2005 NCAA Field Hockey Championships - Pre-Championship Press Conferences
November 17, 2005 | Field Hockey
Nov. 17, 2005
Old Dominion Head Coach Beth Anders
(On goals for the season) "We try to win every game that we play. That's the whole idea of the season. For us, what we wanted to do is make sure we hosted the (Colonial Athletic Association Tournament) and win the CAA, and after that, advance in this tournament. And we're just trying to get better one day at a time and we're very focused on what we're doing."
(On the schedule) "We've had probably the hardest schedule that we possibly can, but I am very aware we've had a difficult schedule. And it's my job to put them in a place and to give them an opportunity with the best competition that I could get them. You learn from it and just keep going, and that's what we try to do every year."
(On the previous Maryland games) "Honestly, it was so long ago. We just really played our game. We stayed within ourselves and did what we could do."
(On the difference between the two games) "Working. We just played tough defense. I'm not going to go into it too much. We just played the right type of defense. We were aggressive attack wise. We made mistakes and we understood that, but we kept trying and we didn't quit. Maryland is not going to quit and we're not going to quit either."
(On playing the number one seed) "Maryland has an excellent program. No questions about it. And we respect them. We respect their coaches and think they're excellent coaches and they're an excellent program. But, we're really preparing ourselves to do what we can do. When we walk off that field, I want the players to know they did the best they could. And whatever the final score is, that's what it's going to be. But make no mistakes, we're go to go after it."
Maryland Head Coach Missy Meharg
(On playing Old Dominion) "We've battled Old Dominion is the last year twice. Once at their place and once at ours they've been truly fantastic hockey games. I know the athletes at Maryland completely understand that from our first half to our second half at College Park was really between good individual teams intercepting or not and we're just really looking forward that outrageous, athletic, competitive, energized Maryland-Old Dominion match."
"We've had four halves with them this year and I've been really pleased. We've analyzed one half or one quarter of all those scores as really being a strong segment of hockey, and we still have places to go and we're anxious to get at there. Our first game was early and it was the second week of the season. We ended up going into overtime with them, feeling each other out. That's pretty typical. That's why we do the September and October kind of style because it's such a good measure and a good bar for where you're at for post-season. The second half, they clearly outplayed us and dominated the thirty-five minutes and if we clearly outplayed and dominated them it would have showed that on the scoreboard, but that was the nature of the game. So it's really exciting to be here, and to play Old Dominion is an honor."
Wake Forest Head Coach Jen Averill
(On winning several championships in a row) I think comes from the tradition that's been here for the last eight years. We've been fortunate to win three (straight) championships and that (2005) championship (trophy) is beautiful, but it doesn't have a name attached to it."
(On having won a championship and having played on this field already this year) "I don't know if there is an advantage, being familiar with it, I don't know. We played here before and we're really excited to come back here."
(On whether there is any motivation to play Maryland on Sunday if her team can advance) "Any motivation? Yeah...No, we don't really care who we play for the championship."
(On whether she feels any extra pressure to win) "I love the stories the media can drum up because it's great and it's interesting. The opportunity to start a brand new season and to start with a totally new set of personalities is exciting and that's our focus. The past has been the past and I think we have a tremendous amount of pride. The bull's eye is on you if you're number one. The bull's eye is on you if you're Old Dominion too. So, we look at our opponents -- you know, a Duke, a Maryland, an ODU -- we look at all those three teams with great respect knowing that they've got great tradition and history in their own right. We're just focusing on ourselves. If you want to put a target on us, then that's great. We can have it, but we've got targets on Duke, which is a tremendous team with a tremendous amount of talent that we know we're going to have to play our best game to be able to be victorious."
Duke Head Coach Beth Bozman
(About their NCAA games so far, both of which were decided in OT) "They certainly made us tougher. I think the first game was a real wake up call for us, we did not play particularly well. To Princeton's credit, they did play very well, but it was a real wakeup call for us to kind of get the passion back. I thought we played well on Sunday. Connecticut limited our scoring opportunities and they stayed in the game, but fortunately we kept working through it and were able to score."
(On having played two games at Trager Stadium earlier this season an having any kind of advantage during this tournament) "We certainly didn't know that this would be the case when we schedule those early games, but it kind of worked out for us. We are familiar with the area, we know where places are and we're obviously familiar with the field."
(On playing Wake Forest earlier in the season) "We learned to play two halves. We played very well the first half, and Wake Forest played well in the second half and we learned a great deal from that game."
