Opening statement …

“Well really proud of our team. Great win today. They had a tough week. That was a tough road trip to Arkansas, got back really late Thursday night and had to bounce back and work hard for two days to prepare for a tough Florida team. Florida always plays really hard. It was a difficult first half so I thought we made some good adjustments at halftime, came out and played some good Kentucky basketball. Proud of them. We’re happy we won this one.”

On the difference in the third quarter …

“I thought we finally started taking care of the ball. We turned some of their turnovers into some fast break points, which then got the momentum turned. I just thought we got more active on defense, but I thought we were getting the ball in some good areas in the first half. Just turning it over making some careless plays. We really worked hard not to be frustrated at halftime. Just (told) the team if we can just take care of the ball and keep them off the offensive glass we had some opportunity in this game. They really locked in, focused in, did a good job the second half.”

On the players having miscommunication in the second half offensively …

“Yeah that’s unfortunately something that happens more often than I would like. We’ve got to get that corrected. We came out of a couple of timeouts and we’ve got to stop doing that. Didn’t execute real well. Those are things that I really believe are correctable. I think we’re getting better at that, but when Florida in the first half I thought really worked hard to get us to take shots that weren’t in rhythm. We missed a couple of perimeter shots and then we started to doubt ourselves. I got a little frustrated with that. We’ve got to remain confident. As long as the ball’s going inside and then coming back out the 3s are good. If we’re just east and west going around the perimeter and we’re just settling for a 3 that’s not very good. So it was just little things like that that I think we can sharpen up. Overall it was a good performance by our kids today.”

On Jessica Hardin’s return to game action …

“I was hoping to get her in a little bit earlier. It was, you know, the second quarter – we didn’t handle that great. It was very close. I didn’t want to get her into a position where the first time back in after a 12-game absence where you’re just in an absolute pressure cooker. So it worked out really well today, and she’s been doing that in practice. She’s really been shooting the ball well. You know she took so much time off with the concussion, but man it didn’t affect her shooting at all. She’s been shooting the ball well in practice. And she’s been building. She’s been getting better. I hope that gives her a little shot in the arm, and gives her some confidence. Got out there a little bit today and so we’ll just keep trying to work her back in, but I still believe she can play a very vital role in postseason.”

On if UK changed how it defended UF’s Ronni Williams in the second half …

“Well we didn’t change any scheme we just tried to tighten it up a little bit. If you are a half-step off on her, if you’re not really sharp in your communication in the ball screen whether she’s setting it or coming off of it and she can just get a little crease she can really turn the corner there, and make some plays. I thought we did a much better job of trying to level her driving off, and did a little bit better. I just thought we were a little bit sharper. I think our ability to benefit from some turnovers may have been a little deflating to Florida and slowed them down a little bit. So Ronni’s a really good player, and I thought we did a decent job on her this afternoon.”

On Taylor Murray’s steals in the second half contributing …

“She just ignites us. She’s so proud of her leadership, and what she’s trying to do there. What she’s trying to develop into. She’s playing some fantastic team basketball. She doesn’t care what is required of her. She’ll do whatever she’s asked so we can win. She’s just developing into a great leader for us, but she is so quick defensively. Has some quick hands and really can disrupt. And when she gets out with the ball, gets going – it ignites us. She’s playing some good basketball right now. Eleven assists, one turnover that’s incredible.”

On what Makayla Epps means to basketball in Kentucky …

“Well she is an unbelievable figure in the game. She started playing varsity so early. Had some notice really early, and so she’s kind of been dealing with that for so many years in the Commonwealth. To see where she is right now, and the way people connect with her I’ve said this many times: she has an unbelievable heart for people. She just has a great, great connection and a wonderful way with people that people feel connected to her. So I’m really proud of the work she’s done as a person. She’s gone through some difficulties here, and a lot of times kids will turn the other way, or leave, or whatever it may be. She hung in and made some changes that are going to benefit her the rest of her life. That’s what I’ll always be most proud of her being willing to do that work. And she’s meant an unbelievable amount to our program, but particularly this year with all of the upheaval. For her to stay here, stay solid, stay loyal, stay in a constant state of giving back to the program, and always being there for her teammates – I think that’s where you really measure her impact. We’re gonna work our heads off between now and Thursday night getting ready to play our very best. See if we can send her and Evelyn (Akhator) off with a victory.”

On if he remembers the first time he heard about Epps …

“I think when Mickie (DeMoss) was the head coach here she (Epps) came to camp. And I had gone to Morehead. So with her dad playing, and being on the (Kentucky) 1996 championship team I think that’s the first recollection I have is that the Epps kid came to camp, and she’s a good player. Looks like she’s gonna be a really good player. That would have been. It’s a long time ago – 12 years or so. Been aware of her for a really long time. It’s an interesting story. Everything that happened with her. So we’re gonna try to write a good ending to it as far as Kentucky goes.”

On how much energy helped in the third quarter … 

“It does help a lot, especially when one of my teammates like (Alyssa) Rice or Maci (Morris) gets a charge. That really helps us. Also, and-one plays. That really gets up fired up and its jazzes our team.” 

