Box Score
Wisconsin vs. Northwestern
Postgame Quotes
Nov. 16, 2014
Kohl Center – Madison, Wis.
UW Head Coach Bobbie Kelsey
Opening statement:
“We’re very happy with the win. It’s nice to start the season off with a ‘W.’ The football team did what they did and the soccer team won their game. Everybody’s doing well. We’ve got to carry our weight.
“It’s nice to beat the tough, scrappy team (like) Illinois State. I knew they weren’t going to be down by 30 and let us just steamroll them, but sometimes the kids don’t understand that. They’ve got to keep their foot on (Illinois State’s) neck so to speak and close out the game.”
On how they snagged the 30-point lead in the second half:
“We just pushed the ball. We played nice defense. We forced them into a tough shot and then we got the rebound. Our offense is now, anyone can get it and go. We don’t really look to Dakota (Whyte) exclusively because other folks are down there in front. It puts pressure on them to get back. It’s just a matter of being more intentional about running on both ends of the floor. That’s what we were doing, hitting shots. Nicole (Bauman) had nine assists, which is a career high for her. Now we got to get Dakota and Tessa (Cichy) doing it.”
On Nicole Bauman:
“Nicole, she’s not a point guard but she has to help a little bit up there. All of our guards work on their ball handling, posts do as well. We’re confident on our ball handling and our ability to read the defense and take care of the ball. She’s shown that. No one had more than two turnovers, which is nice. I’m happy about that and we need to keep that up. We know the defense is going to get more intense with the better teams and we really have to make sure we are taking care of the ball.”
On managing Cassie Rochel’s minutes after last year’s injury:
“If we’re up by a lot, we’re going to take her out. The problem is, when she sits a long time and we want to put her back in, she’s not warmed up. (But) we have plenty. Mick (Michala Johnson) is healthy and fresh. She’s ready to go. Malayna (Johnson) has done a nice job. Jacki (Gulczynski) will get in there and mix it up. So we have some bigs that are still available.”
On freshman Cayla McMorris’ first game tonight:
“Cayla, she’s very aggressive. Sometimes I got on her a little bit because she’s going one-on-three. But I like that about her; she’s not afraid. She took the ball strong to the basket. We know what she can do, and she’s only going to get better and better. We’re going to put her in a position to showcase her skills. And that’s for all the guards.”
On what part of the game she will take to practice:
“It’s the last 12 minutes. You’re not going to have 30-point leads on people. If that wasn’t a 30-point lead game, we would’ve been in trouble. We know what’s coming, no disrespect to Illinois State. Maryland is coming, Michigan State is coming, Northwestern is coming. They have to understand that yes, you should have a 30-point lead against Illinois State when you’re the big dog. But there will be other big dogs. Now it’s who has the biggest bark and bite at that point. We’re playing for what’s coming. Not necessarily not’s what right in front of us. We’re not looking ahead, but we’re making sure we have the best chance to play well against those teams too.”
Senior Michala Johnson
On whether the pace of the game helped her get more opportunities near the basket…
“Yeah. Once my guards set screens for me and I’d come off the screens and finish strong, then yeah it starts to feel more comfortable finishing around the basket.”
On whether it’s hard to motivate herself to get up and play hard in games like this…
“No, when we’re ahead like this, we just continue to work on our offense and just try to stick together. You have to play like you’re losing. Just because you’re up by 30, the game isn’t over and there’s still time on the clock. So again we just have to work on different things, working on our offense like this is a new offense. Like Coach Bobbie said, just work on new things. If we ran the offense one way the whole game, okay let’s try running it a different way. We have to learn how to play with defense and people who don’t know our offense.”
Freshman Cayla McMorris
On what it felt like for her to play in her first regular season game, and whether she thought she found rhythm in the game…
“Yeah, to start the game I had a lot of jitters and nervousness, but once I started playing, it goes away.”
On whether it’s hard to motivate herself to get up and play hard in games like this…
“For me, coming off the bench, it’s sometimes hard to get into the game and whatever. But I have the upperclassmen to help motivate me so that helps a lot to get going when we play teams like this.”
ISU Head Coach Barb Smith
Opening statement:
“I was really happy with our team’s fight. I was obviously not so happy that we were down by 30, but the fight back showed a lot of character with our basketball team. I thought Katy Winge just decided, as seniors do, to put the team on her back and (say) ‘Come along people!’ and she did a great job doing that, she did a great job doing that.”
On how the defense improved after the start of the second half and what changes were made for that to happen:
“I think I called two or three timeouts in that little series there. I just had to settle our team down. We came out where there obviously was a deficit, they went up, and we were just a little bit shaky. (We have a) young basketball team, very inexperienced here still, but I thought that we kept our composure, we got it back together and we started playing again and then some things happened in our favor. We caught fire a little bit and got our confidence back.”
On Katy Winge’s career-high performance and what she saw to turn it around for her:
“Well, she actually has done it (before). She did it in our scrimmage that nobody saw, and then she did it a couple of times last year. She’s capable, and you know it’s Winge’s senior year and she is playing that way. She saw her team struggling and she just decided that this is what she’s gotta do. Hopefully there will be others that do that as well, it won’t be Katy Winge all the time, but you know I thought they played well. It’s tough when you’re going up (against) 6-4 (and) 6-4 inside, they’ve got some weapons in there. But I thought Katy did a great job, she was even on one of them at one point, so she was doing everything.”
