Lady Vols vs. Arkansas Postgame Quotes

Tennessee Head Coach Holly Warlick

Opening Statement:
"I loved our fight tonight, but we dug ourselves into a hole and couldn't finish the job."

On the team responding to her message when she was getting on to them:
"I thought they responded great. We can't give up threes, and we gave up 12 to a team that can shoot. It's difficult because they drive and shoot, but I wasn't happy. We weren't doing some things that we should have been doing. We had better defense, but it still is not good enough."

On the team's confidence level:
"Right now it is not very good. We have lost so many games in tight situations. It's tough on these kids. We had two great practices. We had some mental mistakes (tonight). You have to go with it. We are young, but we have to continue to get smart. I didn't have to coach effort tonight and, for me, that is huge. Obviously, I want to win the basketball game, but at least that gives us the opportunity to win the game."

On playing Notre Dame and how it could be big for the rest of the season:
"Forget the rest of the season, it's big because it is the next game. We will prepare for it. We have to go out and be confident. We aren't supposed to win the game, and that's fine. We were supposed to beat Missouri, Kentucky, Arkansas, and Alabama, and we didn't get it done. We aren't supposed to beat Notre Dame, but that doesn't mean that we aren't going to prepare, be ready, fight and give our kids the opportunity to win. I think that we are going to win every game. When our kids are dialed in and playing hard, we are pretty darn good. We had a lot of turnovers and we made some mental mistakes. We shot too many threes. Those are things that we can correct. We are going to continue to work and fight and get this thing turned around. I have a staff that is killing it in everything we are doing in practice and in prep. We had two killer days in practice, so absolutely this hurts, but we are going to keep going."

On shaking up the lineup by not starting Rennia Davis:
"Yes, I just wanted to shake it up a little bit. I thought we needed a big in with Kasi (Kushkituah), so I wanted to do that."

On Meme Jackson's injury:
"I think it is Meme's ankle, and it will be day-to-day. I thought it was her knee at first, but it is her ankle. Our training staff will do their best to get her back as quick as possible."

On the challenges of guarding Arkansas:
"I thought that we started out really well. We pressed, then did not get up on the ball. In the first quarter, they hit two threes in a row because we were not defending the basketball. You are pressing and jumping the ball; you are gambling. You've got to have ball pressure to make your press work. The two times that they threw out of it, we did not have great ball pressure. That kind of started the first quarter. We got to trust that we can defend, and we did it and we were better. Like I said, we are just not good enough right now. We went man; we went zone. We had a couple of missed assignments where we were supposed to switch and we did not. There are a lot of things that we can get better at, but when we had missed assignments, Arkansas capitalized on them. (It was the) same thing as what we have done in the past couple of games - we have missed an assignment or what we are supposed to do, and teams have capitalized on it."

On having a young team and the close losses being a teaching lesson:

"Absolutely. It is a young team trying to defend seasoned players, but that is what we've got. They are talented, and they are continuing to learn and grow. It is about a young team and again, they've got to understand that little mistakes keep adding up. The 16 turnovers - I think we had nine or 10 in the first half. It just keeps adding up. Arkansas had 20 points off just our turnovers and 12 threes. We have got to really understand the importance of taking care of the basketball. Late in the game, we turned it over. We have got to at least get a shot off. Those are things we are going to continue to work on. It was really tough in the locker room, because they have really worked hard these last couple of days. But I have confidence in them. I have confidence in my staff. All the noise that we are hearing, the players have blocked that out, and they are playing with a lot of heart, and that is all that I can ask them to do. I am not going to give up on this basketball team."

On if the loss holds a different weight being that the game is for Pat Summitt:

"I think Pat would be proud of us because we fought. We are in a tough situation today. I told the players what I learned from Pat is, 'Look, when times are tough you lean on each other.' I thought we did that today. The losses are tough. Everything right now is tough on this team, but we have got to come together, because we are the only ones that can fix it. These players are going to rally together. That is what I talked about, lean on each other. It is a fight. It is a battle. When we play within our team and together, we are a pretty good basketball team."

Sophomore Guard Evina Westbrook

On losing close games:
"I was just proud of my team for fighting back. It came down to the little possessions at the end, and we emphasized that in the locker room. But I think we fought hard and just have to really nail down our defense and take every possession that we could have had stops that they scored on. I was just really proud of this team's fight -- we played really good team basketball today."

On her individual performance in the loss:
"I don't really look at my individual stats. It doesn't matter to me. If we're winning, then we all win. If we lose, we all lose. That's how I look at it."

