Post-Game Quotes: Maryland
1/17/2019 9:15:00 PM | Women's Basketball
Michigan State head coach Suzy Merchant
On getting out-rebounded in the first half…
Well, I just don't think we did a good job of making contact and pushing them back. I mean I think we had some intent, but you know it's always the Murphy's Law, it's the one kid that doesn't do it, it's their kid that gets the rebound. So, I mean that was a big part of our game plan so I was a little disappointed about that in the first half, but I thought our kids collected themselves and collectively did a much better job in the second half, you know really trying to make sure we secured rebounds. That's a tough, physical team especially at the four and five spots and they play the (Kaila) Charles kid at the three and she was a lot of four last year and she's very powerful, but you know I don't know if she could really play her game and attack the boards as well because we got her in foul trouble or she was in foul trouble early, so that kind of hurt them a little bit I think.
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On playing with a must win attitude…
If we just play like that every game I'd feel good about our team, it's just sometimes when we go on the road we just don't bring that energy. So, it's something we've been working on and talking about. It's great to be home, everybody loves to play at home, but you do have to play games on the road in this business and I think our kids have to kind of rally a little bit. I think we were very disappointed in our performance as a group on Monday, hopefully that will carry over, it carried over today, and hopefully it will continue to carry over because Rutgers is as tough as they come on the road. They're winning the league, they're the best defensive team in the league, they can score the ball, they're super athletic, very physical. So, that's not going to be easy.
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On having signature wins and how high the ceiling is for this team…
I mean I definitely think you can't, you know that's been our challenge a little with only having one senior. I think it's that urgency night in and night out that you know sometimes when we had some success early people think that it's just going to happen. We share the ball really well as you know, like when you look at our stat sheet I think we had 5 today in double figures, where in the past if you had teams that might have had like an Aerial (Powers) or a Tori (Jankoska) on them you know there was a point where they kind of just took the ball and they were going to get the job done. We don't have that person per say and that's not really how we play, so on nights when we need to make plays, on nights when we need to have somebody rally us and kind of put the team on the back we have to figure out who that's going to be consistently. I love that we share the ball, I love that everybody is involved and that's a harder thing to guard.
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On Sidney Cooks' performance the past couple of games...
Well, I feel bad for Sidney because I don't think she's gotten there yet and she's bless her heart has been working really hard, but she's had an Achilles issue all year. She sat out for almost a whole six weeks, she just started coming back to play in November, it flared back up, she twisted that ankle and it flared back up so we sat her down again. So, she hasn't, I don't think she's shown everything she can do and I know she would tell you that too and I think she's working on it, it's just when you sit out like that and you have that kind of pain and issue it's just going to take time and the only thing that fixes that usually is rest. Well, we are in the middle of our season and rest is really not an option and so we try to manage it, but I don't think she's as sharp as she could be or wants to be consistently because of her ankle. Some days she comes to practice and it's a struggle to get her to really get up and down and other days it feels pretty good. So, we just sort of gauge off of what she's feeling that day and how she's feeling because she's a big part of what we can do and she can as you know really score the ball for us. Â
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On getting out-rebounded in the first half…
Well, I just don't think we did a good job of making contact and pushing them back. I mean I think we had some intent, but you know it's always the Murphy's Law, it's the one kid that doesn't do it, it's their kid that gets the rebound. So, I mean that was a big part of our game plan so I was a little disappointed about that in the first half, but I thought our kids collected themselves and collectively did a much better job in the second half, you know really trying to make sure we secured rebounds. That's a tough, physical team especially at the four and five spots and they play the (Kaila) Charles kid at the three and she was a lot of four last year and she's very powerful, but you know I don't know if she could really play her game and attack the boards as well because we got her in foul trouble or she was in foul trouble early, so that kind of hurt them a little bit I think.
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On playing with a must win attitude…
If we just play like that every game I'd feel good about our team, it's just sometimes when we go on the road we just don't bring that energy. So, it's something we've been working on and talking about. It's great to be home, everybody loves to play at home, but you do have to play games on the road in this business and I think our kids have to kind of rally a little bit. I think we were very disappointed in our performance as a group on Monday, hopefully that will carry over, it carried over today, and hopefully it will continue to carry over because Rutgers is as tough as they come on the road. They're winning the league, they're the best defensive team in the league, they can score the ball, they're super athletic, very physical. So, that's not going to be easy.
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On having signature wins and how high the ceiling is for this team…
I mean I definitely think you can't, you know that's been our challenge a little with only having one senior. I think it's that urgency night in and night out that you know sometimes when we had some success early people think that it's just going to happen. We share the ball really well as you know, like when you look at our stat sheet I think we had 5 today in double figures, where in the past if you had teams that might have had like an Aerial (Powers) or a Tori (Jankoska) on them you know there was a point where they kind of just took the ball and they were going to get the job done. We don't have that person per say and that's not really how we play, so on nights when we need to make plays, on nights when we need to have somebody rally us and kind of put the team on the back we have to figure out who that's going to be consistently. I love that we share the ball, I love that everybody is involved and that's a harder thing to guard.
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On Sidney Cooks' performance the past couple of games...
Well, I feel bad for Sidney because I don't think she's gotten there yet and she's bless her heart has been working really hard, but she's had an Achilles issue all year. She sat out for almost a whole six weeks, she just started coming back to play in November, it flared back up, she twisted that ankle and it flared back up so we sat her down again. So, she hasn't, I don't think she's shown everything she can do and I know she would tell you that too and I think she's working on it, it's just when you sit out like that and you have that kind of pain and issue it's just going to take time and the only thing that fixes that usually is rest. Well, we are in the middle of our season and rest is really not an option and so we try to manage it, but I don't think she's as sharp as she could be or wants to be consistently because of her ankle. Some days she comes to practice and it's a struggle to get her to really get up and down and other days it feels pretty good. So, we just sort of gauge off of what she's feeling that day and how she's feeling because she's a big part of what we can do and she can as you know really score the ball for us. Â
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