I told them before the (Providence) game started, every team that I've ever coached that was consistently good had seniors that were very, very consistent. And it's time now for this group to kind of separate themselves and say, 'Hey, it's time for me to have an impact every single game and not be in those peaks and valleys.' I think they've all kind of made that progression. |
I want them to be remembered for being at Connecticut for four years and having had an incredible experience during those four years that no one else got to experience in their four years. It?s unfair to think of them as, ?Well, this is how it ended.? It ended not great, but there was a lot of great stuff that they were a part of. |
I was afraid of that. We came off some of the games we just had and we were feeling pretty good. We're playing a game where their No.1 player is hurt, and physically we're not 100 percent coming out of the road trip. You put all those things in the mix, it made for one lousy game. |
I was flabbergasted we couldn't execute something we have run every day in practice for the last five months. |
I was trying not to play her a lot. I thought we were in pretty good shape at 12-4. I didn't realize that was the highlight of the first half. |
I will say it 100 million times, |
I would say for 32 minutes we were pretty good. Six or seven minutes I think in that first half maybe weren't that good, but I think this was as complete a game at both ends of the floor as we've had in a while. |
I would venture to say the other eight times we either had the best player in the tournament or the best team in the tournament - or close to it, at least, the eight times that we won. I don't know about [tonight]. Do we have the best team? Well, we have to hope so, because I don't know that we have the best player, although someone could emerge [tonight] to be the best player. |
I?d like to do enough to kind of get her winded, so I would think a couple possessions would probably do it. |
I?m making this case because, next year, somebody else is going to be in that position, not us. As long as you don?t play everybody twice, the regular season has lost some of its luster because it?s not a true regular-season champion any more. |
I?m not going to put her in a situation where she?s going to play and then next year she?s going to need another (surgery) just to walk; I?m not going to do that. |
I'd like to be able to dial it up when we needed it. Unfortunately, sometimes you keep waiting and waiting and it never happens. My hope is that some time in the next 24 hours we play as close to our ability as we can. Right now, I think we need to play one of the best games that we've played. I don't know where we are in terms of that, but I'd like to see us come close to that (tonight). |
I'd like to see her shoot the ball more from the foul line. She's a good shooter from 15 feet out. And she still gets ahead of herself every once in a while, which is natural. Slowly, but surely, it's going to come. It's just going to look ugly at times. As long as she keeps making progress, that's all I care about. |
I'm glad that she's been patient enough and not kind of succumb to what a lot of coaches succumb to. Which is at the first sign of success they jump up to what they think is a greener pasture -- a big-time job somewhere else. But she's been patient enough to kind of build something that's going to be long lasting. |
I'm glad that the realization has hit that this is it, that this is your last go-around and you've got to get things done. Right now you'd say that Will has really made a commitment to herself to being one of the better players at her position in our league. |