UConn Huskies women’s basketball coach Geno Auriemma along with Bria Hartley and Breanna Stewart met with the media after UConn’s 75-56 win over the Stanford Cardinal on Sunday night at Bridgestone Arena in Nashville, TN.
Here’s what they had to say:
MODERATOR: We’ll take a brief statement from Coach Auriemma and then go to questions for the student‑athletes.
COACH AURIEMMA: Thank you. I think the game played out at least in the first half how I thought it would play out. We knew it would be a little bit of a struggle. It’s hard to make shots‑‑ unless you’re Kayla McBride‑‑ it’s hard to make shots at the Final Four.
Once we got settled in and got our rhythm, I thought we played one of the best games that we played all year, given the fact that we beat a really, really good team.
THE MODERATOR: Questions for the student‑athletes.
Q. Breanna, talk about the first ten minutes of the first half and did you guys feel like you needed to settle in?
BREANNA STEWART: I think at times we were a little jumpy, getting too excited. And we had to settle down and get into the right rhythm of the game. Once we did that, it seemed like we went on a run to end the first half and shots started falling.
Q. Bria, what does it say about the state of basketball and the state of Connecticut that your men’s team will be playing for the title tomorrow night and you’ll be playing for it Tuesday night? And what does it say to see Team Kevin and Team Geno playing for it all?
BRIA HARTLEY: I think it’s awesome. I know our men are really excited for us and rooting us on. We’re doing the same thing for them. I think all the fans in Connecticut are really proud right now and both teams have worked really hard all year and through the preseason preparing for this moment. So it’s now the time has come when we make sure we finish on a good note.
Q. Bria, did something change defensively at any point in the first half when you went on your run but you suddenly were making it really hard for them to score?
BRIA HARTLEY: I think we just picked up the pressure on our defense, really getting into passing lanes. I thought Moriah did a good job, got a few steals out there. One steal that Stewy got was awesome. It changed the momentum of the game.
That’s what our defense does when we go out there and we make it tough for them to score and we’re able to create offense off of that. It really helps our offense and we’re able to play a lot better.
THE MODERATOR: Anything else for the student‑athletes? Thank you, ladies.
Q. Geno, how big of a difference did bringing Kiah into the game make in your defense in particular?
COACH AURIEMMA: When we went with the bigger lineup, we have a few more options defensively that we can do. It allowed us to move Stewy onto a shooter and get some length out there. Kiah has been a real good defensive player and a shot blocker, and we trust her now. We didn’t in the past. But we do and we’re not afraid to put her out there in big moments. That’s the best game she’s ever played, I think, since she came to Connecticut.
Q. Wanted to get you to respond to the question about seeing your men and seeing your team get to it undefeated, and was Bria or Breanna a Team Geno draft pick?
COACH AURIEMMA: Well, unfortunately when we did that, that Midnight Madness thing, we didn’t get to pick our teams. So I was just assigned a team. And I thought I had it made. I had Shabazz, DeAndre Daniels. So I thought there’s no way we could lose. And we’re down like 20 at halftime. Finally told them, I said that’s one reason why I don’t coach guys, you guys just don’t listen. And then Shabazz scored like 30 straight. We won at the end.
So you could see these guys that are playing for Kevin, you can just feel it, the energy that they play with, that they get from Kevin.
They just have so much confidence in each other. It’s quite remarkable. I don’t even know what words you could use to describe that. For the second time in 10 years we’ve got two of our teams playing for the National Championship.
It really is‑‑ you don’t want to say it like it’s incredible, because we’ve done it before. But just the fact that it’s happening for a guy that’s been a head coach for two years, that’s pretty remarkable. That’s pretty remarkable.
Somebody told me that no one who has never won at least a regional has ever won a National Championship.
But they’re coached by a guy who played 13 years in the NBA all on one‑year contracts. I would bet on Kevin. Not that I’m allowed to bet, because this is the NCAA.
Q. Thanks for clearing that up.
COACH AURIEMMA: Absolutely.
Q. You’ve seen a lot of things in women’s basketball, including with your own team, but 39‑0 versus 37‑0 is a unique place for this sport. Can you step away obviously from the fact that you’re coaching one of the teams and sort of, do you recognize that this is a pretty historic thing coming up on Tuesday?
COACH AURIEMMA: Yeah, it was almost‑‑ it looked to me like, as the season went on, it almost looked like it was inevitable, you know. Like it was supposed to happen.
And our sport probably doesn’t have enough significant moments, you know. I don’t know that we have the kind of moments that happen last night at the men’s Final Four where you get a 7 and 8 seed playing for the National Championship. I don’t think we have enough of those moments in our game.
So to have the spotlight on Tuesday on two teams that one of them is going to lose for the first time this year, and it’s pretty remarkable when you think about how hard that is to do for one team, much less two.
