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2005 MWC Basketball Tournament Postgame Quotes
Women's Quarterfinal #4 - #3 BYU def. #6 Colorado State, 70-65.
March 9, 2005 An Interview With: COLORADO STATE RAMS JIM MILLER: From Colorado State, head coach Chris Denker; No. 4, Sara Hunter; No. 32, Melissa Dennett. Coach, if you want to begin with opening comments and then we'll open it up to questions directed at the student athletes. COACH DENKER: I thought it was a very well played game. I thought both teams played well. Hats off to BYU, made really big plays at the right time. I thought the three at the end of the half by Anderson and the three at the end of the game obviously was big, also. They just made some sort of game-winning types of plays. You know, they get a steal and convert it or force a turnover coming out of a timeout, little things like that that kind of break your back, a couple of O-board putbacks. The free throw disparity really hurt us because I felt like they were able to get some easy baskets in the lane. The point disparity was pretty large. It was like 42-20 as I glanced at the stats. I'm really proud of our kids. I thought they played really hard, very competitive. Got after it in all phases defensively, but I thought these two were big for us. I thought Lindsay Thomas had a big game, as well, played with a lot of passion. I thought our coaches did a great job having them prepared and the scatter report and everything. We got beat by a team that made some big plays on us. JIM MILLER: Questions for the student athletes? Question: Sara, you've had a great game. What was going through your head as you were going through the game? SARA HUNTER: Well, coming in I was lower seed, we really have nothing to lose, so we just wanted to get after it and jump on them right away. We fought hard through the whole game, just couldn't finish like coach said. We didn't make the big plays when we needed to. Question: Melissa, I had the sense that this was from start to finish the best game you guys have played in quite a long time. I don't know if you agree with that or not. I'd be curious on your thoughts, and maybe what was the key? What was different tonight that you guys could sustain everything for as long as you did? MELISSA DENNETT: I agree, it's been a long time since we played that hard and aggressive. You know, I don't really know what it was. Towards the end of the season I think we've really come together our last couple of games, and I think that really helped. I don't know, I think we were just all on the same page. We all wanted to come out and do our best and do everything we could, and so I think that's why we were so aggressive and just ready and well-prepared. Question: Sara, can you just talk about the shooting tonight? I mean, 7 of 10 from three-point range. At what point did you know it was kind of your night? SARA HUNTER: Well, just even in warm-ups I was feeling good. I really like playing here at the Pepsi Center. I've done it a couple times before. I think it was after the first couple I was really feeling it. My feet were getting set quick and people were getting me open really well, making good passes. As much as I'd like to take all the credit for it, my teammates did just about as much. Question: Melissa, it looked like it was a very physical game inside. Will you talk about that and also if that played a role in the difference of the fouls? MELISSA DENNETT: It was very physical. BYU is always a physical team. We knew they were going to be pushing us around when we came in here. I don't know really if it had -- I don't know. Question: Melissa, next year obviously you, Lindsay, Vanessa, all you guys are going to be seniors, you're pretty much bringing back the entire team. What do you take from this year heading into next year, which obviously I imagine you have pretty high expectations for? MELISSA DENNETT: I don't know, we had a bunch of ups and downs this season. I hope it's more consistent next year. I hope the way we played now, it'll flow into next year. That's what I'm hoping for because we played really well this end of the season. Hopefully it will carry over. That's what I'm expecting, play more consistent and be able to count on each other. JIM MILLER: Ladies, you can take off, and we'll open it up to questions to the coach. Question: Chris, I would assume you're going to be in contact with the WNIT people. What do you think your chances are, and if you do get in, how do you think -- you're coming off a couple of pretty good performances. How do you think you can do? COACH DENKER: We have had some preliminary talks, and from what I understand, you know, we're a team that they're interested in. I think as always with the NIT there's a lot of what ifs, sort of waiting to see what's happening with the other tournaments. You know how that goes. I definitely think that we would show well in the NIT. I think as Diesel just said, we've been playing pretty good basketball to be specific for maybe seven halves. You go back to the second half of the Utah game where we scored 50 points and then New Mexico we played pretty well, although we lost, and we played very well against Air Force the other day and today was a good game and a hard-fought game. It hasn't always translated into wins unfortunately for us, but we played some pretty doggone good opponents there, too. I think that just shows that we would perform well and we're really starting to play good basketball. Just talking in the locker room there, I know that they're excited to continue to play. I think we would do well if we got a chance to get in the NIT. Obviously we've always hosted well, draw a lot of fans, so that would be beneficial to the NIT, as well, I would think. Question: You said earlier this season that any time a team has been able to get really physical with you guys and kind of body you up that those have been teams