University of Tennessee Athletics
Postgame Quotes: UT 101, C-N 59
November 09, 2015 | Women's Basketball
Recap |
Final Stats |
Notes |
Photo Gallery 
Tennessee Head Coach Holly Warlick
(Opening Statement)
"I thought tonight that we started off slow. The third and fourth quarters were very good for us. I thought Carson-Newman came out and did a great job. They are a very well-coached team. I don't expect us to be at the very top of our game right now, but we are a team that is learning, getting better. But, disappointed in giving up 31 attempts from the 3-point line. I am really proud of how we ended. We had 25 assists, which is outstanding for us. We shot almost 60 percent. Our goal was to get the ball inside. They knew our goal was to get the ball inside. At times, I thought we forced the ball, but I thought we settled down and did some good things. We had some individual performances. I thought Kortney Dunbar was outstanding. She has been a kid that practices so hard everyday. When you see that and you see the result she had, I'm really proud of her and her effort. What she has done in practice has carried over to the game."
(On players that didn't play)
"Basically, we are just banged up. Diamond is banged up. Te'a is banged up. Nia got her muscles aggravated by lifting weights, and she was in a whole lot of pain. [The injury is] her ribs. She is going to be fine. It just got aggravated right before the game. Nia is a tough kid, so when she comes in my office crying, I know she is in a lot of pain. We sent her back home. She is going to be fine. She had some muscle spasms and couldn't get rid of it. We X-rayed her. She is fine. Everything is fine. She had some spasms lifting weights."
(On specifics of Nia Moore's injury)
"I'm not sure, but I know she was in a lot of pain. The doctor assured me that she is going to be 100 percent fine."
(On Te'a Cooper's knee)
"It is. She is just banged up. She just hit it.
(On if injured players are expected to be ready for opener)
"I hope so. We are just going to take it one day at a time. Jordan tweaked her ankle a little bit. Meme got her mouth busted. We should be used to playing hurt, injured and low numbers."
(On thoughts on defensive effort)
"I chose to start off with our zone press. It was okay. We didn't affect anybody the first two quarters. We let them get into our offense. You aren't doing a great job if you let someone launch 31 threes. You have to take information we give our kids and apply it. We did some good things. But, we have to listen better. We have to take what is told and take it on the court. I thought once our defense picked it up, we started pressing and doing a little bit different things. I thought that turned the game around. Looking back, should I have probably man-pressed early? Yes."
(On what to discover about team after exhibition)
"I want to be more consistent on the defensive end. I want to be more aggressive on the ball. I want to make sure we identify what each kid does and know how to respond on the defensive end. We wanted the ball inside and wanted to get inside touches. I thought a lot of it had to do Carson-Newman sagging off, and we got open looks. At one point, Mercedes wasn't touching the ball. She is 6-foot-6. She has to touch the ball. Then, we started passing and standing. We'll watch the tape, but we have to understand to pass-and-cut, pass-and-move. If you reverse the ball five or six times and pass it, you are going to get great looks."
(On Andraya Carter's offense)
"I'm okay if she gets 19 points every night. I think Andraya has a great shot. Andraya is effective is when she takes good shots for Andraya. Those are not forced. Those are not when she has to create a shot. I think Andraya is an excellent offensive player when she takes shots she can make. She doesn't take too many bad shots. I thought she took advantage of the opportunity tonight. I'm more impressed that she had four steals and five assists. She can get better with the turnovers, but those steals and assists are impressive to me. I thought Andraya had a very good game for her."
(On if people watching think Tennessee is No. 4 nationally)
"Probably not. Maybe we weren't top 100. I don't care. We're ranked fourth, and I'm loving it. You keep winning. When you keep winning, you stay where you are. Can we get better? Absolutely. That is why we play this game."
(On Mercedes Russell)
"If i'm guarding Mercedes Russell, i'm going to put four or five people on her, and Carson Newman did. At times, Mercedes got pushed off the block, then she settled down and got inside. We're going to go to her, because Mercedes is very consistent, and I was very proud of her being five for five from the free throw line. She is going to get bumped and pushed, that is part of the game."
(On Bashaara Graves)
"She did a great job, she handled the ball, her game has really stepped up and she has gotten better away from the basket. She handled the ball in the open court very well and was not restricted to the post. I love that she caught and penetrated, she is hard to stop when she is coming full speed down the lane. When we settled down, we had good looks."
(On game tempo)
"I was not happy with the whole game, because when we got the ball out, fatigue set in and we walked the ball up. I thought on the defensive end when we pushed and made steals, the game picked up. Overall, we can do a much better job of pushing the ball up their backs."
(On impact of Bashaara Graves)
"We have played a lot of different lineups, and we have had Bashaara at the point. Whoever it is, I think if Mercedes is effective it will free up shots. I'm old school, I have grown up getting the ball inside to the post. Percentages of shots are a lot higher, opportunities to get fouled are higher. If i'm a post player, I am coming to Tennessee. When people can hit from the outside, that is a bonus. We have spent a lot of time on the defensive end, we want to establish our defense and improve from there. I saw shades of our offense, and hopefully we progress and get better as we move along offensively.
