bleedCrimson.net will be conducting weekly interviews with Aggie women's basketball head coach Darin Spence throughout the 2007/2008 season as the Aggies aim for the WAC Championship and Beyond. In this week's interview Coach Spence talks about the final two games of the regular season, talks about the postseason awards for Sherell Neal, Anikia Jawara and Madison Spence and looks ahead at the WAC tournament and their first round opponent Hawai'i.
bleedCrimson.net: Can you talk about the Fresno State game this past Thursday night?
Darin Spence: It was very competitive. They came out and played well, played with a lot of intensity and we did too. We played well. We probably missed our first ten shots of the game and they were all within 10 feet of the basket. We had some good inside shots, we just had trouble putting it in the basket that night and I think that was probably the story of that game. We just couldn't make shots. It's probably the only game where we've faced that kind of a problem all year long, we've always just found a way to score. That night I don't know if we were just rushing shots or trying to shoot it too quickly but just couldn't get the ball in the hole.
bc.net: Can you talk about your team's performance on defense? How do you think they did with the extra time to prepare for Fresno's offense?
DS: Much better. We were in the right places at the right times. They got a lot of points, we had some just silly turnovers and once we started missing shots we tried to do some things that we don't normally do and it resulted in some turnovers and that's what they got most of their points off in the first half especially. We held them to a point total on there home court where if we had been our normal selves offensively, we'd have had a chance to win the game. I thought we were pretty good, we needed to rebound a little bit better but we were much much improved from the first time we saw them.
bc.net: You made the quick turnaround to go to Hawai'i, were you aware before the game that you had locked up the 3-seed in the conference tournament?
DS: No. We kinda looked at the overall picture. I know Jason had told me that but I never really believed it because I thought had we lost and had Nevada won, we would have tied and I thought they would have got the higher seed because their last game if they would have won, they would have beaten Fresno State. We just really tried to take care of ourselves and go play. Win or lose that last game, we wanted to play better. We wanted to try to get back closer to the identity that we had established all year long.
bc.net: Can you talk about the first 30 minutes of the Hawai'i game? You guys got down by 19 points a couple of times you but you went into halftime down 14.
DS: I just think we didn't play very well the first half. I thought it was the worst first half that we've had all season. In every area. Defensively, we were going under screens, which we never have all year long. We were just a little out of sync on the defensive end. But at the same time they made every shot they threw up. So they got on a roll early. But the biggest key at the half was, I think they had 10 points off some our turnovers and they had 12 points off of second chance points so they got a few too many rebounds and we just weren't all together on the defensive end which hasn't been the case at all for us this year. Offensively we missed a couple shots but it seemed like we turned the ball over way too many times to give ourselves a chance to score. I told them at halftime, I didn't get angry with them, I didn't yell at them, I simply told them that the jersey they're wearing and the program we've built deserves and demands a heck of a lot better than what we just did that 20 minutes and we talked about getting to our identity and getting back to doing what we do. We got out in the second half and we defended and they only scored 20 points in the second half. We got back defensively, we put the pressure on them. We rebounded, we did so much better, forced turnovers and then that helped us keep going on the offensive end as well.
bc.net: Last week we talked about some of your losses this year building mental toughness, did you use that as a little bit of motivation or inspiration when you were knocking on the door? You got their lead down to one point a couple times and then that last time you got it to one point you finally broke through.
DS: No question. We talked at certain timeouts about, you reach back from all the experiences you've had all season. Of all of our eight losses, in all those eight games there were moments in the game that we had control over what we could have done a little bit better and to give ourselves a chance. Only in one of those games was it out of our hands, and that should have never been, and that was the home Fresno game. So we really felt like we could control what we do from there on out, we were knocking on that door, down one and we had a couple shots just go in and out. If we could just tie it or take the lead, I told them we'll win the game. We made that last play at the end, Danisha Corbett, DaDa, a very athletic freshman who's going to be a very good player for us, found herself free and made the layup. She had a really good evening for us all night long and gave us a lot of energy. Then it came down to a defensive stop. At that timeout, that's what I told them again, we've been in this position where people have scored on us in the end and we don't want it to happen again, those days are over. We had really good defensive possession, knocked the ball out when it missed, came up with the rebound and won the game.
bc.net: Can you talk about the game Danisha had? Is it one of those games where you look back as a coach and say this is where she broke out and she's no longer a freshman?
DS: You can pinpoint different times in a couple games for her. Our game at Boise State, she really got us going in the second half. The game at Hawa'i she gave us really good minutes the first half, got some steals and we fed off her energy and she had a really good second half. She's capable of being one of the better players in the league. Her problem has been not showing up and being consistent every day when she practices and kind of taking the approach that we have seniors so she'll let them do it. I told her last week that she should have played a lot more minutes this year and not just accepted the fact that the older kids were going to play and she's practiced better. Now we talk about how we're in a three game series going into the tournament that she'll keep giving us more minutes like that.
bc.net: Can you talk about the huge shot of momentum that it gives your team going into the tournament instead of on a three game losing streak, going in on a winning streak and finally getting that one real close game to go your way and how much confidence it gives your team?
DS: I could just tell right after the game that the kids felt a lot better about themselves. We got the win after losing two competitive games and there's no question that coming off that game we'll be able to build off of it. We feel like more like us, we've got things in line and we can go ahead and play better in the tournament. Had we lost that game, especially the way we played early on, that could have been one of those devastating losses that you never recover from. That was my fear after the Fresno debacle at the end of the game at home, the way that turned out, that could have been a game that was really hard to bounce back from because of the way we lost it. Then you lose at Fresno and so you just never know about kids and how they're gonna bounce back. I just think even today in practice, I really believe we're ready to go and I really feel like we have a shot at winning this whole tournament.
bc.net: The league awards were announced and Sherell, Anikia and Madison were all named to All Conference teams but the one player that didn't get named was the one you really felt should have gotten named and that was Tyshae Walton. Can you talk about the three players that got named to the All Conference teams and can Tyshae use that snub as a little bit of motivation in this tournament?
