All week we have shot at least 50 free throws a day. |
Even this week, neither team's ranked or anything, but we'll still feel like the underdog because they're 23-5 and we're 17-10. I think that's why they've enjoyed it, because it's helped them stay relaxed. They don't go into a game thinking they have to win or are expected to win. They've just played loose and played very well. |
Every game in this tournament we have had a different leading scorer. Anybody who has followed us all year knows we do not have a superstar. |
Finally, Mills got us going. Her cuts were harder to the middle. It was open all night. As soon as we started doing that, things were good. We started making some shots. |
I couldn't be more proud. That's the sixth-ranked team in the state and we beat them on a neutral court. That is huge. |
I told the kids, 'If we're not making shots, do things you can control,' which are rebounding, taking care of the ball and playing defense. We hung in there until we got clicking. |
I'm nothing but proud of our kids. Nobody gave us a chance. I'm sure everyone thought it was going to be a 35-40-point game. There are no moral victories; I just feel good about how we played and the effort we gave. We've made a lot of strides. |
It came when we needed to take care of the ball. That's what's so disappointing about it. |
No doubt our schedule helped us. For example, our game against (Class 4A) McCutcheon was great preparation to play South Central. Those two are very similar. There wasn't anything in the tournament that we hadn't seen, today included. |
On the year we were about 56 percent from the line. Today we shot 80 percent in the second half and 76 percent for the game. |
She's mature enough and she wants to win and she's accepted it. A lot of teams, when they sub, maybe go down a little bit, and teams can take advantage of that. When we sub, me may get better, depending on who comes out and what kind of night they're having. |
Teams can't run many gimmicks on us because you have to guard all the kids. The first of the year, that's what I thought our strength would be was shooting the ball, and they finally got it clicking. |
The girls' confidence has been up ever since the Tri-Central loss, really. We still played with Jeff for three-and-a-half quarters. McCutcheon only beat us by eight. And then we went to Benton Central and played pretty well for most of the game. I think a combination of all those teams will help. |
The key today was our free-throw shooting. … A lot of that has to do with having seniors stepping up and hitting them. |
Those kids have had three coaches in four years. To stick with it and grind it out and make it here their senior year is just incredible. |