Postgame Quotes: Longwood at Virginia

Story Links

Postgame Quotes
Longwood at Virginia
Feb. 16, 2010

Virginia head coach Debbie Ryan
On coming into Longwood after the draining game against UNC
“We sort of approached this like a tournament atmosphere and I thought it was a real character revealer for us. We could have gone one of two ways: we could have folded and just gotten through it or we could have stepped up and shown what kind of character we are going to have in case we play two games in the ACC tournament, three games in the ACC tournament – how we are going to handle it. All 10 players are going to have to give you minutes, all 10 players are going to have to step up whether they are tired or not and that’s what we were aiming for – to see what would happen after a double-overtime game in the tournament. What will we do the next day?”

On individual rebounding:
“Simone [Egwu] was unbelievable. I think two first years with 20 and 16 in back-to-back nights is pretty good sign for this program and I was really pleased with the way that simone came out. She played offensively very well, she defended, and she got on the boards for us. You cant ask anything more from a player and I think she played really well tonight.”

On the defensive effort:
“I think that the defense was exceptional tonight in a lot of ways. I still felt in the first half we didn’t do what we needed to do. I go ton them a little bit at halftime and reminded them of what we were trying to accomplish tonight. They stepped up and took the challenge in the second half and really came out and closed the door very quickly in the second half which is what we wanted to do.”

Virginia forward Telia McCall
On a big win after the close win over UNC:
“We need to get ready for the tournament and we might have to play back to back games, so we needed this.”