On preparation for Notre Dame:
"It really starts in practice. We have to get better, and we really have to be better at getting on each other in practice. We have to continue to work hard. As Coach Dean (Lockwood) would say, 'Respect all, but fear none.'" We're not going to fear them at all coming in, but at the same time, they are ranked as the No. 1 team in the nation. We can't take any possessions off, and we can't take them lightly whatsoever. We have to be ready for that."

Freshman Guard Zaay Green

On if the team holds each other accountable:
"Yes, I do think we hold each other accountable to everything. Ri (Rianna Davis), we hold her accountable to scoring. We hold E (Evina Westbrook) to scoring; we make sure she's passing and being a good point guard. I think everybody is held accountable."

Junior Forward Rennia Davis

On making defense a priority:
"We've got to put a full defensive game together for 40 minutes. We definitely have spurts where we look like a good defensive team, and we have times where we just lack the communication or (we have) shooters getting wide open. It's just little stuff like that that adds up."

On their upcoming game against No. 1 Notre Dame and how they're going to prepare:
"Notre Dame is No. 1 in the country, so it's going to be a big challenge for us. They'll probably be one of the toughest teams we play this year. We've got to look at it like any other team. We've got to put a full 40 minutes together"

Arkansas Head Coach Mike Neighbors:

Opening statement:
"It was a big win for us; it is the first time in two years that we won one that we were an underdog in, especially on the road. I am really proud of our sustained effort in all four quarters and being able to be resilient when they made a run at the end of the third quarter and the end of the fourth quarter."

On the timeout after going down in the fourth quarter:
"I told them we need to get back to rebounding. (Evina) Westbrook had gotten really aggressive, and I told them to get her to pass it a little bit. We had a little lull in rebounding. We were trying to stay after it and trying to stay positive. We needed to keep playing fast. Our playing fast in the first half had gotten to their legs, and we needed to take advantage of it by continuing doing that. Malica Monk went in transition the length of the floor, which is a lot harder to guard when you go in on the side. We had a little better flow; we tried to talk to them and tried to calm them down. We do a lot of game resets. We had a timeout left and a foul to give. It is not usually a lot of strategy, because we do all of that in practice."

On if he expected the Lady Vols to foul on the final possession:
"I was afraid that if we called the timeout they would have. It is really hard to communicate that sometimes, especially when Evina (Westbrook) is shooting the free throw. I did not want to upset them by talking about what to do on defense. We wanted to go fast and call a timeout if we did not like what we got. I saw Malica going at the basket, and that was about as good of a shot as we could have had. I think that they would have fouled us if we called the timeout and advanced it. That is always risky."

On their performance from 3-point range:
"We had some key ones, and I think they were timely. Twelve-for-38 is 38 percent, and we can win with that number. It is what they were giving us, but I am telling you we have a 17 or 18-make night in us. We have not shot it like we do in practice sometimes. This group can really get heated up, and we have not had a night where we were clicking on the same cylinders. We are getting there, and we are continuing to draw fouls. We took 92 shots tonight and only turned it over eight times, that offsets the rebounding. We are not a great rebounding team, so by not turning the ball over we can get more shots."

On if turnovers made a difference:
"Not for us. We don't ever talk about trying to steal it. If they want to pass it to us, we will take it, but we are not going to actively try to steal it. We did try to when they threw it to their post players. You are not going to take it from Evina Westbrook; you are not going to take it from Meme Jackson, and you are not going to take it from Rennia Davis. When their post players caught it, we did try to double team and create some turnovers there. We do not talk about forcing turnovers as a defense."

Arkansas Guard Malica Monk:

On her go-ahead shot to finish the game:
"I am not going to lie to you, I was kind of scared, but my teammates had confidence in me making that shot. So, I just risked it all, and to know they had my back it gave me an extra boost. It was really amazing."

On fending off the Lady Vols' third quarter run:
"We just kept our energy going, because from the jump we had that energy boost. Energy is the most emphasis we put on the team and also rebounding. As long as we kept those components in the game, we knew we were going to win the game."

On re-grouping in the fourth quarter:
"We talked to each other and kept our heads in the game. The important part is keeping ourselves uplifted and letting each other know that we can win the game. We had to keep contributing and doing what we do best. We kept executing and doing what the coaches told us to do."

Arkansas Guard Chelsea Dungee:

On the final shot:
"I was not too worried. I had confidence in us. We practiced last-second shots before we came up here. We knew that was a possibility, so we executed, and we worked on those things in practice. Doing it in a game is no different."

On how they kept their composure:
"We never lost our identity and we stayed true on what we planned on doing. In the third quarter, you look up and realize there is still a lot of game left. Even though they went on a little run, we were not too concerned about it. We just stayed true to what we do."

On their performance from deep range:
"We kept pushing the ball and caused them to change defenses several times during the game. That opened up the 3-point, when they came out in man, we started shooting layups."