Nov. 11, 2005
On first game
"We had a lot of first game jitters and came out nervous, but we had a lot of returning players that played well which helped to calm down the rest of the team."
On Emily Westerberg"Emily worked hard during the off season to come back strong this year and it showed in today's game. I'm so proud of her and Reagan's (Pariseau) performance today and I can't wait to see how they do the rest of the year".
On Jill Noe"She (Jill Noe) is a different player than her previous years on the team, but she came out strong this game and did a great job scoring."
On Next Match Up"The last thing we want to do is relax against a team like Missouri. They've played tough teams night in and night out so we are going to have to go out there and play a good game and utilize our bench more and get in to a better transition game."
On Giving Respect"We respect every team; we look at film and even if they don't have a winning season we still respect them and realize we can not take them lightly."
On the first half:
"I came in at halftime and knew that I had a lot more to give. We got our first game jitters out. We came out and played strong to utilize our strengths. We didn't execute anything we had practiced in the first half and we made the decision at halftime to execute. That's how we got all the things that we had in the second half, getting all the easy buckets and rebounds. We slowed down and executed better."
On taking over the game in the second half:
"It was a team effort. You could feel the chemistry out there and the energy flowing through everybody. Kristen had a few easy steals and a few times down the court she was left wide open. When you get easy buckets like that and you are tracking down offensive rebounds like we were, it makes it so much easier to get into your game. I think it was a team effort and I knew what needed to be done."
On containing Vanderbilt's :
"We always knew coming in that her and Thomas were going to be huge. The guards stepped up and played huge defense. The whole game the plan was to wear her down through the double team and make her tired. Towards the end, that started to happen. We did it through great defense. We take pride in our defense and our point guards did a great job of keying on her."
On the first half:
"We weren't taking very good shots and we were taking them off the first pass. We weren't working it inside for easy lay ups. We definitely adjusted in the second half to make that extra pass and we were finding our teammates wide open."
On tomorrow against :
"They're definitely a good team. We have to come in early tomorrow to look over their personnel to get a better idea, but the onus is on ourselves to play our defense and run our offense."
Coach Melanie Balcomb
On Vanderbilt's focus during the game...
"I need to work on handling the pressure and turnovers and our inability to get the ball in bounds and execute our offense. Our focus was on trying to take care of the basketball and do the little things right. When we got the lead in the second half we settled down a little bit. We were up 38-30, that's when they called a time out. It became a defensive issue half way thought the second half."
On defense in the second half...
"We played different defenses and [ASU] was able to score on both. I don't think we did a good job of guarding the high low in the second half."
Christina Wirth
On her play tonight...
"I could have done a little bit better. Obviously I would have loved to come out with a win. There are a lot of things I need to work on."
Liz Sherwood
On carrying the team...
"I felt like we all play well as a team together. Not one person should have carried us. I felt like I should have done a lot more than I did. I had faith in what we were trying to execute. We just needed to do a better job of that."