Post Game Quotes: Notre Dame
12/20/2016 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Recap | Box Score | USATSI Gallery 
| MSU Gallery
MSU Head Coach Suzy Merchant
On the offensive flow of the game…
I think we needed to score the ball better. That always helps your defense. We had some inconsistencies there. Taya (Reimer) was in foul trouble a bit there. Jenna (Allen) shouldn't have even played tonight. She's been throwing up, had an IV, and has been in the hospital all day today. So, for her to come in and do anything for us is something. That hurt us a lot. Branndais (Agee) needed to be consistent. She had some really good looks. Some of them she made, but she missed that layup and wide open three. That's five points right there. That could have gotten us generated and going a little bit. I thought we did a good job in the first half keeping them off the boards and not so much in the second half. They kind of wore us down a bit. Then they played a little more downhill off those ball screens which hurt us, I thought, definitely in the third quarter and in the fourth quarter as well.
On Brianna Turner…
She was an McDonald's All-American, one of the best players in the country, coming out of high school. She is talented. As good as she is, I think we had to make her work a different way. If you watch her clips, I think you see that she's so athletic that she can spin and seal and they'll throw it up to her and she doesn't even have to come down. She did that once tonight. She doesn't even have to come down to make a move. She's so good with the ball above her head. She plays above or at the rim. We felt that we couldn't do that. We felt like we needed to be underneath her at all times. We felt that our ball screen defense wasn't as aggressive as we normally like to do because we didn't want her to beat us to the basket if we were in a helping situation. In the second half, I thought Notre Dame did a better job of attacking that situation. They had some pull-up jumpers. They got to the rim. In the first half, they weren't doing that. What it allowed us to do was stay between her and the basket and push her out. We got some foul calls in there. I don't know if they were fouls or not. But at least we pushed her away from the basket and make her into a true back-to-the-basket post player versus an angle-lob post player. We just can't defend her that way. We played her during her freshman year here and we did that and it was really successful. You watch her play, and she'll spin and go to the rim and you won't win that battle. It's like taking a knife to a gun fight and we just weren't going to do it.
On Taya Reimer's play…
I think she just had a couple silly ones (fouls). I think a couple were questionable and the other two were probably legit. But it's difficult because she had just hit a couple back to back jumpers and was getting into a bit of a flow. Then the kid I had to put in was literally running out the door to throw up (Jenna Allen) and come back on the court. I had a feeling that was going to happen. Sometimes you get too hyped up for those type of games. We were right there. We just couldn't make a few plays. We scored the ball a little better and hung around, we just couldn't get over the hump. I think it was more offensive problems than it was defensive problems. When you don't score the ball you make it easier for them to do it.
On Victoria Gaines' play…
I think Coco (Victoria Gaines) has been getting better and better. We redshirted her last year because she had two ACLs (tears) in high school just to rehab her and get her stronger. So, we went through a season of practice with her which I thought was really encouraging. She got stronger, got her legs stronger. We've been getting her in the gym more. I think Coco is our best pick and pop, post up, four man that we have in terms of what she can do. She's got length, she's mobile, she can post up, she can face up, and shoot it, and drive it. If they drive her to the block, she's six foot two and she does a pretty good job defending that. She's really multidimensional and her ability to shoot the shot outside is something that I don't think we have consistently in that four spot. I think she was a bright spot in that first half for sure for us. I just need to get her to put two halves together. And hopefully her legs okay with her knees.
On going into the Big Ten schedule…
We have a few things we need to work on in the paint. We need to have bigs that want to the ball down there and we need to get them the ball more. We didn't do a great job at that. Some of that was Turner. We like posting our guards, and we thought we could get them in foul trouble and we did. Lindsay (Allen) was in foul trouble. We have big guards that like to post down there and they do too. They ran a couple plays where they posted their guards. I know if Jackie Young was healthy they would have posted her more. We just need to get more consistency in terms of playing downhill. Meaning getting the ball in the block or turning the corner and penetrating. We really don't have that kind of consistency within our offense right now.
On Tori Jankoska…
I thought she pressed a little early. She took some bad shots early trying to set the world on fire within the first couple minutes. Then she settled in. If I had to critique her I would say that she was more focused on the offensive end than the defensive end. She allowed some stuff that should never happen. Tori is a better defender than that. That's disappointing to me. Then she turned it around. The thing with Tori is that she's going to compete. If she gets a good look at the basket it's pretty much a 50 percent chance that it's going in, which is pretty darn good at our level. I just think she tried to do a little too much too early, taking some crazy shots. Then she settled in and did a much better job defensively.
On her expectations for Tori heading into the Big Ten season…
I just need her to keep doing what she's doing. I think she's trying to put this team on her back and be consistent. She has really good numbers. She's rebounding the ball really well. I just need her to keep doing what she's doing. I think she needs to do a better job of getting the ball inside at times. I think we sometimes miss our post players. Coming back from Christmas break, we'll do a better job of making sure our bigs get the ball inside.
Notre Dame Head Coach Muffet McGraw
Opening Statement…
I was really, really pleased with the game. I thought that we're really starting to come around. I think that we're playing better every game. We played smart, we played tough, we battled on almost every possession. I was really, really proud of the team tonight. It was a great win for us to head into the break. In particular, I thought Kathryn Westbeld with a double-double and Brianna Turner. I thought we had the advantage inside in the post, and we certainly did. I thought we did a great job in getting the ball to our bigs.
On Turner's performance tonight…
Yeah, you know we expect a double-double from her every outing, and she really responded offensively and so she's really doing a good job. She got a lot of physical playing inside, I thought she got beat up pretty good but she handled it well. We try to go to her on almost every possession. I'd like her to get about 15 shots, it's what she got so I was really happy with her performance today.
On playing multiple road games in a row…
It's going to prepare us for the ACC for sure and then for the NCAA tournament so it's great for us to be able to go on the road in front of a hostile crowd. Toledo had a fantastic crowd. There was a good crowd out here tonight so that's really good for us. It's great for women's basketball to see the crowds.
On strategy against Tori Jankoska…
You know, it was Mychal Johnson. She's our best defender and brings a lot of energy. She's really active, she's competitive, she's active. So she was going to be on her (Jankoska) as much as we could. We tried to trap her on the ball and in the second half we had some success, but overall I thought Mychal did a fabulous job on her.
On Jankoska's greatest strengths…
She's a great player, she really is. She's a tough match-up, she's smart, she can shoot from just about anywhere. She can put it on the floor. You cannot give her any space at all, I mean she really is a talented player. She's somebody that's definitely an All-Big Ten type of player. It was great for us to hold her under average, I was really happy with that.
On Aerial Powers…
First round draft pick in the WNBA, you can't lose a player like that and not miss a beat. She has the ability to get her own shot. She's really just a great athlete. So, I think having her would make a huge difference. I mean they would be unstoppable.
