From The Press Room
11/20/2004 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Nov. 20, 2004
Head Coach Joanne P. McCallie
On the overall game:
"This is a good chance for us to work on some different combinations, put different sets on the floor together, obviously a much more physical team. We did some good things - 22 steals was interesting, of course we turned it over 22 times, so that's another interesting statistic. We were able to spread out some minutes, work on different combinations, and get ready for the opportunity to play Western or Boston College."
On the Spartans' quick start:
"Obviously you always want to come out of the gate and really be aggressive and I feel we were, and if you keep that up, I think it's difficult, because you've got coaches making a lot of substitutions, all the time. We had people not only subbing in but changing positions, so that's going to challenge people."
On the freshmen:
"Not bad. Laura Hall has been out forever with a shoulder injiry, so I think she looks great relative to how much practice time she's had. Maggie Dwyer didn't' have her best game, but she's an excellent player - going to get a lot of minutes and impact us. At one point I put Courtney out there with four post players to play all guard positions just to see how she would handle that...I thought Courtney really rose to the challenges that we gave her."
SR G Kristin Haynie
On their game strategy:
"We knew as a team coming into this game that we had to work on our ball pressure on defense and so I think we definitely did that today - we picked up our ball pressure and we just made the other team frustrated."
On the team's depth:
"That's great for our team. Finally we're all healthy, and it definitely helps having depth on the team, rotating subs in and out quickly and getting rest, saving your legs."
SR C Kelli Roehrig
On the importance of playing defense:
"We had to come out this game and play our defense that we know how to play. I think our guards did a great job in the half court. Ball pressure was great; we had Liz (Shimek) come back tonight, and that was a great advantage for us because she boarded out of her mind."
On the play of the freshmen:
"I think they came in and stepped up. We played a lot of the bench, and we had some big plays from freshmen that were key."
