Louisville vs. St. John's
January 27, 2013 | Women's Basketball
Jan. 27, 2013
Recap | Final Stats | Notes | Photo Gallery 
Louisville Head Coach Jeff Walz
(On the sequence that proved to be the turning point in the game) "What happened was that we got a few stops. When No. 3 (Aliyyah Handford) went out we went into a triangle-and-two to try to get the ball out of Shenneika Smith's hands and move Nadirah McKenith to point guard. It kind of caused them some problems. I thought they had to take some contested shots and then we did a really nice job of rebounding the ball. If you are going to play with them you are going to have to rebound the basketball, because they're a very good basketball team. "
(On if (Aliyyah) Handford's play was expected) "Yea. We told them that she drives and we watched as she drove by us. It's coming down at times, right now, it's going to be gut check for our guards. If you can't defend somebody you are going to be embarrassed. She (Aliyyah Handford) embarrassed us. All of their guards did. They drove right by us. One after another. So what I'm going to have to do is hopefully find two or three guards who actually want to defend. I really don't care who it is right now, because there is nobody that putting up 25 points a night that it's like, "hey she isn't guarding anybody, but she's scoring 25 a night." We don't have that. If you can't guard it's going to be hard to find playing time."
(On Shoni Schimmel's long stretch on the bench to start the second half) "She wasn't guarding anybody. I mean she kept getting beat to the basket. I'm sorry, I love her and she is one of our best players, but when she gets beat every time going to the basket I can't keep her in the game. It might not be her man that scores every time, but it's because we get beat off the dribble. Now I thought she did a better job the last six minutes of the game, but we need that effort from her the whole 40 minutes."
(On Antonita Slaughter's improved and matured game) "She's grown. She's matured. Instead of getting all defensive and upset when I coach her and get on her and chew her butt, she's accepted it and is like, "I want to get better." It's not very hard. If you play hard and do what you're supposed to do I don't say much to you. It's not that hard. I don't say much to Antonita anymore. I don't have to and I know what Antonita is going to do every night. The rest of them, I chew their butt most of the time. It's really not that hard. I'm not saying you're going to be perfect, but you at least have to give the effort and understand basketball. How about Sara Hammond? She is playing so much better and playing hard, but you can't foul. There is 43 seconds on the game clock, we're up five, and we foul their best free throw shooter in the open court? That's stuff we can't do. Then Shoni (Schimmel) drives down and takes a wild shot. It's terrible, and those are the things we are trying to teach our players - time and score. Like I said on the radio, there is a reason I have to call a set play every time down at the end of a game. Because, that's what happens. If that happens with eight minutes left to play, that's okay, we're fine. But it can't happen with 24 seconds left. You have to know time and score, like the pass she (Shoni Schimmel) made up to Bria (Smith) I'm all for pushing the ball up in transition, even at the end of a game. We got it to Bria, she goes up strong and finishes, that's great. That is unbelievable. But when you don't have it you can't force it, you have to make them guard you. Now if it goes in, great shot. There is too much risk for the reward at that time."
( Monique Reid) "She's out probably two to four, three to six weeks. We were just doing a simple box out drill yesterday and things we work on, step around and get it in and she just kind of stepped funny and her knee pounded together. So she has a bone bruise on the knee. They'll look at the MRI again probably on Monday and she's got a Doctor's appointment Tuesday just to see if there's a chip to the graph or anything that they repaired. But it's part of it. Like I said out there on the radio, we've got four players sitting on the bench that would start anywhere. I mean, all four of them would start the same time. You play with what you have and I'm proud of our kids but it's tough. It's a battle as a coach trying to figure out your line ups and figure out who to put out there. But we can't use it as an excuse because I know St. John's, their two guard, Eugenia McPherson, is out for the year with a torn ACL. We all have some adversity. The difference is, it'd be nice if we can get to the point where we miss a kid for two weeks because of a sprained ankle not a whole season because of a hip injury, a shoulder injury, or an ACL. That's when it takes a big impact on you."
(On Jude Schimmel) "Jude was great. I thought Jude was outstanding. Jude came up with a huge steal there at the end. It was just like the A & M game expect it doesn't go down for a layup. But it gets us the basketball. She played 28 minutes and she may have played like 18 in the second half, I think. But she just does a really good job with the basketball. Zero turnovers, two assists. I mean for us, we had nine turnovers for the game. If we can continue to do that we're going to have a chance to win a lot of basketball games. We aren't going to go 0-7 from the three point line very often. If you can win when you have a terrible night from the three point line, and we do like to shoot them, I think it says a lot about the grit. Antonita was 10-11 from the free throw line, Cortnee goes 2-2, Shoni goes 2-2, Bria went 3-4, Sarah makes her last four after missing the first two. So, we stepped up and made some big time free throws."
(Three point situation) "It was but I mean at the same time at least we didn't sit there and try to keep jacking them up, as I like to say. You can't keep firing them up, you got to let the game come to you. We weren't on from out there. So Antonita, I'll give her credit, I mean she goes 6-12, 0-3, but she realized hey, I'm not making threes so she starts going into the paint and scoring which we needed her to do."
Sophomore forward Sara Hammond (On a 6-0 run that sparked a comeback victory) "Coach kept saying in the timeouts: We haven't had a run yet. Our run is coming. So he just kept giving us positive feedback and told us we have to get stops on the defensive end, the offense coming, we're getting shots. He knew that our run was going to come at the end. I think we had to believe in ourselves that it was going to happen."
(On the team improving their free throw shooting from the last game) "It was just a lack of concentration, I think. We just have to focus when we get to the line and be confident. In practice, these past couple of days, Coach has been stressing free throws. After drills, we'll shoot free throws to put you in a game-like situation. So you just got to focus, step up, and be confident that you're going to make it."
(On the team's 3-point shooting) "They had four guards, so Coach was telling us, `Post up, post up, post up. Their guards can't handle us.' So the inside was working for us and we just kept going for it."
(On pulling out a win from a game that was so close and so difficult) "Yeah, well they have been struggling this year because one of their good guards went down with an ACL injury. They have played a tough schedule, I think their schedule is like top 15 in the country, so they really needed a win. Coach told us coming in, for them they are going to play as hard as they can. They are thinking they beat us twice last year, so they think they will come in here and beat us again because they return four starters. This is our home court and we take advantage of getting to play in front of our crowd and support, we don't want to lose on our home floor. That gives us enough motivation to get out a win."
(On Jude Schimmel not showing up on box score, but doing other things to help the team win) "Jude is our best defender on the team no doubt. She is confident in her defensive abilities and she is very smart with the basketball. Coach says all the time in practice that she is the best guard we have coming off screens and dishing in traffic to post player or guard. I know right now, we need her defensively, especially with today's game, because their guards were so quick and could get to the hole. We needed someone, a spark plug who could get us going on defense, and that is the only way we are going to win is if we get stops. It may not show up on the stat line or on paper, but her defense is a big stat to helping us get the win."
Junior guard Antonita Slaughter
(On the team's defense) "Our eyes were mainly on Shenneika Smith. We shut her down and some of their guards stepped up so we had to adjust what we were doing on defense."
(On the team's 3-point shooting) "Our 3-point shooting wasn't very good at all so we just had to adjust and it worked out pretty well going inside-out. Just driving on them and rebounding was a big part of it too."
(On transformation from just an outside shooter to doing everything on the court) "I don't know what to say. I think I have matured over the years. I have wanted to play more physical. I think it has done a lot for me."