that you've had some trouble with. What did you do tonight to try and get over Anderson and Kubic and company? COACH DENKER: Good memory. No, you're absolutely right. You know, the question was asked earlier about -- posed to Diesel about the physicality in the lane and the free throws and whatnot. They always play physical, BYU, and we knew that was going to be the case. They'll kind of shuttle in posts there and try to keep banging. Obviously we have two really good post players that we're going to try to get some shots for, so they're going to just try and shuffle people in and out and try and bang on you. Unfortunately we didn't get some calls that we would have liked to have gotten, but I thought it was a pretty well officiated game. One major difference for them is that they would really initiate contact with the dribble in terms of when they're driving the ball. Sullivan, she creates a lot of contact on her own, so that physicality really kind of took its toll, I think. You look at the interior scoring, again, 42-20 and the free throw disparity, situations like that, I think that their physicality kind of got to us eventually. Question: When Sarah is going like that, obviously you want to get her the ball. Do you think you can maybe have that too much? It seemed down the stretch trying to get the ball to her and you guys end up with the 20-footer from Lindsay? COACH DENKER: It wasn't so much that we were just going to her on that because -- what we did is we ran a little ball screen play and we knew they were going to try to step out and show hard or perhaps even double her, and when they had done that earlier in the game, it opened up Diesel on the roll. We were really looking for that. But then what they were doing to get specific, LT's man was specific to Diesel so we knew if we switched to LT we'd have a jumper. When we did that she didn't have a shot so it came down to playing some motion and trying to get a shot. They just kind of scrambled out of it and played pretty good defense on that possession. Question: With Julie and her penetration, it seemed like both her and Ambrosia got to the rim a little bit. Just defensive let-downs on that or no rotation? COACH DENKER: A little bit of both. You've got to do a better job at the point of attack. We always kind of tell our kids, and I've heard it said several times by coaches, the better you can just do one-on-one and not help and rotate, the better your team defense is going to be. We always tell the kids, try and shut your man down. It's a team defensive system; you've got to have some help. BYU has got five kids on the court that can all shoot the basketball, and I don't mean a layup, they're knocking down permanent jumpers, you've got Cheesman, Kozlowski, they can all make 17-footers, maybe the occasional three. You can go right down the roster. That's what makes them dangerous and that's what makes Sullivan so good. She's a threat to drive it, sneaky-quick, but uses her strength to kind of shove off a little bit and then rise up to shoot. Ambrosia, she obviously had a good ballgame and they can do a lot of things with her. Late there they tried to post her. They run off and double hit a three, pretty versatile kid. She's a pretty tough guard. I'd also add that I thought Sara's game was one of the better individual games, regardless of class, that I've seen -- she just had that look in her eye, and I was really proud of her for that. I thought LT and Diesel played their tails off, but for a freshman kid to play like that, that's pretty special. JIM MILLER: Thanks, Coach. An Interview With: BYU COUGARS JIM MILLER: We'll begin with BYU head coach Jeff Judkins; student athletes No. 14, Julie Sullivan; 35, Melinda Johnsen. Coach, if you want to open with some opening remarks and we'll open it to questions for the student athletes. COACH JUDKINS: It's nice to be here. It's nice to be able to win a game that close. I give Colorado State a lot of credit. They played very hard tonight. They played as good as I've seen them. They had an outstanding game. You try to take their inside game away, and when Hunter is hitting those shots, it's very difficult. It seemed like we kind of went in spurts and they went in spurts. Both teams were emotionally high for this game. It's tough to beat somebody three times in a row, and Chris has done a great job with that team really, preparing for our game. I thought offensively he did some things we haven't seen in a long time. We did a pretty good job of adjusting. That's why I've got Melinda up here. Melinda was a key part of the game defensively. She did a great job on Hunter the last five, six minutes. Every basket she scored was head in the face. I'm real proud of the team. We've lost a lot of games like this where the game has been close and we haven't executed and made the plays, and I'm just glad these guys stuck together. We had to make some defensive stops, and we knew that they could do it. Hopefully we can continue this tournament. JIM MILLER: Questions for the student athletes. Question: Melinda, on that last play, the set up, Ambrosia for the three, is that kind of a set play or do you get the credit for that? MELINDA JOHNSEN: I wasn't set up for that. I knew the shot clock was going down, we had six seconds. I knew we could get a better shot than what I had. I'm just glad Ambrosia was sitting there. COACH JUDKINS: It wasn't great coaching? MELINDA JOHNSEN: Great coaching. Yeah, it was awesome. Question: Julie, could you talk about how you handled the pressure that came after you on the dribble about three-quarters court and some of the adjustments that you tried to make with bringing in some help, another point guard? JULIE SULLIVAN: To tell you the truth, I didn't really recognize that it was pressure because I've handled that all year, so I don't think -- I think we were really prepared for it from our pre-season games. You know, we