UK ATHLETICS COMMUNICATIONS AND PUBLIC RELATIONS
WOMEN’S BASKETBALL POSTGAME QUOTES
STETSON AT NO. 13 KENTUCKY
WEDNESDAY, NOV. 13, 2019
MEMORIAL COLISEUM – LEXINGTON, KY.
Kentucky Head Coach Matthew Mitchell
Opening statement…
“Well, good victory for us tonight. I’m real proud of the effort that the players gave on the defensive end and really worked hard to give effort on the offensive glass tonight. I thought we got off to a good start to the game and gave good effort. So, we just need to keep working, improving and giving this kind of effort every night and every day in practice and we’ll end up with a really good team. But hats off to Stetson. I thought they just kept playing all night, kept battling and I think they’ll have a really good team as well. So, I’m really happy to get the victory and looking forward to improvement as a team.”
On Rhyne Howard’s hot start…
“I thought she was much more focused and we tried to move her around a little bit and be intentional about where we got her shots or her opportunities early on, but I think it was really her just having a mission tonight. You could see she had a lot of juice in her cuts. She was really going and attacking the basketball and getting into her shot and just had some great plays tonight. I thought it was an attack mentality from the first possession. I’m really proud of her for that.”
On KeKe McKinney’s defense…
“I think KeKe has really matured in every possible way. As a person, from a fitness stand point, from a knowledge of the game, feel for the game and she always had just tremendous fire burning in her, competitive fire, and so I just think all of her maturity and experience is kind of coming together now and she’s just doing an outstanding job. She’s really the glue that’s holding everything together on the defensive end. Playing her guts out and just getting after it and a lot of the stuff that’s not on the stat sheet, she’s doing a great job taking away high post and denying that or denying the reversal pass that keeps the ball on one side of the floor, a lot of little things she’s doing. So, real proud of her effort. She’s getting after it on the defensive end.”
On the team’s offensive struggle…
“There’s some things that we need to do that offensively we can really improve. We’re rushing some shots around the basket and playing with a lot of poise in the lane. Some of those open jumpers I thought were good looks and didn’t go in, and it’s the layups and the shots in the paint that are off balance. Those are the things we’ll go about correcting. We’ve worked hard at shooting. We spent a lot of time… we know that this is a good shooting team. We have to look at the things we can control and that’s being on balance, catching it ready to shoot. Sometimes you do everything right and the ball doesn’t go in. What I’m going to encourage the team tomorrow is really catching it on balance, ready to shoot and then around the basket is where I think we’re missing a lot of our opportunities. We’re just in a rush and the good news is, those are things we can improve and I know that they’ll get better. Also, the 3-point percentage is really low right now and I just don’t think there is anyway in the world that can stay low. It’s a good 3-point shooting team and we’re going to hit our stride before long.”
On today’s signings…
“Well we’re really excited about the three players we signed today, with Erin Toller, a native Kentuckian and Nyah Leveretter out of South Carolina and then Treasure [Hunt] out of Tennessee. We’re really excited about those three people from a character standpoint from the first place. After you decide someone who has the physical gifts to play, then we’re on a search to make sure we get the right kind of people character-wise, and these are three awesome people with great families and great support systems around them. We’re really, really fired up about what they can do here as students and as citizens here on our campus and our community and they all three have great basketball value. I think with Treasure and Rhyne, I definitely think that them growing up together and playing a lot of basketball together and that bond certainly didn’t hurt us, and that made her probably look at us maybe a little bit harder than she would have, but I think it was just our overall atmosphere here. She felt really comfortable and she has tremendous, tremendous upside as a player and so we’re excited about her. I think Erin, we offered her in her sophomore year, and at that time, I was so impressed with her explosive nature and her ability to score. Really, really savvy scorer, can score at all three levels: shoot the 3, mid-range jumper, and can really get to the basket. Not the tallest player, but really strong and explosive and I think she’s an outstanding guard. And listen, these injuries have unfortunately become very common, but on the bright side of that, we know how to handle them and how to help people have real successful careers who have had them. So, we’re real confident that she’s going to be an outstanding player for us. And then Nyah Leveretter, just one of the most impressive young people we’ve signed. Really, really has a great maturity about her, awesome athleticism, perfect for our style of play, really plays hard, has a high motor, great length, great athleticism, very fast, and willing to work and I think she’s going to develop into a great player for us as well. So, wonderful day for the Wildcats, and I really appreciate all of the hard work our assistant coaches, Kyra Elzy, Niya Butts and Amber Smith worked tirelessly in recruiting. And then, all the people that maybe you don’t know about that are behind the scenes. Our entire support staff, it really takes a group effort to sign a class like we did today and so I’m so appreciative to all our people that contributed. And finally, our players. I think that’s the big, big key is you attract the right kind of people when you put your best foot forward in recruiting with your players, and we’ve got a high-character bunch and I really appreciate them too. So, it was a good day for us.”
