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NCAA WOMEN'S REGIONALS SEMIFINALS & FINALS: LOUISVILLEMarch 30, 2014Danielle BallardNikki CaldwellTheresa PlaisanceJasmine RhodesLOUISVILLE, KENTUCKY Louisville – 73 THE MODERATOR: We're going to start with opening remarks from Coach Caldwell. COACH CALDWELL: I'm extremely proud of this group. They have an unbelievable spirit about them. They have shown not only to our fans and families but to the basketball community that they can achieve when people think that we can't, and they've shown that we can. Honestly, tonight we played a very tough Louisville team that played extremely well. Tonight just wasn't our night. But I can't say enough how proud I am with this group for the challenges and the adversity that they had to overcome. Q. This question is for Theresa. If you could just kind of sum up what you're going through right now as a senior and what it's meant to play for LSU these last four years, or for your career. THERESA PLAISANCE: For me, it's a pretty sad moment. I really take pride in wearing LSU across my chest, and knowing that I won't get the opportunity to do that again is pretty heartbreaking to me. But I just‑‑ I've been through such a huge journey, and the people‑‑ the seniors that I came in with, Katherine Graham, Latear Eason, they really got me through my first year, along with LaSondra Barrett, Swayze Black, those people really got me through my first couple years here where I was struggling, and I wasn't the player that I expected myself to be. My junior year, my teammates just really had trust and faith in me that they were going to get me the ball, and I have nothing but great things to say about the girls that I've come through with. And the players that are currently on the team right now, this is a great group of girls. I can't say more about them. It's a sad moment for me. I'm really going to miss this place. I'm going to miss the staff. I'm going to miss the players. I'm just going to miss the whole tradition of LSU. It's a great place to be. Q. This for all three of the girls. Jasmine, we'll start with you. Could you just talk about the lack of offense today and, I guess, the teamwork to create it. It seemed, if you weren't making it on your own, just two assists on the game, it just wasn't happening for you guys. Was that something they were doing or something you were unable to do? JASMINE RHODES: Like Coach said, it just wasn't our night tonight. But we kept fighting, even though we were down by a lot. We strive to come back and never gave up. We tried to overcome adversity, but we just came up short. DANIELLE BALLARD: We were just never in our rhythm, running plays. We couldn't hear each other really on the court. We tried to do our own thing, but‑‑ that's good. THERESA PLAISANCE: I think they said it all. We never really got into our rhythm, and then coming down playing on defense, we didn't really start off in what we‑‑ in the rhythm that we wanted to start off in on defense, and then Louisville kept hitting those threes. So our defense really sets a tone for our offense and vice versa. Our shot selection wasn't that great. We just weren't making buckets. And even easy little buckets that we typically make, they just weren't going our way. But we were playing against a great defensive team, and those nights happen. Q. You guys obviously are missing two key members of your offense as well, and I understand they traveled with you. Have you texted them or been in any kind of contact with them, any communication since the game? THERESA PLAISANCE: Well, yeah. Rai's here with us. She's our supporter on the sideline. It's really hard to keep Rai in her seat. She's always trying to keep us hyped. She's trying to keep us in the game. I can't say enough about Raigyne and her heart and determination to succeed even when she's obviously limited with a torn ACL. We have a great trainer that's going to get her right back to health, and she'll be 100 percent as soon as they're ready to go. Jeanne Kenney is at the hotel, and she wrote us a note before the game. They're here, and they're supporting us. Having those two probably would have helped us out a lot on the offensive end. Q. Do you have the note? THERESA PLAISANCE: I don't have it. It's in the locker room. Basically, she just told us to play hard and that no matter what, she's proud of us. We worked really hard to get to the spot, and we just need to play in the moment and just play for LSU across your chest. Q. How good is Louisville compared to the teams you've seen in the SEC? Two 1 seeds out of the SEC. Just kind of how good are they, and how far do you feel like they have a chance to go in this tournament? THERESA PLAISANCE: Going up against a Louisville team, I can't compare them to any team in the SEC. Their pressure defense is one of the best we've come across this year as well as their three‑point game. They shot an unbelievable