Post-Game Quotes
2/11/2008 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Feb. 11, 2008
Recap | Final Stats | Notes
MSU head coach Suzy Merchant
On the play of Courtney Davidson...
I thought Courtney was spectacular tonight. We felt like she had a great focus, at both ends of the floor. Sometimes with Courtney she really loves that offensive side, and I have to say she really has made a concerted effort to be better and more efficient on the defensive side. I thought she did a great job sparking us. When she didn't score I thought she created some offense for some other people. We really needed a playmaker out there, because we weren't putting the ball in the basket. There's no question when we're struggling that way, Courtney is usually the one we turn to. Give her a lot of credit being a senior at home, and stepping up against a good Purdue team.
On the first 10 minutes of each half...
A lot of times that happens for us, when we don't put the ball in the basket. For us, we get more excited and play better defense when the ball goes in. It just seemed like when we were putting the ball in the basket, and we put a couple back together, our defense got a little bit better and we had more confidence in ourselves, and I thought that showed. When we were struggling early to put the ball in, I thought we had some good looks at it, but we were turning it over and not making our shots. One thing I will say for our circumstances and how young we are, these girls are fighting, up and down, I think we are fighting. We are staying in games, fighting to win games, and that's basically what we ask them to do. That's what tonight is about, the "Think Pink" week is about people fighting for their lives and that's what we told our kids, just go out there and fight, fight for this game, fight for this crowd, the Michigan State pride. I thought even when we were down we weren't out. I think we had opportunities and that they were going to come.
On the "Think Pink" week...
I told our kids at the shoot around today that I think there isn't anyone on our team or anyone in our community who hasn't been affected by cancer in some way. It's a pretty crippling disease, and one we hope we get a cure for someday. The biggest theme for us was that people were fighting for their lives, as I mentioned earlier, and they honored the cancer survivors at halftime. And that's what we needed to be, we needed to come out here and fight, and make people proud of us. I think the "Think Pink" week is something that really brings awareness to breast cancer. And the thing that I really appreciated was the t-shirts that were sold for five dollars. It came right back here to the community, to the (Greater Lansing) Komen Foundation. I certainly felt like it was a nice opportunity to be a part of, and a lot of credit goes to our marketing and promotions staff. (Senior Associate Athletic Director) Shelley Appelbaum and her crew did a great job of making this a special night for a lot of people.
Purdue Head Coach Sharon Versyp
On the free throws and turnovers affecting the game...
We've digressed back to non-conference. No one wanted to execute. You know all we've done is play well. We've played proper when we've needed to step up and do some good things. But when you have every single kid on the team that doesn't want the ball, you can't do much with that.
On missing this opportunity...
Of course this is huge. It's how you're going to respond when you win. We had an opportunity, we gave it away. We let certain people knock down shots but the bottom-line is we gave it away. You can't go and turn the ball over a hundred times when you haven't done that for seven straight games. Twenty-three turnovers, every single kid making errors that they don't make. Just focus and heart.
On Courtney Davidson's play...
Oh she gave them a great left, I told our team that she plays well against us. She made some big shots last year, you know, we didn't defend her well - wide open threes. We just let her do whatever she wanted. But she hit big shots and I think she is the best three point shooter on their team. And we just allowed it to happen. But, it's a great credit to her no doubt.
