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Postgame Quotes
No. 14 Virginia 77, No. 25 Wake Forest 59
Jan. 11, 2009
Virginia head coach Debbie Ryan
Opening statement:
“The first rule of holes is, stop digging and get rid of the shovel. I felt like our defense was not very good to start the game and I thought [Camille] Collier played out of her mind in the first half. Once we stopped the barrage of threes, it was a lot easier. We still hadn’t settled down with four minutes gone by in the second half. With 11 minutes left in the game, we locked down and that line-up was very efficient.”
On the difference between the first half and the second half:
“Once you rebound and go it’s tough to stop us. We made much better decisions in the second half. Give Wake credit, they got up by 16 on us and they played a really good defensive game today.”
On the play of junior Monica Wright:
“They played very good defense and she still ends up with 20 points and does what we need her to do. She’s such a strong player.”
On whether this was the best win of the season:
“The best win of the season? This was a very good game. I don’t think in terms of best and worst. Every game is the best for me. Every game has its importance and its place in my heart. For me, the next game is going to be the best game of the season.”
Virginia senior guard/forward Lyndra Littles
On the Cavaliers’ second-half run:
“I know that we had made up in our minds ourselves to come down on every possession on defense and get a stop. We knew we were getting stops because we were able to get out and run. It’s not so much that you notice … we just played hard.”
Virginia junior guard Monica Wright
On the atmosphere of the season-high 3,737 fans at JPJA:
“The crowd was most into it today. Getting stop after stop, and getting those steals, our defensive energy was amazing. They might not know it, but that really fuels us and gives us energy.”
Wake Forest Head Coach Mike Petersen
Opening Statement:
“I thought we played very well and very hard for about 31 minutes. Our kids did a really good job defending and we had a pretty good scheme. The difference in the game was two-fold: we stopped making shots. It took us nine minutes to score one point. We can’t do that and hope to be a really good team on the road. And then we just got caved in on the glass. In the gut of this game, the two things that decided it were offensive rebounding and us missing open shots. They were the same kinds of shots we made in the first 31 minutes that we found a way to miss in the last nine.”
“They got rolling and the crowd got behind them. They did a very good job but we are at the end of a three-game, six-day road trip and the last two games were Maryland and Virginia. I thought our kids did a pretty good job of staying focused and competing.”
On the play of Camille Collier:
“She is a really good shooter and she hasn’t shot as well in games as we watch her shoot everyday in practice. It didn’t surprise me; I have seen it before. She hasn’t gotten that loose in a game lately but we run those plays for her and it is not because we are hoping. We have confidence in her, absolutely. That is the best half that she has had this year.”
On dominating the game early:
“We are still playing well. Don’t overestimate the three games we have lost. Those losses were to teams with RPIs in the top 20. We are playing ok right now. On this trip, we played very poorly the first eight minutes at Maryland. We played ok after that. Here we played poorly the last nine minutes. So we played 120 minutes on the trip and we played 100 pretty good minutes. Unfortunately when you go on the road and play three pretty good teams, you have to play more good minutes than that to win the game.”
Wake Forest guard Camille Collier
On her shooting in the first half:
“You hope everyday is our day but coming into the game, for the past couple of games, Coach (Petersen) has been saying go straight up and follow through. Today I felt like once I got the ball and I hit my first couple of shots, I just felt like I was in the zone. Unfortunately it didn’t carry over as much as I would have liked in the second half.”
On guarding Monica Wright:
“It was difficult but the thing about it is were are a team. It was my job to try and contain her but I knew that I had help with my bigs and everybody on the bench, all the coaches were talking to me. Everybody did a great job helping me and making sure I did the best that I could while I was out there guarding her.”