And they’re far and away the best team that I’ve seen this year. Far and away. No one else is even close of any team that we’ve played or that I’ve seen play on film. No one else is even close.
Q. Geno, can you talk a little bit about Bonnie Samuelson? She was 1 from 7 from the field. I believe they were all from beyond the arc. And she was shooting 46.7 percent through the first four tournament games. And they’re a team that typically tends to shoot a lot of 3s. Can you talk about what emphasis you placed on defending the 3‑point line and how you went about doing that?
COACH AURIEMMA: We knew that. We knew they were going to shoot a lot of them. They took 25 of them. Our goal was not to let them take 25. They made 10 against North Carolina, I think. They made 10.
That’s 30 of their points. And tonight they made six. They banked two of them in. That’s the kind of stuff that happens at the Final Four. But we can do things that other teams can’t do. We can play Chiney one‑on‑one. We don’t have to worry about doubling down there leaving 3‑point shooters open.
We can switch some screens that maybe other teams can’t because they don’t have our size or our versatility.
So Bonnie’s a great shooter. I’ve seen her make that one shot she made when Stewy got up in the air she went by her. That’s the kind of stuff she can do.
Their whole team can make seven, eight, nine, ten in a row. So that was part of the game plan. Doesn’t matter how many 2s they get. But we gotta limit the 3s and the free throws. I thought we did a great job of both of those things.
Q. Geno, speaking of 3‑point shooting, for about the last week or so you guys haven’t shot at the clip that you’re accustomed to. How have you guys had to adjust and modify what you’re doing to account for the fact you’re not hitting as many shots from the outside as you normally do?
COACH AURIEMMA: There’s not a lot of adjustments you can make when you’re not making shots. At one point I think Stanford had all five of their players inside the lane and just daring us to make a shot.
As I said, it’s contagious. You’re not going to believe this but yesterday at practice here and today at shootaround, we made every shot to the point where I’m like, yeah, I like this. And then couldn’t make anything in the first half.
I’ve always said if you play great defense, you put yourself in a position to win a game. And then however good your offense is, that will depend on what the spread is.
If your offense is great that night, you can win by a lot. But if your offense isn’t great that night, you can still win if you play great defense. And we managed to do that this entire season.
Q. Geno, although it’s led to this dream Final, both you and Notre Dame have not only gone undefeated, you’ve overwhelmed virtually everybody you’ve played. Is it good that two teams have separated themselves so thoroughly from the rest of the country to make it seem like it’s really been a two‑team season all along?
COACH AURIEMMA: I think it’s good once in a while. I think it’s good. I don’t know that I would want a steady diet of that every year. But I think once in a while it’s good. Draws a lot of attention to the game. An awful lot of people might tune in Tuesday night that wouldn’t normally maybe tune in.
I think it’s okay. I know that there was more‑‑ it was much more competitive beyond those two.
Like if you took those two off the boards, everything else was really, really competitive this year. It’s a work in progress. I don’t think we’re there yet.
Q. Why have you two separated yourselves so thoroughly from‑‑ what do you think it is about these two teams that has allowed each of you to separate, this season, to separate you so thoroughly from everybody else?
COACH AURIEMMA: Well, we had everybody coming back from last year’s team except Kelly Faris and Caroline Doty, two kids that played a lot. And Kelly was the backbone of our defense and was unbelievable.
But the core of our team was back. So that obviously was a huge benefit.
And the same for Notre Dame. They lost a great player in Skylar Diggins. But what they had coming back was a great team. The way both teams have managed to make the necessary adjustments throughout the season.
I’m not surprised. We are the two best passing teams in the country. I think we pass it great, and I think they pass it great. I think we’re the two best passing teams in America. And that’s something that a lot of teams can’t do, they can’t pass.
So when you pass the ball really well and you have a lot of really good players on the floor, you end up kind of having a dominant team.
Q. You hit on this a little bit, but you mentioned that they were far and away the best team when you looked at them on film. Can you be specific? Is it when you look at them on film, is it just a question of talent? Or is it the execution that the talent that you see performed is at a higher level than anybody else?
COACH AURIEMMA: I don’t think talent is always the answer. Except they have two First‑Team All‑Americans that are as good as any two players in the country, individually and collectively. There’s not too many players better than those two. And they’re so aggressive, and they have such a scoring mentality.
And when they run their stuff, they really run it. They execute as well as anybody in the country. They probably attack the basket as well if not better than anybody I’ve seen.
When Kayla McBride gets the ball, when she gets to half court, you better put three people around the basket and hope because at some point she’s going to get there and she’s going to score or get fouled. And Jewell Loyd is the same way. So when you play with that kind of aggressive mentality and you’re that talented, you look like a great team, which is what they are.
THE MODERATOR: Thank you, Coach.
Here are Stanford’s postgame quotes.
quotes courtesy of asap sports
photo credit: john woike – hartford courant
