Kentucky-Mississippi State Women's Basketball Postgame Quotes
Kentucky-Mississippi State Postgame Press Conference
Rupp Arena at Central Bank Center
Feb. 1, 2024
Head Coach Kyra Elzy
On what they learned from it being the first time playing in overtime…
“You know, there’s a lot to learn from this game but I want to first say that we talked about playing loose, keep fighting for 40 minutes, didn’t know it would go to overtime but I thought they sold out defensively. But you know, in overtime, we gave up an offensive rebound, that easy drive down the middle, have turnovers, so we just have to be more solid, but we can go back and fix all of those things.”
On what it means to take a team that beat LSU to overtime…
“Well, I love their fight, and that’s what they needed. And we talked about staying together. We only had each other and I thought they felt sold out obviously disappointing. You want to win. That’s the name of the game. And so, their spirits are really down right now, and rightfully so because their competitors did a lot of good things. You know, we got to be able to finish, finish out but we did grow up in this game and that’s what we needed. Obviously, we want to grow up and get the win. But you got to live learn and we got to continue to be resilient.”
On what do you like about having Eniya as an option…
“Yeah, I thought that Eniya Russell stepped up for his big offensively. She’d made some great defensive plays as well. But just her size and athleticism, her ability to finish around the rim with contact. You know she can make moves and short spaces and she’s a real mismatch problem. And she delivered once again so very proud of her and the team for executing down the stretch. Even the last play to draw that up and come out. You know at the end of the day you want to be able to get looks to get the shot off. We were able to get two of those unfortunately, they didn’t go in.”
On what specifically stood out in tonight’s game…
“You know, I thought we did better in the ball screen coverage. We communicated which was what I wanted to see. Also, our helper I thought we rotated slid overtook some charges got some deflections helped outside the paint, and dropped and made people score over us instead of around. I also thought we were way more disciplined tonight as far as not just swiping down. I told him instead of your arms going down. Let’s practice the arms going up and I thought that was helpful for us.”
On taking charge in a physical battle …
“Yeah, it’s real physical. You know Mississippi State, they’re really athletic, they’re physical, and they play fast. Obviously, Jessica Carter is a handful. But I thought you know; we battled I thought we matched their physicality.”
On playing in the SEC …
“You know in this league, one or two possessions down the stretch, whether you miss an offensive rebound or free throw, it can cost you down the stretch. Unfortunately, tonight we’re on the wrong side, but we’ll like I said keep battling… go back to the drawing board and learn from it.”
On allowing those open three-pointers down the stretch that gave Mississippi State the lead…
“You know what you know, defend the three-point line and we didn’t want to give up open threes obviously. Don’t fall on the shot, but when you over-rotate your defense and you have an open three, you’re not going to fall out, so you know we have to be more solid and just keep them in front. But then the three-point line, if anything, we have to make them put the ball down and lay it up. Twos are better than threes. But you know that’s where we’ll learn and grow and shout out to my team for battling and in regulation. I just told them we’ll learn from this.”
Player Quotes
#4, Eniya Russell, G, Sr.
On what ran through her head when Coach Elzy drew the play for her…
“Nothing really, just to put my head down and go. I know I’m very efficient going to the basket, so it all came naturally to me – I was confident in it.
On what’s coming along for her in the middle of the season…
“I think my teammates help me a lot. I would say they believe in me a lot; they tell me to just go downhill, tell me what shots I should take, tell me that I can make those certain shots so. I feel like my team helps me a lot throughout the season, so they build me up for the right time and now it’s starting to show.”
On what changed in the second half…
“ I started off a little slow in the first half but the second half is usually third quarter slow but I feel like today we took a step and came out with better intensity, better pace so that helped us a lot and Maddie always starts off with a good flow and she pushes me to start off too so, I started off slow but she picked me up– so second half I definitely came and played better.”
On what allowed Mississippi State to knock down the threes in the late part of the game…
“It’s something we definitely are going to build on. We just had a few mishaps down the stretch which things happen, but we can definitely learn from them and build off of them. We just made a couple of mistakes helping off the shooters and things of that sort so that’s how they got open looks but we’re going to learn from it go back to work tomorrow watch film and learn from our mistakes.”
#22, Maddie Scherr, G, Sr.
On what happened on their last offensive possession of the game…
“I had a good look, you know, and I didn’t knock it down. I thought the second one when Saniah [Tyler] passed it back out to me, I thought she was gonna fly by and I could get another one off because we got the O-board. Kicked it to Saniah — I thought she had a pretty decent look, too, but sometimes you just don’t find the bottom of the net.”
On what changed in their play over the course of the game..
“In the first quarter or first half, we weren’t shooting all that well. I think just having a short memory is so important and not letting your offense affect your defense, and that was the main thing that I was really proud of tonight. We played hard on defense for 40-plus minutes.”
On MSU’s success with three-pointers…
“We knew who the shooters were, and we were aware that they weren’t shooting well. I’m not exactly sure how they got those really good looks at the end, and that’s something we can learn from. We really need to lock that down and not let them get comfortable. So, I think that was something to learn from. We were holding them on the three-point line, and it can get dangerous when teams get in a rhythm.”
