St. John's University Athletics
Postgame Quotes: Baylor 73, St. John's 59
12/11/2011 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
Dec. 11, 2011
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St. John's Head Coach Kim Barnes Arico
Opening Statement:
"We feel Baylor is a tremendous basketball team and I thought our young ladies really stepped up to the challenge today. We're playing without our best player [Da'Shena Stevens] as we have all season so far. I don't think a lot of people really realize that we're without our BIG EAST Freshman of the Year, our First-Team All-BIG EAST Player. She's our senior, our leader, so we came into the game without her and I thought our kids stepped up and did a great job. Baylor has so many weapons and we tried to take away their top two and we did a tremendous job with that in the first half. They wore us down a little bit in the second half and they made plays when they had to. They are a great program and I thought it was a great basketball game for everybody to watch today."
On losing junior guard Nadirah McKenith in the second half:
"It really stinks. Nadirah was unbelievable. Obviously, Sims is the best point guard in the country, but I thought Nadirah McKenith, in the first half, shined. As much as Da'Shena [Stevens] has been our leading scorer and leading rebounder for the last three years, Nadirah makes our team go. She's special and no one can do for us what she can do."
On being up, 36-30, after halftime:
"We talked about it at halftime. Our players were a little too excited at the half. I wanted them to be excited about it, but I knew we had twenty more minutes and I knew they were going to make a run. We had done a tremendous job on Odyssey Sims in the first half, but I knew that she was going to want to make more of an impact in the second half. The first three or four times down the court, she had the ball in her hands and she was really looking to go. I knew it was going to be difficult, but we came out at the start of the second half and scored those quick buckets and went up, 36-30. I looked up and said, `Can we sustain this?' I think that's our biggest thing right now and our biggest challenge, keeping that level of consistency. To be able to do it against this team today for as long as we did was tremendous."
On Baylor's 18-3 run:
"During that run, Amber [Thompson] picked up her fourth foul. We took her out of the game and put in a guard. We played a wacky defense that was sort of successful. The guard became the person who was fronting [Brittney] Griner and she struggled - she hadn't worked at that assignment and she struggled with that. The other part that hurt us during that time was we had a couple easy buckets that we missed that resulted in transition for them. We did a great job with defensive transition, limiting their easy buckets, and then during that spurt, they had long rebounds that resulted in easier baskets for them."
Freshman forward Amber Thompson
On playing in the Maggie Dixon Classic:
"Coming out and shooting around, I was a little nervous. The arena is big and I've never played in a big arena like this. Imagining all the people that were going to be in the seats, filling up the arena, and playing the number one team in the country, I guess I was kind of nervous being that I am a freshman. But, knowing that I was going to have to step up, I was just preparing myself, getting my head right."
Junior guard Eugeneia McPherson
On playing the number one team in the country:
"We didn't come here to lose. The first half we played really great and followed the game plan. I'm excited because Coach Arico sees a lot of improvement. We also see a lot of improvement. It was the number one team in the country that we played. I'm excited for the rest of the season - to know that we can play like that is exciting."
Baylor Head Coach Kim Mulkey
On today's win:
"I am very proud that we won; I am most proud that I did not have to come in here and make excuses. Sometimes we take wins for granted. I do not take any win for granted because I understand when you have `Number One' plastered in front of you, you are going to get everyone's best shot. If St. John's plays as well as they did today throughout BIG EAST play, they are going to finish pretty high in that league. They were not afraid to pull the trigger, and that is what you will see from a well-coached team. I hate that [Nadirah McKenith] got hurt, injuries can change the entire complexion of your basketball team -particularly an instrumental player like she is to her team."
