Colorado University Athletics
Colorado Wisconsin Quotes
November 27, 2011 | Women's Basketball
Colorado Head Coach Linda Lappe
General
"The defense was key, they did a great job in the first half [holding Wisconsin] to 23 points. Even with those 23 points, a lot of their shots were rushed and not ones they wanted. That really helped us win the game. Our rebounding was outstanding. That team was outrebounding teams by eight and we come in and out rebounded them by 19. We did a good job of executing that and being physical and paying special attention to limiting them to one shot."
On Colorado's Offensive Rebounding
"When you're not shooting the ball particularly well like we have been the past few games, the offensive rebounding helps you stay in the game and keep momentum when we very easily could've lost it midway through the second half. I thought Meagan (Malcolm-Peck) did a great job with that. She only had four points, but the two baskets that she got couldn't have come at a better time. She was doing whatever she could to help our team and I thought she did a great job."
On Wisconsin's Physicality
"I thought we lost our composure for about a minute and a half to two minutes in the first half when we were fouling too much but we regained it and I think that's important. We called a timeout and took a deep breath and refocused on what we needed to do to score and not put them at the free throw line."
On The Early Technical
"I thought that was a huge [motivator]. [After that], we never lost our lead; we still stayed up by a decent margin at that point. It wasn't for five minutes; it was for about a minute and a half and I thought our team really responded. I thought we could've been ahead by a few more, but I thought we went into halftime with a good lead and good momentum and it really carried us into the second half. We chipped away and got some easy baskets, started hitting our post a bit more and I thought Rachel did a nice job hitting the open player."
On Winning Being Undefeated And Winning The Omni Classic
"We love to protect our home court. Every time we're here, we talk about it; we have to have a lot of pride when we're on our home floor. The Omni Classic is a tournament that we've had here for a long time, playing home over Thanksgiving and it's something where family can come watch and it's always nice when you can win. It's always a goal and it's always one of the first times we can win a championship in the year. To win the Omni Classic is important."
Colorado Players
General Statement
"It's huge, it's our own tournament so we know we have to come in and be ready for anything. We can't take anybody lightly, but we know we're hosting something in our house that we have to take the tournament. I think it's real great, 2 years coming in. Us starting 5-0, that's big, because I don't think we've been undefeated this early for years. So I think that's real great."
On The Physicality Of The Game
"I love it. I love physical games because it hypes everything up. You bring more energy. I think it's good for us to face physical teams, especially early on because that is like an emulation of what we're going to see in conference. So I think that's real good, getting it out early and actually seeing more physical teams, pressuring teams because then we know how to respond to it and keep our composure in situations like when coach got the technical, and things like that. I think it's real good for us to have physical games like that."
On If They Expected This Type of Game From Wisconsin
"Oh yeah, we knew from yesterday when we were watching them play. We knew they were going to come out gunning for us and we were going to come out gunning for them. We knew it was going to be a physical game."
On Slowing Down The Wisconsin Offense
"We only had one day to scout; we came in earlier scouted. We were writing down notes and we knew that #2 and #40 were their key players. Me and B and Lexy and all of us were spend a lot of time on her. We knew we had to go over the ball screens on her because she can stop and pop. She has a quick shot and she is their key player and she is capable of going off. Last night I think she went off for 20-some odd points and we knew we couldn't let that happen because she was just going to get streaky and it was going to keep going and it would have been hard for us to control it. I think jumping out on her at the beginning was good for us."
On Being Named Tournament MVP
"It's big, I'm thankful. It just makes me want to keep working and I know I can't dwell on it. I love it, it's good, it's great but I just got to come back ready to work harder. Got to get some shots in obviously, so I'm not great in all areas but it's good. It feels good.
On Rebounding Being A Focus
That's part of our identity. We have to be a good rebounding team because we know that teams kind of scout us and see that we kind of turn our heads. So we work on that in practice for us to get physical box outs and crash the rebounds on offense because just like they can catch us sleeping, we can catch them sleeping too. I think we have a lot of good rebounding guards at that and not a lot of teams have that. I think that's huge for us.
On Making Free Throws
"I'm very confident in my free throw shot; on the free throw ladder I'm on the top. I wanted to defend my title in the game."
On Extending The Lead
"I mean any run is definitely important for the team but you just have to keep pushing even when you don't have the run. You can't let them get a run, so that was the main focus I think was not to let them go on shooting sprees or anything like that. We just kind of played controlled today."
On Rebounding Being A Focus
"And one of our goals before every game, we always talk about how we want to outrebound the other team. It's always one of our 3-key goals. So we always focus on that."
On Being Named To The All-Tournament Team
"Actually when they called my name I didn't really know what they were talking about but it's humbling. I just appreciate the support from fans and everybody that came today."
