Nov. 27, 2009

Recap |  Box Score |  Notes

Head Coach Brenda Frese

Opening Statement...
"Well I think Thanksgiving dinner was too kind to us for the first twenty minutes of the game. Very sluggish start, Howard came out with a great intensity and energy from the tip and I was very disappointed in the first half, obviously, with our defensive lapses, our lack of intensity and energy. But I thought the group that came out in the second half did a much better job, they were just ready to play and gave us some great energy. I thought that Lori and Tianna did a tremendous job helping us set the tone in terms of the energy and intensity that we needed."

On the injury to Lynetta Kizer...
"I think it's an ankle injury. That's all I heard, but I won't really know her status until tomorroe. Obviously when you only have ten healthy players, we need to remain healthy. We have very little margin for error or injuries. This may be her first injury, so that's always a psychological battle to have to deal with the first time you injure yourself."

On the play of freshmen Tianna Hawkins and Diandra Tchatchouang...
"Two freshmen...all they do is come ready to play, and I thought they were terrific. They really gave us a tremendous spark and obviously what I love about Tianna and Diandra right now is that they're giving us a level of consistency and I thought they played extremely well together."

On if she sees Tianna's confidence growing with each game...
"Absolutely. Obviously she's our best offensive rebounder, just her knack, her ability to go rebound the basketball. It's accredited to Tianna, she's worked extremely hard, she continues to keep working herself into tremendously good shape and that's the number one reason why I think she's been so consistent. She's done a terrific job utilizing minutes and putting herself in a position to be successful."

Senior guard Lori Bjork

On playing a game after Thanksgiving...
"When you have a young team, I remember when you're a freshman and you have a chance to get home for maybe a day and eat, it's hard to come back. It's hard to leave your family, and making that adjustment to college where you have to be ready to play every night."

Freshman forward Tianna Hawkins

Her reaction when teammate Lynetta Kizer went down...
"When she went down, I thought it would just take a minute for her to come back, but when I noticed that she wasn't going to come back and she came out on crutches, I knew that was my time to step up."

On what has helped her in her rebounding ability...
"The encouragement from my coaches and working hard in practice. I guess it's the best part of my game. At first, in the beginning of the season, Coach was like `just calm down, let the game come to you, just take your shots'. Now I'm taking that and it's coming easier."