Kentucky Women’s Basketball Postgame Quotes
Kentucky vs. Gardner-Webb
Memorial Coliseum – Lexington, Ky.
Nov. 12, 2017
Kentucky Head Coach Matthew Mitchell
Opening statement…
“Proud to start off the opening weekend here in Memorial Coliseum 2-0. Gardner-Webb is so well coached and played really hard, and I know they’re going to have a fantastic season. I thought we came out and from the opening tip to the final buzzer, I thought there were some real areas where we improved. (Tierra) Huntsman is a heck of a player and all of them really spreading us out and putting us on our heels with our perimeter defense was difficult, but it was some good work for us. I thought the team responded to what we asked them to do today. A day of improvement, long way to go, we need to keep getting better, but real proud of the players for working hard over the weekend to try and improve.”
On our defense adjusting to their five out offense…
“I think you do just have to try and get a feel for the game. They were at their best early on when they were freshest execution-wise. I just wanted our players to be patient. You can lose your patience when they just kind of went five out and tried to drain the clock and then attack off the dribble. They had to have seen us have some trouble with that on Friday night. I think it was a really good game plan and smart by Coach (Rick) Reeves. He’s a great coach and so we just tried to talk about hanging in there, trying to get better with your fundamentals. I don’t think our fundamentals are good enough to where we can rely on them right now. We still are trying to get to a spot to where we can disrupt an offense with our defensive pressure. I thought they just stayed patient, moved their feet, they tried to do the things we asked them to do in the short practice we had yesterday. We ended up doing enough good things to get the victory.”
On the importance of the 19-0 run to seal the win…
“That was a big moment for us. We lost Tot (Tatyana Wyatt) in the game day practice today. Just a bang-bang freak play and so she is really, out of our post players, one of the perimeter threats that can really stretch the floor and so KeKe (McKinney) being able to slide over to the four today was big. KeKe has always been able to make 3s. She didn’t shoot a lot of them in the first game, but that is not a shot that is unfamiliar to her. That is something we really are looking for from her and so that was a really good spark to a 19-0 run.
On Maci Morris’ performance …
“I thought Maci really tried on defense and she tried to improve her box-out technique. Friday night we were just watching the ball and Sacramento State was just flying in and getting a lot of offensive boards. We challenged them yesterday. We had a short, but very intense practice yesterday and we emphasized defense and then we watched a little bit of film this morning before the game day practice and we just tried to call a few people to the carpet about their rebounding effort. We didn’t mince words with that. I thought Maci really responded, and it’s like I told her and all the team in the postgame talk. I saw a lot of people trying to use the proper rebounding technique and really sitting down and doing a good job fundamentally with that. So, happy for her. All of hers (rebounds) except for one were defensive, and that’s where we were really struggling on Friday night. We just weren’t boxing. Good for her. Proud of her and for her hustle today.”
On the Friday/Sunday turnaround…
“You can’t fix everything. So what we did was we really tried to focus in on rebounding and we felt like we worked for a little over 30 minutes on defense and the emphasis was on rebounding. We thought we could make a lot of progress in 30 minutes of focused effort there, and we did. Still not where we need to be, but better. They really improved on that, and then we tried to be disruptive and I thought for some of the game it was hard for Gardner-Webb to get into what they wanted to get into. We just tried to simplify that defensively and emphasize hustle in those two areas and it helped us out.”
On Maci Morris stepping up …
“That’s the thing. Shots are going to come and go. It’s what you’re going to do on the defensive end of the floor. Rebounding, you know anybody can run around and fire the ball up at the goal. It’s what are you doing with the overwhelming majority of the game when you don’t have the ball in your hands. It’s a very short time where you do have the ball in your hands and so how hard are you going to defend? How hard are you going to box out? How hard are you going to go after rebounds? So, I’m really proud of Maci.”
On importance of depth …
“Today, losing Tatyana (Wyatt) right before tip-off – and for us to be able to handle Gardner-Webb the way that we did – speaks a little bit to what the possibilities are for depth. We worked hard the last couple of days trying to get Makenzie (Cann) and KeKe both ready to run the four so we can go with a four-guard lineup and I think down the line that is going to be something that will help us. It was really great to see Maci and the rest of us get down on the boards and defend and leave the gym with some sense of improvement.”
UK Student-Athletes
#22, Makenzie Cann, G
On three big wins and not letting them get to their head…
“We talked about that in the locker room. We’ve still got a lot to improve on, so we’re definitely going to rest tomorrow and get back to work Tuesday and get ready for a big road trip.”
On hitting a couple of 3s and playing inside and out…
“That is definitely something I have been working on is shooting and being able to score, be a threat in multiple ways. But as for Maci (Morris), me and Maci are getting shots together, she’s my partner. I still have complete faith that she’s still one of the best shooters I’ve ever seen.”
On what they did to slow Gardner-Webb down…
“I think initially we weren’t expecting five out, because they haven’t done that yet. That was just good coaching on their part. After that, we just made in-game adjustments and were like, this is what they are trying to do to us and what are we going to do to stop it. It was kind of that situation.”