On how you feel about the team at this moment…
“Well, what I’m so happy about is I think our effort is at a good spot. I think our intensity is at a good spot and the way that we playcan’t even resemble what we want it to be if you don’t have that. And so, all the things I think we need to focus on, our offensive execution, as coaches, we just have to do a better job of giving them opportunities to get better. We’ve spent an awful lot of time on just intensity and toughness, trying to be a pressure defensive team, and I think we’re getting some good results there. I think right now and over the next couple of weeks, we have to just slow down a little bit, give them an opportunity to execute our offense a little bit better, and those are things that we know we can get better doing, but I’m excited to get in the gym and see how much we can progress over the next couple days. Got a big, big game coming up Saturday on the road at Virginia, so we definitely have to get prepared for that. But I think right now it’s very important for us to stay focused on where we can improve and I think that’s one of the spots right now for us, just offensive execution and finishing the play is going to help us tremendously at this point.”
UK Student-Athletes
#1, Sabrina Hayes, G, R-Sr.
On how playing ten players in the first quarter affects the game…
“I think for us, it’s more of a nod towards how deep our team is and how he can play ten people in a quarter. I don’t think its necessarily us being worried about coming out. We know that our team is that deep and that people are able to keep up the energy. To make it even better, knowing our team can do that is comforting to us.”
On how shooting is going in practice…
“Yeah, we are knocking them down in practice. We really are, we promise. It’s just different whenever you get in the game. It’s a different type of feel, and of course it’s another team you are playing against. You have to adjust and luckily Rhyne (Howard) came off hot tonight. She really helped us out a whole lot. The rest of us are getting use to everything. I know personally, I’m still getting used to the game feel. In practice, we’re shooting great. It’s going to translate, we know it.”
On upcoming game against Virginia…
“I know they’re a great team and they’re coached by a legend. Watching them play last year from the bench and watching Ry (Rhyne Howard), I know that its definitely going to be a tough contest. We’re going to practice this week, we’re going to get ready and do our best to get that dub.”
On coming in the game after sitting out a year…
“I think he hit it right on the head (Matthew Mitchell). We do kind of tend to rush things, you know, and the key to basketball isn’t trying to always be faster than somebody, it’s trying to be smarter than somebody. So, for me, I know sometimes I’ll rush. I feel like I have to get the shot off before they cover me, when really, I could make a different move and do better in order to get my shot off better. Our team definitely does struggle with trying to rush a bit, but we’re working on it.”
On free-throws (2-of-8) in tonight’s game…
“Everyone has those days. I definitely can guarantee I’ll be in the gym; I have never missed that many free throws in a game ever. Stuff happens, I can’t sit here and dwell on it so I’m definitely going to improve next time.”
#10, Rhyne Howard, G, So.
On the early hot shooting to start…
“I really wasn’t expecting to shoot that well, I was just focusing on having a faster pace and staying active.”
On if Coach Matthew Mitchell was running plays for you early in the game…
“Yeah, he started calling my number a bit once I started hitting some shots.”
On holding your scoring in a little bit…
“Toward the end, they started trapping a little bit. I knew somebody else would be open.”
On defensive effort…
“I know we were the better team, so I just tried to use my length more and I think on quickness we kind of equaled out, so I just feel like its staying in front and being aggressive.”