percentage tonight. That's what they do. They do a great job, and they're led by a great senior, Shoni Schimmel, who really gets it done for them. And also defensively, they caused us a lot of trouble. We had a hard time splitting the traps and getting out of the traps and converting, finishing contested shots. They're just a great team. I don't think I can really compare them. They have a pretty good shot of making a really good run this tournament and doing well. Q. For Jasmine and Danielle. Could you talk about next year's team. Clearly, you kind of assumed that role in the postseason. How do you carry that over to next season? Jazz, you as well, stepping up here, you're going to be the key cogs moving forward. JASMINE RHODES: Coming in next year, I know we're going to have a pretty big‑‑ some big shoes to fill with the seniors leaving and everything, but it's been a nice run with them, and I'm happy to have had this opportunity. But for next year, we just want to keep working hard. I know Coach is not going to let up any. So just going to keep working hard and having fun as much as we can and do our part to get back here and even further. DANIELLE BALLARD: Going on next year, we have some great players coming in next year, and I'm going to step up, and I'm going to improve to be a leader. We're going to grind hard. Next year we're going to be a better team than we were this year. We're going to have some good players, and the returning players, they're just going to improve on their game. So we're just going to be a good team next year as a group. THE MODERATOR: We're going to excuse the student‑athletes. We'll open it up for questions to Coach Caldwell. Q. Nikki, Theresa looked like she had a hard time offensively around the basket. Were you trying to do some kind of action with her, high‑low with Shanece, or were they just making it difficult? COACH CALDWELL: I think the one thing about Louisville's defense is they do a nice job of changing up their defense, and they do a nice job of picking and choosing who to trap, when to trap, and things like that. So we wanted to take the guesswork out of it. With Theresa's ability to pass the basketball, we wanted to always have a relief person, if you will, in the middle of the floor, and that hopefully will take some pressure off of Jasmine and Dashawn because we were down two of our other ball handlers. So that was the reason for putting Plaisance in more of that high post area. We would have liked to have gotten her inside a little bit more than we did, but she obviously kept us from turning the ball over as much as we typically have been. Q. Along those lines, if you knew going into this game that you were only going to commit 12 turnovers, would you have thought that this would have been a drastically different game than what the final score ended up being? COACH CALDWELL: Our turnovers, even though we've had 20 a game, we typically have good turnovers. So 12 probably averaged out for us. But I thought our shot selection really hurt us. I felt as though there were times we were rushed, and we didn't get any of the reversal action. That could be attributed to the play action that we were running. But definitely did a better job of taking care of the basketball because we didn't want to put our players in those positions to get trapped as much, and so that kept us away from a lot of our ball screening action. But, again, I felt as though we got some good looks. We didn't knock down a lot of those looks, though. Q. Coach, late in the game, Danielle came out, and you had a pretty long conversation with her. What was your message? Were you looking to the future, like the girls were talking about here? COACH CALDWELL: With Ballard, I just thanked her for being a competitor and putting this team on her back, if you will, and carrying us. She's just a sophomore, and she's playing like one of the best guards in the country. We have her coming back, and I'm glad that she's on our roster. But just wanted her to know how proud I was of her and that we will be back, and she's going to be better because of this experience. Q. Nikki, how much did the shorthandedness really kind of maybe catch up with you guys today? I don't think anybody off the bench scored, and just maybe the second half wearing down, especially Louisville plays 10, 11 deep. Did it catch up with you guys today? COACH CALDWELL: I think it played a role. I mean, when you lose what we did with Moncrief and Kenney, two players that are two of our better offensive players, if you will. And, obviously, Jeanne Kenney is one of our‑‑ we'd love to have her back there in some of those transition breaks they've got because she typically saves six to eight points in transition alone. But this team, they did all that they could considering, and our bench, they came in, and they tried their best. I'm proud of them for that. We didn't execute as well as we wanted to, but it wasn't