played a lot of tough teams that got in our shorts. To tell you the truth, I don't really even recognize the pressure. Question: Julie, could you talk about last year? You missed a couple of free throws and you were upset and this year you came back and made them. How good was that redemption for you? JULIE SULLIVAN: Knew that question was coming, because as soon as I missed them I thought about last year's. I knew I was going to get fouled again because I wanted the ball in my hands. I knew I was going to make my second pair of free throws. But it did cross my mind and I kicked myself in the butt for it. JIM MILLER: Ladies, we'll let you go and open it up for questions for the coach. Question: Can you just talk about the shot Ambrosia, she hit a couple big threes for you tonight. It just seems like she's not afraid to shoot in very key situations. COACH JUDKINS: She's very confident, sometimes maybe a little bit too confident. She took the one shot she missed kind of quick on the clock. I said, Bro, I think we can get a better shot than that. She believes when she's open that that's the best shot she can get. She has the confidence. Tonight I believe we proved we have the deepest bench in the league with both Kubic and her, and I'm very fortunate to have her because Ambrosia can score in so many different ways, and Kubic the first half did so many good things for us when Danielle was trying to score. It's nice for a coach to really have that. It's tough because you have to balance those minutes and a lot of players like to play a lot, but as long as you give them opportunities and you're positive with them and you let them understand that winning is the most important thing, it seems to work out for you. Bro has hit that shot a lot in practice and she's hit it in big situations. As Melinda said, she had six seconds and she saw Bro open and that's how much confidence she had. We tried a little play to get the ball to the basket and Colorado State did a good job of closing that off. That's where I was so proud of the team is they let the offense, whatever the defense did in that situation, they just let it come to them, and that's where we've matured as a team. Question: Could you talk about Julie's performance? It just must really feel good as a coach when you're over there and you know the ball is in her hands down the stretch and she's not going to make mistakes with it? COACH JUDKINS: You know, I've been real lucky to have her. Hopefully Tiari will take that over next year. Julie is a competitor. She remembers that foul shot, and she remembers a lot of situations, and I think she has fought through that this whole season, and I was just proud of her getting up there and sticking those foul shots once she had to and not being afraid to really do it. I wouldn't want it to get in her way in a tough situation because she'll do whatever she has to. She'll go through a brick wall. I think she's been a great example of what hard work is, having a baby, dealing with that, having her ACL and then being able to come back for senior year and having the kind of career she's having now, I'm very happy for her. She feels good about herself, and that's what the main part of basketball is all about. Question: Could you talk about your adjustments on your defense? They did have some success inside. You went to a zone and then was it Hunter just on or did she get lost in the zone? COACH JUDKINS: She hurts more in the man-to-man, a little pick-and-roll action. We tried to cover down, and they kicked it, and Colorado State did a good job of making the extra pass for her. We just didn't rotate quick enough. Johnsen the last eight minutes of the game, every one she scored in the end was a hand in the face, and when players get that going, they get to feel like that, it's really hard to stop them. I thought Melinda did a great job. Colorado State's inside game is very scary, and Dennett is athletic and she can score, and Thomas is a good shooter, so you try and take that away and you're going to give something up. Tonight Hunter took advantage of it. Question: Considering the start and everything, you know, you win two games against CSU and I know your players are dying to play Utah again. Was that start, even though it came back and tied up, was that big to get off to that lead? COACH JUDKINS: Yeah, it was. We came out with a lot of energy and we kind of burned the cylinders fast. Julie got tired, and so I had to pull her out just because of that, and we were going. My wife says to me all the time, don't pull out your team when they're going good, let them keep playing, so I've tried to take that advice but Julie was really tired and so was Cheesman and Kozlowski. It's going to be a great challenge. Utah is a very good team, and as they got voted MVPs of our league we've got to do a good job on Shona and Kim. I think my team is looking forward to this game. We've been talking about it, and hopefully we can play one of our best games. Question: How important is it to have time off tomorrow before a Friday game in a tournament like this? COACH JUDKINS: It's big-time, really. For us, we had a hard-fought game and Utah did not have to battle as hard as we did, and part of that is our own fault not doing well in the conference. Having that rest will give us a little bit more time to kind of think a little bit about some things and stay off our legs. I really believe we have one of the deepest benches. I think New Mexico and us are probably the two deepest. I mean, it's to an advantage if you can get to the third game. We've always seemed to play better the second night, so we'll see what happens Friday. It'll be a good opportunity for us to just rest a little bit and hopefully watch some things that we can do better, and it gives me some time just to rest, too, a little bit. JIM MILLER: Thanks, Coach.
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