Jan. 21, 2009
Coquese Washington Weekly Press Conference
January 21, 2009
Q: What is the injury status?
A: Tyra (Grant) is getting better with her groin. Meredith (Monroe), depending on how practice goes today, may play tomorrow. I'm thinking she'll suit up she'll be ready to go officially she has to go through today's practice with contact and make sure there is no residual, lingering effects of the concussion. Meggan (Quinn) is not playing tomorrow she still has some issues with her concussion that she's got to get through and Janessa (Wolff), she'll be playing, she'll be ready to go. She still has a little bit of swelling and what not with her nose. She'll probably wear the mask.
Q: What are you looking for in practice today from Meredith, is it just to see how she is taking contact and what is it their doing differently to see how she feels?
A: Well, she has to go through a contact and practice, she hasn't had any practice with contact in an active practice, she'll get evaluated by the doctors to see how her brain responded to the contact you know if her memory is good, she doesn't have any headaches and things like that. It's more she has to go through it and then let's see how she is afterwards, see how she is tomorrow morning, that type of thing.
Q: How does Wisconsin's physical and low scoring play change your game plan?
A: Hopefully it won't, we want to get out and run, we want to try and make it a high scoring game. They're not real big on pushing the ball and scoring and transitions. It's going to be one of those games where whose style dictates the tempo and being that they play a lot of man-to-man, I think we can still get up and down the court and score rather quickly earlier in the shot clock.
Q: With Jolene Anderson gone, how does that change the look of this Wisconsin team?
A: Well, one thing that they are doing is that they're getting contributions from everybody. Last year, they were a team that relied heavily on Jolene Anderson and to a secondary degree on Janese Banks but with those two gone they're getting contributions from everybody (Lin) Zastrow, Rae Lin D'Alie, Alyssa Karel, everybody is kind of contributing and even Teah Gant is stepping up as of late and knocking down the three-point shots. That is the change in their team, they go from being pretty much a one or two man team to a team with contributions from everybody, which challenges your defense because you can't forget about anybody, and you've got to be aware of all five players on the court.
Q: Is it really important to get off to a fast start with a team like Wisconsin that likes to slow the game down?
A: It's really important. I think it's important that we establish our tempo and our pace early and if we can do that I think it gives us more confidence. However, we start games slowly then seem to pick it up, we would like to start early with our pace.
Q: How challenging is it with all these injuries to be able to keep some sort of fluid mix?
A: It's tough especially in practice. Yesterday, Janessa (Wolff) got bumped in the nose and was gone for 10-15 minutes and with Meredith (Monroe) not practicing and Meggan (Quinn) not practicing and Rashida (Mark) has a class that meets at that particular time and we had two post players in practice Julia (Trogele) and Evelyn (Lewis) are looking around and I'm like it's just you two, there's no subs. So it makes it challenging to get everybody in and make sure everybody knows what they're doing and not over working the people that are there at practice so it makes it tough but slowly but surely we're getting healthy.
Q: What are the players saying to each other about the whole situation?
A: Well, they are being positive. The things is it's day to day its not like anybody has any long, drawn out injuries, so everybody knows that people are slowly but surely getting back and everybody at this point of the season has bumps and bruises and nagging and maybe nagging injuries that won't keep you out of practice or games but just slow you down a little bit. So we try to temper practice so we are not killing each other but we are still able to get work done.
Q: You have a whole week off after this game, how much does that help going into this game knowing that you can put everything out there and then just be able to rest?
A: Mentally I think it's good time to get a rest, a mental break, a physical break too, but definitely a mental break and it's good it's a Sunday because when it's Thursday off it's almost, it's good to get a weekend off sometimes because you guys are college kids, you know the weekends are a lot more fun than a week days. Have weekend off and kind of watch a little TV, no classes and truly have a couple of days rest. I think the mental break as important as the physical break.
Q: How was Julia Trogele's experience in Germany helped her as a player?
A: She came back with a lot of confidence, a lot more tough and she had a little bit of a swagger and we have been talking to her about getting that back as we kind of got up into the season and especially Big Ten play. Her confidence took a bit of a dip and I talked to her about having that swagger she had when she came back from Germany this summer. She was their leading scoring and I think their leading rebounder and really took that team on her shoulders and was one of the leaders and we need her to do the same thing here, maybe not be our leading scorer and rebounder but certainly be somebody who has the confidence that she can make plays, that she can be a big factor for us night in and night out. I think she's coming back around.
Q: How important is if for a player like Julia, who tore her ACL twice in high school and didn't play a lot, to just play basketball.
A: The summer is really where you get better. It's tough to get better during the course of the season because you're constantly working on team things and your game planning and your preparing for specific opponents. You really get better in the spring and summer we are not allowed, the coaches, we're not allowed to talk to them or coach them really at all so how much better each player get depends on their own personal dedication their own personal work ethic. We will give them the plan and tell them this is what you got to do but how much better they get in the summer really depends on how much they're in the gym and I think for Julia being in a competitive environment all summer, when your able to play the kind of competition that she played against all summer and for some of our kids who are going to in years to come be involved with USA Basketball or when they had the Big Ten Travel team those kind of experiences where you are in the gym, you are practicing, your playing against good competition, your playing game like conditions day in and day out that really helps your confidence that really helps your game develop.
Q: Losing a couple in a row, how do you keep your season from getting away from you?
A: Well, I think the thing that helps is our conference, because our conference is so competitive and even though we are at two and five in the conference right now we are tied with Michigan, we could win two in a row and jump up to fifth place. I think that's what helps us stay poised and confident is that the Big Ten is so competitive that even though we lost and couple of game in a row we could easily just as quickly go on a two or three game win streak and we are playing teams that we don't give, like against Wisconsin, we don't give up a tremendous amount of size, we don't give up a tremendous disadvantage in the post, as we have been against Michigan State or Purdue or some of the other teams that present match problems for us. I think the schedule is one that we can get two or three in a row and be right back in the hunt for things.