Alabama vs. Tennessee: Postgame Quotes
1/26/2012 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Jan. 26, 2012
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Head Coach Wendell Hudson
On playing tough against Tennessee:
"We played about as hard as we've played in a long time. We did a lot of good things. You look at the first half, and we weren't making free throws. It's an eight point game—seven, eight point game. When you're playing a team like Tennessee, you can't let anything go by. Just stepping up to the line and shooting 75 percent, 80 percent, we shoot that and then that changes the whole complexion of the game. Tennessee's a really good basketball team. I thought we competed, hung in there and did a lot of good things. It's just one of those games where you're playing against a good team, and you can't let them score like they were scoring. You've got to get back and move your feet and take some charges instead of blocks. We're not a shot-blocking team. We're not big enough to be a shot-blocking team, but as far as effort was concerned, you talk about this night in and night out. Effort is where we needed to have it and that's what we said to the team after the game was that if we played with that effort and played together that way, we still have a lot of basketball games to play."
On injured players and getting players back:
"Shafontaye Myers practiced one day, and she went out there. We knew she wasn't going to be at full-speed, ready to go. Kyra Crosby gave us all she's got. Her knee is really bothering her still. Then when (Aneesah Daniels) went down and she fell, we're just holding our breath that she can get back up. I'm quite sure that her hand will be sore tomorrow. This is the hand that we're dealt and they're fighting and playing hard and that's all you can ask them to do."
On Pat Summitt:
"I've talked about Pat and people have asked me that over and over, especially now in her situation. But I'll tell you about her. When I got into the league, Pat Summitt was one of the most welcoming people that was involved as far as coaches in the league. Not just her, but all of them. Somebody asked me if I expected that. I didn't have any preconceived ideas about her. I'd watched her play, didn't know her, but when I got to the first conference meeting and met her, sat down and met together, she was supportive about promoting women's basketball. Not just Tennessee basketball, but women's basketball all over the SEC. Without any question, she was as helpful as she could be in helping people promote women's basketball."
On playing Kentucky this weekend:
"We're playing in the SEC. That's not anything unusual. With the effort and the way we played tonight, I'm hoping we can grow from that. We're looking forward to going and playing. You can look in the players' eyes and tell that they're looking forward to going and playing."
No. 21 Kyra Crosby, Forward
On her mindset:
"My mindset was just to get my team motivated and know that this was just like any other game. If we play together, and we play hard we can do anything."
On whether she was satisfied the effort from the team tonight as a whole:
"The first half I was excited about the way we were looking, and then over time we deteriorated. It happens. Overall, I'm happy we are making improvements."
On what the biggest challenge was tonight:
"I would say rotating because they swing the ball so much. As a team, it was the most difficult."
No. 33 Jessica Merritt, Guard
On still fighting for the team's first SEC win:
"I just feel like we have to keep working. It's nothing that we can't fix. We just have to keep coming to practice and motivating ourselves and our teammates. At the end, we are going to come out in some kind of way. We are a transition team, so if we can get our fast breaks we will be doing well."
