day and win.  That just isn't going to happen this year.
We had obviously a bad day today.  We did not do things very well, and Wyoming did things very well.  So if you have one of these days, and that would be the entire league, you're probably going home.
I thought Wyoming played very well today.  Give them credit.  I thought Woodward was excellent.  I thought Mileto was the difference maker for them.  Give them credit, they played well.
THE MODERATOR:  We'll take questions for the student‑athletes first.

Q.  Natalie, you struggled from the field tonight.  Any reason for that?  Did you feel good going in today?
NATALIE VENTRESS:  I felt good going in.  When I got out there, they were playing really aggressive on me.  My shot wasn't falling.  I expected my teammates to step in, they did, they tried, but our shots just wouldn't fall.

Q.  For the first 15 minutes, it was a normal back‑and‑forth game, then they go on a 15‑0 run, was there any inkling on the court that was about to happen?
ASHLEY COLBERT:  Nobody anticipates a run like that.  When that happened, we have a mentality to cut it back down.  It didn't come out.
THE MODERATOR:  We'll dismiss the student‑athletes at this time and continue with questions for Coach Mittie.

Q.  The first 15 minutes, like I was asking the players, y'all were playing well, looked like a good game was at hand.  Did you have any inkling that was about to happen?
COACH MITTIE:  Well, I didn't like our mental focus in that stretch.  There were breakdowns that you can't see from the stands that we were having.  So we didn't feel like we had all five engaged mentally.
Noonie got off to a rough start.  She was obviously trained to figure out what she needed to do.  We went 0‑4 in the free throw stretch.  Lovings missed two.  That got us into our press because we weren't making any shots in that stretch.
We have a tendency to have some dry spells offensively because we don't shoot it as well as we'd like.  In that stretch we'd like to get to the free‑throw line.  If we can get to the free‑throw line, that gets our press set up and it's different.  We did not get our press set up hardly at all in the first half.
Then Wyoming made some good shots.  They made some shots that I thought Mileto was key in that stretch.  We gave her two threes.  I thought Woodward was steady all day long.  In that stretch we had opportunities because we have Sewell in foul trouble, she has to come back in with two fouls.  We just couldn't make any shots.

Q.  Was it just them knocking down more shots today or did they show anything different today that caught you by surprise?
COACH MITTIE:  I wouldn't say they did anything different.  They just did everything a little bit better than they did.
It wasn't like they were running different sets.  It wasn't like there was a different emphasis.  They made more shots.  Woodward looked more comfortable.  She looked like she had a rough game against us, and that's what you get with youth sometimes.  You have a young kid that has a down game.  Today we had a lot that had a down game.
I thought their mentality was more aggressive.  Other than that, they just seemed to have a different look to them than they did at our place.
I thought early, from a just individual standpoint, Colbert got off to a great start for us.  Gets the first four points of the game for us.  I thought our team was executing some things.  But then it looked like we got very internal to our own struggles.  I had trouble getting all five on the same page.
Sometimes you get that with players that get frustrated.  We had our share of 'em today.

Q.  Your thoughts on Antoinette Thompson, your lone senior?
COACH MITTIE:  She had a very good career.  She came to us late in the recruiting process.  We actually signed her in August.  She's one of those players when we signed her we had a need.  We didn't know how much she'd play for us.
Her hustle, her attitude has been great.  She had her struggles today.  But, you know, she fights real hard and is just a great kid.  Tough to see her go.  She had been a very solid player for us for four years.
So, yeah, we'll miss her.
THE MODERATOR:  Thank you very much, coach.
COACH MITTIE:  Thanks.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports




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