TEXAS WOMAN’S UNIVERSITY QUOTES
Beth Jillson, TWU Head Coach
(Overview of game)
“It was a hard fought battle by both teams. Northeastern is a great team and they will go on.”
“Defense was a key tonight. It was the best we’ve played this year. We defended the three point line well. We talked about playing defense for 30 seconds and we did that. We got tentative down the stretch, but we made the big shots.”
“This team has matured a ton. We beat two ranked opponents, and then had a rough December. But I really felt we’ve turned it around. We still make mistakes, but we have stepped it up with intensity.”
(On losing a 10-point lead in the second half)
“Early in the season we might have folded. But we’ve faced a lot of ranked teams this year and we took more time off the clock. We made it come down to defense and we made it happen. We made hustle plays and went diving for loose balls, they responded. I’m so proud of them.”
(On the play of senior Kayla Weaver)
“Kayla is consistent night after night and she helped us get that 10-point lead. Then she stepped up with the free throws to ice it.”
(On playing in the Championship Game)
We’re just ready to play in the Championship. Central Oklahoma is a very disciplined team and we’ve played them twice and lost twice, but we’ll be ready.
Kayla Weaver, TWU Player
(On the free throws with four seconds left)
“I was very nervous and coach said just do it and I did.”
Brooke Shepherd, TWU Player
(On playing all 40 minutes of the game)
“I like to play 40 minutes and that’s what I do. I wanted to be there the whole time.”
(On picking up the win)
“I went in with a confidence knowing that we could win. We won by 10, but so did they earlier in the year.”
Northeastern State quotes
Randy Gipson, NSU Coach
“The thing that jumps out is that we shot such a low percentage. I give TWU credit they played great defense, played hard and stayed up in our faces. They simply made it difficult to get good looks on offense.”
“I felt good about our chances. We knew we had to get a defensive stop. We couldn’t get the defensive stop and get the ball back. I think our defense was better in the second half in terms of execution. When it came down to the big possession, we couldn’t get the stop when we needed to them.”
“They stayed up close on us. We’ve had trouble maintaining composure against this team. They don’t give up easy shots. They are fundamentally sound. They stay in their stance. We just didn’t do a good enough job on finishing with some layups when we had the opportunities. They put their nose on the ball.”
“We did a good job in free throw shooting. There were some days when we were not so good. I was glad to see us get back in the game. Making only 13 field goals in the game has to be a low for us.”
“It will be interesting to see what type of response we will make. We can’t continue on as business as usual. We can’t continue playing the way we have been played. We pulled one out of the hat, when we didn’t have a good performance. We tried to do the same today, but it didn’t work. We will see what lessons we can learn and see what things we can make for our next game.”
Taylor Lewis, NSU Player
“They were in my face all the game. I just needed to do a better job adjusting to it. We didn’t get stops and when we were not scoring, you end up losing the game.”
“We just needed to run our offense and get good shots. We didn’t get stops on defense. That’s where it hurt us. We should’ve done better than that all around.”
Jasmine Webb, NSU Player
“I was just trying to score.”