UK ATHLETICS COMMUNICATIONS AND PUBLIC RELATIONS
WOMEN’S BASKETBALL
MOOREHEAD STATE at NO. 25/25 KENTUCKY
NOV. 28, 2018
MEMORIAL COLLISEUM – LEXINGTON, KY.
UK Head Coach Matthew Mitchell
Opening statement…
“First off, just to mention how impressed I was with Morehead State, how they played and how good of a team they are in the Ohio Valley Conference. Morehead State means a lot to me, giving me an opportunity to start my career as a head coach and help me develop, and has continued to support me throughout the years. So, I really appreciate Morehead State and I wish them the best this season. I think they will have a very good season and very good OVC team. I was real proud of our players, fourth game in seven days, very, very difficult stretch we had and early tip. There were so many reasons to make up excuses for lacking energy. I thought we came out with some energy. Morehead State is top five in the country in scoring and fourth in turnovers and you had to come with energy versus that team, and I’m really, really proud of our players for coming out and playing. We’re really banged up right now and some downtime for some of our players is really going to help us refresh, and rebound, and recover, and that’s what we need. So, really proud of the efforts today and really good win for us.”
On Maci Morris this year compared to last year…
“Yeah she’s been really fun to watch. She’s just worked so hard throughout her entire career, since she was a kid, to be a good basketball player. So, in the radio interview she had a couple 3s at the Paradise Jam that was streaming on the internet and I don’t know how many people got to see that. She made some 3s in the North Carolina game where the net didn’t even move, just perfect shots. So, she’s shooting the ball great right now and was really in rhythm and just didn’t have the same job, and it’s so much fun to watch how she’s fit into it, and I just know how much it means to her. She cares, and as a coach, you just want to see hard work pay off and she’s a really, really hard worker.”
On how Maci Morris is encouraged by the depth in scorers this season…
“I think it’s a big difference for her. I noticed that in Italy when Rhyne (Howard) joined us and started making some plays. I just think it lifted everybody, but particularly Maci and Taylor (Murray). It makes such a big difference where you don’t have to be so perfect every possession. Last year, our defense wasn’t very good so it put tremendous pressure on our offense. A lot of the players who were playing really outstanding in their role were not as good last year. They worked really hard. Jaida Roper is making a huge difference, Keke McKinney makes so many plays that show up in the stat sheet. But, just everyone is better. It has taken more pressure off Maci and she’s very excited because she wants to win, and she wants Kentucky to win, and she wants to be successful, so it’s a big difference from last year.
On what it says about Kentucky being successful against a fast team like Morehead State…
“The good thing about what we are doing right now is that we have committed to do what we have to do to be good. I don’t know that we are the most talented team around. I’m pretty positive that we’re not, but the only way I really felt like this team could be successful is the way that they’re doing it right now. We have a long way to go and we have a lot of good teams to play, but we can’t focus on what we don’t have, we’ve got to commit to what we do. We have some hard-nose players that have paid the price to get in great condition and have paid the price to come together as a team. I don’t know if we are any better conditioned than somebody else. What they’ve done is they care about each other, and they don’t get down on each other. They don’t come unglued when the going gets tough, and that’s a credit to them for coming together like that. We just have to stick with it, it doesn’t always look pretty for us, but we have to be one of those teams where the sum is greater than the parts. I think you do that with high-character people and that’s what we have.”
On the improvement with the press…
“It can get a lot better, however we have shown lots of improvement. We went from not knowing what we were doing, to creating a pace. A lot of the turnovers that are happening now are because people are in a hurry – it’s not so much trapping and rotating. We had one good trap and rotation today, that’s an improvement over zero. It can get better and with the press you just have to start seeing it. Our first pressing team that went to the Elite 8 in 2010, we weren’t very good until January and that’s when it really started to come together. What this team is doing is they’re playing hard enough that you may look at it on film as in she’s open, she’s wide open, I need to make those plays. However, people are still making mistakes because we have to have the right pace. Next, we are denying enough for the entry pass right now that’s causing some difficulty. As we are trying to get better, teams will get better throughout the season. We got to search, fight and hunt for improvement every day. The commitment to playing that hard has been really good so far, but what we told them going into this game was we really got to sell out and commit to it and see if we can round ourselves into a really good defensive team.”
On giving out prizes for the one with the most deflections…
“The thing that we try to do is to make sure that we catch them doing right more than doing wrong. We start every film session with some type of positive play that signifies hustle. Deflections are important, making a play fundamentally sound with a correct technique is really praised, taking a charge, tough screens, good passes, those are the types of things that we try to emphasize on a regular basis.”
UK Student-Athletes
#4, Maci Morris, Sr., G
On how she played in the first half …
“I was joking with some of my teammates and told them, ‘I don’t know how any of my shots are going in because my legs were so dead.’ But, Taylor (Murray) does a great job, she always knows where I’m at and we work really well off of each other, so she got me the ball and I just had to get her the assists.”
On what she had for breakfast…
“I would love to do it again because I loved the breakfast this morning. I had oatmeal, biscuits and gravy, bacon and some water.”
On the scoring ability of the team this year compared to last…
“Taylor is playing amazing right now and so is Rhyne (Howard), so it takes a lot of stress off me and I can play off them instead of just always looking for my shot. I can look for my shot, but I always know that they’re going to be available to score as well. Taylor does so well running in transition or getting steals and just going to finish the ball, and Rhyne can score whenever she wants to so it takes a lot of stress off me.”
On running the 40-minute press …
“I think it’s super beneficial for us. I think we wear teams down and get a lot of turnovers from it, and we’re able to get more shots up than the opponent, so it helps us out in the end.”
#24, Taylor Murray, Sr., G
On if she knew the last shot before the half was going in…
“Oh yeah, like she (Maci Morris) said, we feed off of each other. I attack the rim and she just follows me, and then the ball had fumbled and she was the wide open person, so I just passed to her and she had enough time to get herself set and let it fly.”
On what has changed in her game this season…
“Just a lot of confidence, but staying aggressive. One thing I try to do is stay after practice and get up extra shots, and that’s just one thing coach and I started to talk about before the season – staying aggressive, staying committed and just playing with your teammates, trying to feed off them.”
On being fluent with the left hand…
“Just to grow my game that was one thing that I needed to add. Point guards need to be able to go both ways. It’s not like I couldn’t go left, it’s just that I didn’t want to go left. I’m dominant right, but teams scout you, and in order to make plays for my teammates I needed to go both ways.”
