Denver-Colorado Quotes

Colorado Head Coach Linda Lappe

General
“I'm really proud of our team. I thought we played a tremendous game in all phases, both offensively and defensively. We shared the ball and got everybody involved. I thought we took the right shots on offense and defensively, we really stuck to the game plan. We played a really smart game and I thought our players really executed. We played with a tremendous amount of focus and we were on a mission tonight. You could see that and our players really responded to everything DU threw at us.”

On The Early Turnovers
“We were pretty tentative. I felt that Chucky [Jeffery] had a few too many because she was driving in there to not turn the ball over versus driving to score. I thought she really loosened up in the second and we had a few tipped balls. DU did a great job, they're long, they averaged quite a few steals. We knew that coming in. But we cleaned it up and a lot of it was because we were able to run in transition instead of running half-court offense the entire second half.”

On Julie Seabrook's Performance
“I thought Julie did a nice job of establishing deep position. That was part of our game plan. We wanted to make sure we got it inside. I felt like our team did a great job of hitting her when she could score in there. She's posting up really hard and she's starting to understand angles really well, knowing when to call for the ball and when to post up versus when to wait. The team is getting better at feeding the post, something that we've really had to work on this year because we didn't do much of it last year. Our team is getting better at it. I thought Julie was a presence, whether she scored, I thought she did a great job defensively guarding [Kaetlyn] Murdoch and they had to stay worried about her offensively.”

On Defending Kaetlyn Murdoch
“We knew we couldn't let her catch on the block. She has a great turnaround fade away. She's not extremely tall but she uses her height and her length really well. We wanted to make sure nothing came easy and we established position first. We knew we had to do our work early on her. We couldn't let her catch it anywhere she wanted and then try to stop her, that wasn't going to work. I thought our help side was very good on her. I think the passer always saw somebody in help. I thought Julie did a great job of keeping her high and moving on the flight of the ball.”

On Whether DU Was A Good Test
“DU has a good team. They were 6-2 coming in. Their only two losses were against Vanderbilt and UTEP and both of those teams were very good. They had won a lot of close games. It was well-known that they had beaten everyone on the Front Range up until this game. They're going to win a lot of games. They were picked to win their league. We knew it was going to be a tough game and we wanted to come ready. We wanted to make sure we were the aggressors. We wanted to make sure we threw the first punch. Last year, we got outhustled, I felt that DU wanted it a little bit more than we wanted it and we wanted to make sure that wasn't the case this year.”

Colorado Players

Julie Seabrook, Senior, Forward
On the Win –“Payback is awesome. We've been really excited to play them again. Just because of last year and also because they have beaten every other Colorado team in Air Force, Northern Colorado and CSU so we couldn't let them sweep the state. Obviously we didn't let that happen and its awesome, we are really excited about it.”

On the Focus of This Game –“The last two games we've been a little unfocused. Our defense has not been as good as we hoped it to be, and we really focused on that at practice. We knew it was going to be a really important aspect of today's game. We really came out and pushed it. Our defense allowed us to push it on our offense.”

On Blowout Performance – “We always say that we are a second half team. We knew they were going to come out gunning in the second half. We buckled down and fixed the things that Chucky said that we were doing wrong in the first half. We fixed that and that definitely helped us to push ahead and get the lead.”

On the Difference of this Team from Last Year –“I think when we had a new coach come in, the first year is always kind of hard. We are really settled in; we know what coach Lappe expects. We know what we expect from each other. Having a year again to play with each other and get used to it. I think also having great leadership in Chucky, Meagan (Malcolm-Peck) and I and I think that helps us to work well on the floor and stay composed during tough times…Coach Lappe definitely helped us define our role. The beginning of the year we had meetings so we knew exactly what each person does and if we do those things we can be successful. If we stick to those things more goods things will come.”

On Brenna Malcolm-Peck's Return –“Even with three minutes left to go in the game we were like, 'Is Brenna going in? Is Brenna going in?' and Coach pulls her over and asks, 'Brenna can you run up and down for a minute?' She's still trying to get back in shape. Brenna said, 'Yes, I'm your go-to-girl!' She was just so happy.”

