March 21, 2009

Head Coach Pam Borton

On playing in the NCAA Tournament…
“We’re really excited to be here in South Bend for the NCAA Tournament. This year we have a lot more veterans who have had NCAA Tournament experience. They’re ready to go. They’re playing great basketball right now, so let the games begin.”

On their high three-point shooting percentage…
“It’s obviously all about half-court execution. We have been able to get some transition threes throughout the course of the year. If we can reverse the ball and have good ball movement and find our three point shooters it will be a good thing for us.”

On Notre Dame’s home court advantage…
“I’m not sure if it’s a different feel for us because we were in this situation a few years ago when we hosted the NCAA Tournament. It’s obviously a different feel because you sometimes don’t get the tournament experience, but it’s also an advantage with your home court and your home fans. It’s always an advantage to play on your home court because you’re in your comfort zone.”

On playing two freshman…
“Both Jackie [Voigt] and Kiara [Buford] are very mature and are beyond their years in knowing what’s going on. Both have learned a lot over the course of the year and in the last two weeks have come to see how every game we play throughout the season matters. They have come to see how focused and how disciplined you must be throughout the year. I think his is a new season for them. You often worry about them coming into NCAA Tournaments because they don’t know what to expect, but at the same time they just go out there and play because they don’t know any better.”

On Katie Ohm’s three-point shooting…
“Katie Ohm is the Big Ten’s best three-point shooter. If she’s open, she’s most likely going to knock it down. She’s a deep three-point shooter, and hopefully she’ll be able to utilize that for our team tomorrow.”

On the Notre Dame team…
“They’re a well-coached team. They’re a disciplined team. They’re a well-balanced team with not just one or two scorers on the team.”

On the outlook of Kristen Dockery…
“She’s a very skilled post player who knows the game extremely well. We as coaches want to get her out on the floor because she is so skilled and talented. In the future if we can keep her healthy, we’d love to have her out on the floor.”

Emily Fox – Senior – Guard

On the role of the guards…
“The guards are very strong on their team. Their goal is to penetrate. One key thing is going to be our guards’ rebounding, which we’ve been working on a lot in practice. Brittany and I have really been working hard on controlling the tempo and taking control.”

On playing away games…
“I think that it gives us a lot of confidence. A lot of people were asking how we were going to play at Notre Dame, against them on their home floor. We have beat Ohio State on the road, we have beat Michigan State on the road, and I think that experience and that confidence is really going to help us out because we know how to handle this situation. It doesn’t matter where we play, we’re just ready to take them on.”

Brittany McCoyo – Junior – Guard

On controlling the tempo of the game…
“We’ve been doing a better job in practice of controlling the tempo, and knowing what to run to keep our team under control and playing half-court. Notre Dame is a team that likes to run. They like to push the ball up the floor. They’re a team we have to get back on defense with but they’re also a team we can run against. If we push the ball like we can and get people running in the lanes like we can, I think we’ll be very successful.”

On Lindsay Schrader…
“She’s a really good player, obviously, playing the three spot and the four spot. She can do a little bit of everything: taking it to the hole and posting up. It’ll be a challenge for our defense, but a challenge we’re very ready for. It helps that we’ve been working a lot on guarding her on our scout team in the post and also keeping her outside the lane because she’s someone that likes to attack the lane and pull up. She’s a great player, but we’re ready.”

Ashley Ellis-Milan – Junior – Forward / Center

On the importance of rebounding in tomorrow’s game…
“Rebounding is going to be the key to the game. Notre Dame is a great rebounding team offensively and defensively. I think not only myself, but my team needs to step up and start rebounding better than we have in the past couple games we’ve had. I think we’ve worked on it in practice and I think we’ll be ready for Sunday.”