St. John's University Athletics
Postgame Quotes: St. Bonaventure 64, St. John's 58
11/12/2011 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Nov. 12, 2011
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St. John's Head Coach Kim Barnes Arico
Opening Statement:
"St. Bonaventure did a great job of not giving up during the game. They hung around, hung around and hung around. We ran out of gas a little bit and didn't score late in the game and we put them on the free throw line. St. Bonaventure is a good team, but we need to get better, and learn how to finish out games - which is something that we struggle with early on."
On the interior defense:
"Everybody thinks that we are returning a ton of experience. As far as experience goes, we are only returning Nadirah McKenith, Shenneika Smith, and Eugenia McPherson. All the rest of our people inside are really young in terms of minutes played. Amber Thompson, a freshman, played 22 minutes and had a tremendous amount of upside, but obviously has to get better. Mary Nwachukwu, who transferred from Boston College and really didn't play much her freshman year, is also kind of a rookie. Zakiyyah Shahid-Martin didn't see much time last year and Jennifer Blanding has not logged many minutes in her career - all those kids are new faces to the program. Obviously, I think they are going to get better every single day, but interior defense is our point of emphasis and where we need to improve.
On allowing St. Bonaventure's scoring off turnovers:
"We got loose with the ball and got fatigued. Right out of the gate, we tried to set up a play and it resulted in a turnover. We just got loose with the ball and we didn't do a good enough job of taking care of the ball down the stretch. We got fatigued - that was the factor right there."
On playing through injury:
"Shenneika [Smith] limped off, Nadirah [McKenith] limped off, and Mary [Nwachukwu] limped off. Every time one of them limped off, we had a pretty good lead. By the time they went back in the game, we didn't have a lead anymore so that significantly hurt us. Mary was doing a really good job for us, she comes out and then St. Bonaventure makes a run. Shenneika came out, St. Bonaventure makes a run. Nadirah comes out, St. Bonaventure makes a run. They are all banged-up, but they better learn to toughen-up and play through it and not come out of the game when it counts."
On her message to the team after this game
"We need to get better. I kind of knew what we were about coming in. I hoped that we would be able to sustain enough and continue to improve every practice. We made great runs - we just couldn't sustain them. Our conditioning and our execution down the stretch of the game needs to improve in addition to our defense. We're going to improve, we're definitely going to get better. We're a young team and those kids are going to improve. I should definitely have their attention now."
Junior Guard Eugeneia McPherson
On her effectiveness in the first half:
"I got to the basket - they kept playing up on me. My shot was not falling early, but I still got to the basket and got fouled or dumped it off to my teammates."
On the difference between the first half and the second:
"We didn't execute and St. Bonaventure got to the basket whenever they wanted. When they needed big shots, they hit them. We also slacked defensively.
On the difficult slate the team will face over the rest of the season:
"From the beginning we knew that we had a tough non-conference schedule. Even if we did win this game, as we should have, we still knew that it was going to be a tough road ahead of us. We all know that we need to work on our games and get better.
St. Bonaventure Head coach Jim Crowley
On today's game:
"It was a well played, very intense first game. I thought both teams played hard and the referees did a good job of letting us compete at a high level.
On the pace of the game:
"It was a game of runs and we were very fortunate to go on the last run when there was no time left."
On playing from behind and St. Bonaventure's game plan:
"Once St. John's went up 11, I think our kids did a great job because they could have hung their heads, -- but instead they came back and battled and gained a lot of confidence from that. We knew the things we were giving up, but because St. John's is so talented it was hard to control it on the floor, but our kids found a way to make them take some difficult shots. In the end, we had that late run and we were able to stick our game plan and that really helped us pull through."