On her career at UK nearing an end …

“It is something that I have to think about, but I know there are few games left. But now I just need to think about all the games for my teammates because right now I am still here and I just have to think about my team and everybody else. I will (think about it more) when it is time to think about it.” 

On what parts of her game she wants to continue to improve on …

“I think like I was talking to my coach about. I need to work on my ball handling and also my shot. I need to bring my game out. I want to have more chances to do it on the court while we play but right now they need me more on the block. After the season, I plan on working on my ball handling and my shot more.” 

On slowing down Ronni Williams …

“Like you said, she leads the SEC in scoring so one thing we thought about is we shouldn’t let her get the ball. As a team, when she was on the court we said that she was not going to get to the basket. That is one thing that we did as a team.” 

On what went right in the third quarter…

“At halftime we just talked that we needed to get more movement on the offense and I feel like we did that and we started going into E. Evelyn just, when she had the ball she just executed or she made great passes out. Usually when we get the ball to Evelyn we start clicking a lot better. Defensively, we just knew we had to communicate a little bit better and we wanted to extend the lead and I feel like we did that.”

On what parts of her individual game she’s working on with the season winding down…

“Just my ball handing and being able to be more consistent with my shooting. And then I can always work on my defense and just being able to bring more to the team next year, especially losing Evelyn and Epps. They bring so much to our team, so me, Tay and everyone just have to step up their game next year.”

On how aware she was of Makayla Epps as a player growing up…

“Oh, of course. We actually played in the same AAU program, so I got to see her play in the summer and you just love watching Makayla play. I loved watching Makayla play when I was in high school. I mean, obviously you heard all about her because her dad played here and then her coming up and coming to Kentucky. So, yeah, I loved Makayla’s game. She’s taught me so much. It’s just been a joy playing with her.”

On what it is about Makayla’s game that makes her special…

“She just, she’s a team player. You know, a lot of people think she might be selfish but she does what she needs to do to help us win. She’s all the time being less involved and she actually gets pretty mad when we don’t take shots because she wants the assist. She just brings so much energy even if it’s not even her making the play, if one of us makes the play, she’s bringing so much energy and she’s celebrating. So, it’s just great to play with her.”

On what went right in the third quarter…

“We got stops and were able to push in transition which allowed us to get a bigger lead, and we were just staying focused and running our sets.”

On what the issues were in the second quarter…

“There was just some things that we weren’t sure about, so we just had to talk and it was just us as players we needed to communicate with one another and let us know there may be something we didn’t switch over or we didn’t hear our teammates. So, we just cleared it up whether it was like a dead ball or just us as teammates coming together.”

On what parts of her individual game she’s working on with the season winding down…

“Individual game, shooting and just like Evelyn said, being more of a factor and taking my game more inside, and she said outside, but just being more of a factor and hitting open shots.”

On if she was aware how many assists she had …

“I wasn’t aware of how many assists I had, I was just trying to make the open play. One of the things that our coaches were telling us was to drive and we drove and we had players that were open. When I drive and they are open, I am going to pass it.” 

Opening statement…

“It was a really tough game. I felt like it was ugly in a lot of ways. We obviously needed to play better than we did. We turned the ball over too much and I think that led to some easy scores for them. We didn’t play with as much half-court composure on offense than them, but you have to give Kentucky credit for getting those steals and causing those turnovers and converting those points. I thought those 3s that they hit were really timely. It really brought energy for them and we have to play with a lot more fight with the situation that that we’re in right now. We can’t have patches of fight. That has kind of been our trademark. We need to go 40 minutes of all-out effort and we’re learning how to do that. Our younger players are learning how to do that, play with adversity.”

On the difference in the third quarter…

“We turned the ball over a little too much. I don’t have a great answer, a creative answer or coaching answer. We turned the ball over too much. We forced a lot of things. We had a lot of unforced turnovers as well because we were trying so hard to get paint touches and those high percentage shots that we like to take and too many possessions where we flat threw it out of bounds.”

On Kentucky outscoring them 25-5 down the stretch being part of that fight she wants…

“It’s one of those areas where we don’t look for excuses or anything. One of those areas where we really miss Haley Lorenzen. We’re one of the best offensive rebounding teams in the league but one of our best offensive rebounders wasn’t available tonight and our guards needed to pick up the slack more and that didn’t happen. That, again, is where we are inexperienced and that we have to learn. Nobody is going to feel sorry for you when you have a player out or unexpected injuries. You have got to try to fill that hole with extra effort, extra fight and two or three percent of extra energy, whatever you need to do to contribute and we didn’t do that. We left some of those holes open.”

On Evelyn Akhator as a player…

“Evelyn is fantastic. She is a really hard matchup as a rebounder and I think that gives any team an advantage. She is similar to Ronni Williams for us. She’s just a really difficult person to keep off of the boards, especially when she’s not the only person you have to worry about. But really happy for Evelyn and the senior year that she is having, the career that she is having here at Kentucky. I think she’s a fantastic young lady.”