DS: Well, Tyshae should have been on the All Defensive team moreso than Sherell should have been on there. That was not right. It is what it is, Sherell's the one that blocks shots and so people think she should be on the defensive team. I feel bad for Tyshae. I don't know what Tyshae will take from that, I don't talk to her about it, I won't talk to her about it, we just move on. Sherell being First Team, yeah she deserved that. She's had a good year, she's had good numbers. But I always say as good as Sherell has been, she needs to be so much better and can be so much better and that's not saying anything negative about the kid, that's just facing the facts. She's a 14 points and 8 rebounds a game but I believe she should be 20/10 every single night and not just when the game's out of hand and we're winning by a lot and you score. I really think she's got a lot more in her to give us. I'm very happy and pleased that Anikia was named to Second Team. She's had a really good year. The thing about Anikia, through her ups and downs, she's a true competitor. She'll fight you to the end and I know she's really worked hard last the spring and through the summer to have a good year and so I'm really pleased that she was recognized. With Madison, I didn't think she'd make an All Conference team being a freshman but I'm excited that the other coaches know that she's a pretty good player. When you talk about Newcomer of the Year, Jaleesa Ross at Fresno's pretty good but my opinion on that is, you look at the difference from last year to this year. Fresno wins 18 games a year ago, so did that one kid have that big an impact? We win 13 games, now we're 21 so I'd say our freshman had a bigger impact on our team than theirs did on their team. But that's the way it goes and there's more coaches in the league voting and that's the way it is. But I'm happy for all three of them, that they were recognized. It's nice to get two on the All-Conference and one of the All-Freshman team. But again Tyshae should have gotten on the All-Defensive team but that's kind of the way it goes. Those awards are nice but it's a team thing and we've got bigger plans for the year.
bc.net: We've talked a lot this season about how conference play is different than non-conference play and now we're into the tournament and that's a whole different animal. Can you talk about your preparation for tournament games? Do you prepare any differently?
DS: I tell our players that this time of year is for the players. It's all up to what the kids want to do. My approach from day one with this team as we looked at how we broke the season down into different parts of it. With our group and the experiences they've been through, not just our returning players that have been through it, but all our high school kids have either won a state title or two or been in the state title game so that, winning in tournament play is nothing new for them. That's what they're used to. Now it's just a matter of them drawing on their experiences of what we've been through. They know what they're up against, they know you lose you go home, you win you keep going. So it's all about surviving and advancing but you want to play well. I think teams that kind of struggle but still win, at some point in the tournament it's going to catch up to them. From our standpoint, we need to keep our balance going. Offensively we need to keep our inside-outside approach. Our last two years, I really felt as though our guards, in the quarterfinal and semifinal, our guards were the main reason we advanced because we hit a lot of threes. Our bigs didn't do a whole lot, they just rebounded and played defense. But then when we got to the final game, when those shots are harder to come by and you're a little bit more fatigued, we really needed our forwards to step up in the two championship games. That's something we want to try to balance, we don't want it to be all of one or all of the other. But I think that's been a strength of ours this year, just having that balance. So that's something that we've talked about and again we're the best defensive team in this league so we need to be that for three games.
bc.net: Your quarterfinal opponent is Hawai'i who you just played on Saturday. Having just faced Fresno State back-to-back, what can your team draw on from that experience that will help them in this game?
DS: As it turns out, playing Fresno back-to-back is a good thing because we've done it. Now, we're on the other end of it because we won. But it is fresh in our minds, we're now back on our home court. I told them right after the game at Hawai'i that we were going to turn around and play Hawai'i again. Not because they just knew we would show up and win but because our kids are a little angry because we know we didn't play near our best basketball at Hawai'i. They know the Hawai'i kids were talking about how they should have beat us and it was just a weird kind of a game. Now looking into today at practice, our kids read papers from the other teams and the Hawai'i players are talking about how they're gonna come here and they'll beat us next time, that kind of thing. So that excites our players. The biggest thing is for our players is from day one we've talked about the WAC championship. We started back late August, went to Canada for those three games. It was all in preparation for this moment right now, this week. The regular season title would have been nice but it was all geared up towards this three game run here. So we're here now and we've just got to make the most of it.
bc.net: Can you talk about the advantage that being at home, the comfort level and being able to maintain a routine as opposed to the other eight teams who have to come in and their regular routines are disrupted?
DS: It's always nice to stay at home and play in your home building. It's also tournament time, I always talk about how you just don't know how kids are gonna react to tournament play. Whether they're on a good team or a bad team, you have some kids who've had a really good season but they get into a one and done situation and they don't play to win, they play not to lose and so that's something that for us, we don't want to play that way and we haven't the past couple of years. I don't anticipate us doing it this year. The tournament play affects maybe a freshman on a team, maybe a junior who's been struggling, maybe it's a senior who had a pretty good year but now realizes the weight of the team is on their shoulders. You just don't know. You don't know if coaches all of the sudden try to put in a new offense with a couple days. It's just a totally different animal. It's the third season of your year, you have the first semester, second semester and then the playoffs. You just don't know until the tip-off comes. The other thing is tournament play, especially at the mid and low level leagues, the intensity rises, the enthusiam, it all builds because it all comes down to a three game series. No one's going to the NCAA tournament unless you go win the postseason tournament. Records go out the window, past experiences, if you're hungry and you find a way to make plays, you'll have a chance to win it. It all comes down to a three game run and what you can put together for three games in four days.