Chucky Jeffery, Junior, Guard
On Turnovers –“I take most responsibility for that. I was really sloppy with the ball. It came from getting so excited. Running in transition I got a little sloppy with the ball. We kept our composure, we gathered ourselves, talked about to slow down and take care of the ball, especially in the paint because they were collapsing a lot. We talked about it and we fixed it.”

On Defense –“That was huge. They were keys in the game plan. We knew that number 24 was a key player and number four was a key player. We knew we couldn't let them come into our gym and go off because they are capable of it. We did a great job on 24 and number four. We frustrated them a lot. Our defense was on tonight, and our team was so focused on the game plan, and we did a really good job.”

On the Half Court Shot –“Oh yea! As soon as it left my hand it felt good. I saw it spinning back and I stopped. It went in, but when it left I felt like it was going to go in.”

On the Difference of this Team from Last Year –“We have great balance on this team. I think [Coach] could put anybody on the floor and we will work just as well as the first five. We have a lot of scorers, we're very dynamic. We're so defensive-minded. I think that's very good. Last year we had (Britney) Blythe, she was really good. When we needed (Brittany) Spears to step up at defense, she did. This year I think she could put anyone on the floor, and when she tells us to deny, we will. Everybody's listening and focusing on what she wants us to do.”

On Brenna's Return –“Me and Ashley took a lap around the court. It's just big. Brenna has been through so much adversity since we got here as a freshman. To see her overcome that and get in the game was just huge. We were begging for her to shoot that shot off the screen, but we're just so happy that she's back with us.”

Lexy Kresl, Freshman, Guard
On Her Scoring Run –“That run was good. The energy was great right out of the half. We just kept going. Our defense stepped up a lot. We hit the boards a lot harder. Everything. We started trying harder I feel like.”

On Thinking College is Easy –“No, not necessarily. I think that they are easy when we work well together and play hard. It's not easy by any means…I'm so happy people underestimate us.”

Brenna Malcolm-Peck, Sophomore, Guard/Forward
On Returning to the Floor For The First Time Since 2009-10 Season –“I can't really describe the feeling, it's been about two years. It was absolutely amazing and I couldn't make the comeback without the support of my teammates.”

Denver Head Coach Erik Johnson

On the expectations going into tonight's game: “We expected a really good basketball game and unfortunately CU played the only really good basketball game. I have to give Linda Lappe and her and her team a ton of credit. I thought we looked undersized. We weren't able to score and we're a better scoring basketball team. The fact that Linda was able to take away our inside game and our outside game force us to put the ball on the floor and take us out of our comfort zone I thought was really impressive. CU defended very very well. Not that we didn't expect that, but I was just disappointed that we weren't able to handle it any better than we did.

On Colorado's offensive break away: “I think the difference was their defense. They clearly made shots and I think CU shot the ball better than they have been shooting the basketball, and we were trying to take away their inside game and they made us pay. I mean Chucky hit that half court shot at the end of halftime. They hit shots consistently throughout the whole game. You have to give them credit offensively. They really won the game on their defense. They held us to 36 points and a low field percentage. They defended really flawlessly. They almost made no mistakes and about the only thing we could do was put our head down and drive to try to get ourselves to the line and unfortunately that's their game and they are better at that. In basketball when two teams are different, you want to make the game play your way and we made the game play their way. Unfortunately we weren't able to convert and make it a Denver kinda game. Again that goes back to coaching and being a disciplined basketball team. They are solid. There is a reason they are 8-0 now. They are going to do really well in the Pac-12. They are much better than they are picked out to be. I'm excited to root for them the rest of the season.

On the game plan moving forward into practice and conference play: “We have another Pac-12 game on Sunday against Oregon. Then we're playing Minnesota three days later, so there's no question that this is the level we want to be playing at. We scheduled these games for a reason. We believe we can be playing at this level. Tonight we just weren't able to compete with them. I thought they dominated us in about every aspect of the game. I'm very impressed with CU. This gives us a lot of film to go home and watch. We've got lots to work on in practice and we can move forward and give it a shot at Oregon. I told Linda… I'll give her a scouting report and root for the best when they play against them."