Kentucky Women’s Basketball Postgame Quotes
Kentucky 85, North Carolina 75 – FINAL
UVI Sports & Fitness Center – St. Thomas, Virgin Islands
Saturday, November 24, 2018
Head Coach Matthew Mitchell
Opening statement…
“Just an absolute incredible performance by the players. We had a very productive halftime. I thought we came out discombobulated, we weren’t into it particularly, or focused… everyone talks about our speed, but North Carolina… we haven’t played anybody with that kind of speed, and I thought they came out so aggressive, and it was hard for us to adjust. Once we settled down, I thought we were executing well on offense, but we just couldn’t get any shots to fall. So, we had to get into halftime and get some things organized. Our ball-screen defense was not good, really thought the players made that adjustment. We quit giving them wide-open 3s, and then our offensive poise… we just started attacking, and it was an amazing performance and you’ve just got to give our guys credit, real proud of them.”
On seniors Taylor Murray and Maci Morris, and also Rhyne Howard in the game…
“Yeah, we needed a big day out of those three from a production standpoint, and they are three really good players, give them a lot of credit for keeping their poise. Once we got it down to six going into the fourth quarter, assistant coach Niya Butts, came up with a great idea. We moved Rhyne to the four and started to run a little rocket action there at the free throw line. They had a hard time with that, of course we had not run that, so they had a hard time with it and it got us some momentum, some buckets. So a great job by Butts. Once we got a little momentum, it just shifted. It’s funny how it shifts, its incredible.”
On getting the spark in the fourth quarter…
“I just thought they really hung together, they were smart today, just did a great job of responding to adversity. We missed a layup I thought could have sparked us, then it looked like it might’ve been a deflator, but we didn’t deflate, we hung in there and ran back. A lot of good stuff today.”
On Tatyana Wyatt playing through adversity…
“Incredible performance by her and Ogechi (Anyagaligbo) both, who went back to the hotel yesterday and worked as hard as they could to get treatment. Tot (Tatyana Wyatt) was at the pool last night, the pool was shut down this morning so she got in the Caribbean Sea and got her self loosened up, ready to go, and had some huge plays in the game. Really proud of her toughness, laying it on the line for her team.”
On how the team performed the way they did in the fourth quarter…
“We busted it wide open, we kept going, kept going, weren’t getting a whole lot of success – I think we had it turned over 11 times at the half, something like that, but we just busted wide open there with our pressure defense. So proud of our players and we earned every bit of it today.”
On the week ahead…
“It’s funny how confidence can help you and we ought to gain a lot of confidence. You know, we didn’t have a breather for three straight days, three tough and talented teams, and so now we will enjoy it, have a good time tonight, travel back safe tomorrow. We’ll have an off-day Monody and we’ll have one day to prepare for Morehead State. We’ve got to get focused in, they’re playing really good ball. Then we’ll have some time, hopefully, to learn some lessons from the islands and take a step forward as a team and let this be a building moment for our team. But, I’m just so proud of them, they played exactly how we wanted to play, with resilience, they played like Kentucky Wildcats today.”
On these three teams being NCAA tournament teams…
“No question, North Carolina can get there. UCLA fought so hard, South Florida ranked, so there is no question about it. Good weekend for the Wildcats.”