(On three point game)
"Meme has a great three point shot and we have a lot of great three point people. We just have to get the ball to who is the most consistent. Our most consistent 3 point player is Kortney Dunbar, and that's one of the reasons we moved her to the four. That will give more opportunities to shoot threes, but I do not live and die by the three point shot. A lot of teams do, but we are not going to do that. Eighteen threes was a lot of us tonight. Thank you.
Tennessee Guard Andraya Carter
(On simplifying the offense)
"I think so, I think anything for me anything in life and on the court is so much easier when it's not forced. I'm not ever going to be someone that forces something. If it's a shot that I don't feel good about, I'm not going to take it. Some people may think that it's a great shot, but if I don't feel good about it, it's probably not going to get released from my hands. I take shots that I take in practice and that I take in my individual workouts, and those are the ones I feel good about."
(On the lineup changes)
"A little bit, but that's what a team is for. So, whatever five are on the court we have to play together and we have to gel together, and I think that will come with practice. In practices we have tons of different lineups. Coaches put different groups together and I think that's what they are trying to prepare us for because you don't know, anybody could have to go out, or they might get hurt, or just be struggling, and so the lineup might change. I think that's what we work on in practice, so as we get going different lineups will gel more and more and hopefully we will peak by the end of the season."
Tennessee Center Mercedes Russell
(On her first two baskets running the floor)
"I think that first basket kind of just got the nervousness out of me and the first-game jitters. I think that first basket really helped me get all of that out early."
(On what she took away from the win)
"I think of the whole game as a learning process. We get to test a bunch of our defenses and a bunch of our plays. I just think we learn and see what works for us and what doesn't work for us the best. So, I just think the whole game overall is a great learning curve for us."
(On Dunbar switching positions)
"I think she's been doing a great job. This past summer and just since practice started it has been big for her. She has been learning a lot, so I know it has been pretty tough on her, but I think the transition for her is really great because she has that 'inside-outside' type of game. She is a tall player that is very versatile and just her three-point shot is incredible. So I think the transition for her so far has been great. I think she's taking the role on pretty well. She's adjusting to it."
Tennessee Forward Kortney Dunbar
(On scoring from the perimeter)
"I would just say working more towards being a stretch four. It's what I've been working on in practice. So, I'm really getting low and working with Mercedes, Nia and Bashaara. You're working with some of the best posts in the country. Having me feed off of them is something I've been working on in practice."
(On UT's team attributes)
"We as a team have not really been struggling as the year has gone on. I think that as we practice and we are playing with the freshman and playing with each other, and even having Mercedes and Diamond healthy now, we're trying to see what each player loves to do - what is their main attributes to score and stuff. I think later down the road we'll be more comfortable playing as a team together and knowing what each player does the best. So, I think we'll be definitely a better team down the road."
Carson-Newman Head Coach Mike Mincey
(Opening statement)
"We appreciate Coach Warlick and her staff for the opportunity to come down here and play in this environment. The kids appreciate it. We make some money as we do it. I think our team got better tonight."
(On the score being misleading at the end)
"They outscored us 19 to 18 in the third quarter. It was 37 to 11 in the fourth. I think the press was on pretty much the whole fourth. It's like I tell these kids all the time. It is an honor to come down here and play against the Tennessee Lady Volunteers, and I am going to let every one of them play. I am not saying our kids didn't play well in the fourth quarter, but we took our experienced kids out to make sure everyone got a chance to play. I didn't get to play them as much as I would have liked. I thought [Kailyn Brooks and Tatum Burstrom] handled the ball very well. Any time there was a trap or pressure on them, they made plays out of it. I was proud of my basketball team through those three quarters. Whatever the spread was is not indicative of how well we played."
(On if he liked the way his offense was running)
"We didn't get a lot of looks inside because of the size discrepancy. [Brooks and Burstrom] are so experienced and I am proud of how they played. They played confident last year and they are playing confident this year. They have the green light to shoot threes because I know they can make them and they are very good shooters and won't take bad looks."
(On if he was surprised about how well Mercedes Russell played)
"No, I thought she might hurt us a little bit more. With our game plan, I knew we couldn't front her. Two years ago, we couldn't zone them because they would just throw it over the top, so our game plan was to try and body her. I thought Jecca Simerly and Abby Tinsley, who guarded her most of the time, did a pretty good job of keeping her posted off the block. She is a great player. To hold her to 23 points while playing 34 minutes, I think our kids did a good job. She is a really great player, and I am sure Tennessee is glad to have her back."
Carson-Newman Guard Tatum Burstrom
(On being surprised about moving the ball so well)
"I thought they would pressure a little more. They let us have a little room on the perimeter, so it was easy for us to get ball movement. We typically move the ball pretty well. We shared the ball to try and get each other open shots. I was proud of how we moved the ball."
(On getting to play here multiple times in her career)
"In my first two years, it was Thompson-Boling Arena, so it was very nerve-wracking. Coming here my junior and senior years, I have been proud of how the team has played together and we are building confidence each year. It leads us into our season pretty well."
Carson-Newman Guard Kailyn Brooks
(On what she thought about the team's play)
"I was impressed by the way we played. I wasn't surprised because I knew we could come out here and do that. I know we played them pretty tough last year too, and I am just really proud of my team and how they played tonight."