that they were fearful. I think, when you look at Louisville, they're a very experienced team. They have unbelievable guard play. They have depth. They did a nice job of pushing the tempo. Their transition game is one of the best in the country, and they get out quickly. But they also do a nice job of finding the open player. Their spot‑up shooters from the three‑point line, they're hunting for the three‑pointers. And there's so many times when Schimmel is coming down the floor, and you can just see her searching for an open teammate. She's a great play maker for her team, and her teammates have answered the call. Q. What did you say to the team in the huddle? When you were up 12‑9, and Danielle, I think, hit like four or five in a row, five baskets in a row, what kind of things did you say to your team to try to get them to support her, or what did she say in the huddle? COACH CALDWELL: Honestly, I don't remember, but it would probably be along the line of we've got to make sure our shot selection‑‑ I know we were talking about that because we were getting good looks, but also I knew that their transition game was where they had scored half of their points at that point. So we were talking about probably the transition‑‑ our transition defense because we didn't do a nice job. And once you get the crowd involved and that first three goes down, I mean‑‑ because we know how it is when we're at home. That right there was a momentum play for them, and then it became contagious. So then you had different players stepping up and making shots for them. So I know we talked about our defensive scheme. Q. As a followup to that, when Gibbs hit the back‑to‑back three‑pointers that got them ahead or helped them get ahead, is that the kind of, I guess, twist that you were warning them to avoid? COACH CALDWELL: Yeah, I think the one thing is that we were doing a nice job of guarding their initial action. We just didn't do a great job in our transition game. And that's where they're very good. Q. Coach, this is a two‑part question. First, could you kind of give us the scouting report, in a sense, on Theresa Plaisance at the next level. She seems to me to have so much more than height to offer. And maybe a little bit under appreciated. And then the second half of that is that Louisville is known for its guard play, but they did a very good job of containing two taller post players tonight. Could you evaluate their post‑game. COACH CALDWELL: I think the one thing about Theresa is you've got a player that's very versatile who can play with her back to the basket, and she can also go to a face‑up game. She has the ability to stretch the defense with her three‑point shot. She's also a player that, when you are looking for a player that can play away from the basket and be a great passer and a read and can read defenses, she's been that for us. I like Theresa's ability when she's‑‑ when play action isn't being ran to her, her going and getting those offensive boards. I thought she's added that to her game as of late. Defensively, Theresa's somebody that we've had to play on the perimeter, and that's not an easy task. But every game, night in and night out, she's does that. We play a matchup, and she's on the back side, and we're asking her to go out of her comfort zone. So you're going to get a player that's going to do whatever the team needs of you. I thought that our post‑game, the disruption of our guard play kept the ball from getting there, and I think that hurts you. When you don't have one of your best passers in Jeanne Kenney able to get the ball there and play in that high‑low action, that will challenge us. They did a nice job of taking that action away. Q. Nikki, could you also look towards next year. I know you have a couple of transfers maybe. Who else can kind of supplement this roster and kind of get you guys back where you want to be? COACH CALDWELL: Every year it's different, what you lose and what you have coming in, and we're going to be a different team next year with different post play. We won't have two 6'4" book ends next year, but we will have an Ann Jones, who's a very mobile post player. Akilah Bethel is that 6'1" tweener type post player, guard. She'll play three and four. We'll have Boykin back at a swing. She can play the four or five for us, and Anne Pedersen can play the three or four. So we're going to be a little bit smaller, if you will, but faster and quicker. We also had a couple of first years and looking forward to them adding. I see this team pressing a little bit more. I see this team spreading the offense a little bit more. I think we're going to be a little bit more guard oriented than we have in the past. But, again, it's about how well you're going to play this game together, and I feel like we've got some great cohesion already. Thank you. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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