#32, Jaida Roper, G
On a couple of big jumpers in the first half, being part of a 19-0 run, feeling comfortable and the depth…
“I feel real comfortable because I practice all those shots, so it’s just preparing and helpful giving me more confidence. And the depth is great, we don’t have to go so long. You just play your hardest and the subs come in.”
On what they did to slow Gardner-Webb and Tierra Huntsman down…
“It was a very well-coached team. I give them that. But we just prepared really well for them. We just got in the huddle and said that we just got to stop them and stop her. I feel we put Tay-Tay (Murray) on her, it slowed her down a little bit and we started talking more and picking up the defense tempo and just got some energy about ourselves. So, that was always good.”
Gardner Webb Head Coach Rick Reeves
Opening statement…
“First of all I want to say that I really appreciate being here in Kentucky. My wife is from Kentucky and both sets of grandparents, even though I grew up in Southern Indiana, I was always a Kentucky fan. I really appreciate Matthew Mitchell inviting us up here, it was really good for me and my team. I played high school ball at the same time Kyle Macy did and was actually in a tournament against him but unfortunately didn’t get to play them because we lost and they won. Since Kyle Macy I was always a big Kentucky fan, unfortunately Coach (Joe B.) Hall was coaching at the time and he never called me to come down and play so it’s nice to even come as visitor. I think Matthew is doing a really good job with the program here. I’ve been aware of Kentucky women’s basketball since the 80’s. He’s done a nice job of building tradition here.”
On what happened with their offense and what Kentucky did…
“Second quarter, I don’t know if somebody put a lid on the rim but I have a good shooters that make good shots. Again I’m glad we brought them in this environment, some of them were a little bit nervous and afraid, some of the younger players, but we were staying at hotel that had a bunch of military people here in town that their families were spending their last night with them. I said look they’re going through something real, it’s just a basketball game. We’re so blessed. So the second quarter really turned the tide for us and we couldn’t ever really recover from that and we had to get out of our strategy. We didn’t want to take quick shots with them and again early we took a couple quick shots, we got a charge that really hurt us. I was at Indiana State with Larry Bird and he only scored two points once so if it can happen to Larry Bird it can happen to anybody.”
On who stood out from Kentucky…
“We were definitely afraid of (Taylor) Murray. She is just quick, quick, as my grandmother would say she was quick as a hiccup. Again I grew up in the country. But we didn’t want her to get a lot of transition points, we wanted to make their post players score and finally their started pounding it in and finally it costs us. We wanted to really guard the 3-point line where I thought we did a great job. We have the upmost respect for Maci (Morris), such a great shooter and then one of your post players (KeKe McKinney) hit a 3, I think it was the first one, I think UK was one of 10, our players looked at us and said ‘Coach that wasn’t on the scouting report’ and I just told them that it sometimes happens. But the kids that we knew could shoot 3s I thought we pretty much stayed with them pretty well. Again Kentucky is such a good basketball team and they have so many weapons. Ok you’ll take that away and we’ll go over here and score. Again that’s the mark of great coaches, I’ve known Lin Dunn, and Kyra (Elzy) since they were players and Pat Summit was a good friend of mine so you’ve got a great coaching staff. Like I said they do an excellent job.”
On Tierra Huntsmen’s performance…
“Well, I tell people sometimes that I’m in a mixed marriage because I’m from Indiana and my wife is from Kentucky. You know because there is a little bit of a rivalry there and I really appreciate John Calipari. I saw him last night and I met him when he was at Memphis and I was at Southern Miss and he came down and spoke to our kids, but Tierra was the only one I was worried about coming over because she is an Indiana fan but I was like look he’s a great guy come on over and speak to him and after she did our players really liked him and we really appreciate that and like I said we had nothing but wonderful hospitality here and you know Tierra does what Tierra does, it’s just that she didn’t have anybody else to come a long with her. I mean usually Alexus Hill, Carly Plentovich usually starts, she just got release from bone spur surgery, Savannah Plentovich has been out for a week with a concussion. We got them back to play but Carly was only supposed to play eight minutes max per our trainer, we got a great medical staff and then Alexis Hueston and Nia Lee are freshmen and so we even got a point where we played a couple of the walk-ons there at the end but it was great experience for us because Kentucky is better than anybody in our league and that’s what I want. You know I want to put us in a tournament atmosphere and where we have to face some adversity and now got to do this and tomorrow we have to go play Morehead. I was disappointed at our free throw shooting, we a lot better at free throw shooting than that. I thought the officials did a good job, I had no issues with the officials but then I was disappointed that a couple of our players that normally got shots that they normally make, they missed and they would drop their head and I told them you can’t do that. We talked about that, you just got to play through that and again I’ve seen great players go through that and you know the size, strength, athleticism of Kentucky, you know they’re going to make you miss some shots so got to give them credit.”
