Head Coach Nancy Winstel

On the key to the win…
“ We got off to such a lousy start, but we just hung in there. We tried to make plays and tried to stay together and not fall apart. We tried not to let them get up by 50. Our free throw shooting kept us in the game in the first half and our inside play got us ahead in the second. I thought we made some stops.

We made some plays. We still turned the ball over too much but not as much as we did the other night, so that’s a plus. It is good to go into the Christmas break with a win, and that’s important. We just have to hang in there and stay with it.”

On changes made to get back into the game…
“ What we really tried to do and what I told our kids we needed to make a few more shots, get a few more rebounds, and we needed to get a few more stops. We really got the ball inside more. I thought (Elizabeth Burrows) had a great second half from a point guard standpoint. We ran some stuff and posted up.

We got the ball to (Karmen Graham) and Connie, and they pounded, and Liz did a great job getting the ball to them, and they did a nice job of finishing. I think we may have surprised Fort Valley State a little bit with our aggressiveness. The first half they came out aggressive, and we came out aggressive in the second half. Then, it was close, it was close, and it was close, and we made a couple stops, we made a couple plays and hung in there.

You want to be in the finals of your tournament, but if you’re not, you definitely want to win the second game. We are getting better. We just need to keep working at it, keep the faith and stay together.”

On Karmen Graham’s double-double…
“ She was struggling yesterday, and she couldn’t make a shot to save her life. I called her last night and told her to keep her head up and keep working her butt off because good things come to people who work hard and sooner or later the shots are going to fall.”

Elizabeth Burrows

On having seven assists in the second half…
“ A lot of the assists aren’t to my credit. They go to Connie because she made me give her the ball. She was wide open. Connie created the spacing, and it wasn’t just a great pass, it was a great post move. I think once we got her down on the blocks.

In the first half we were more up, so she wasn’t down on the blocks as much. When she went down to the blocks, we were able to move the ball a little more. We just started out horrible. We weren’t moving the ball at all, and last night we moved the ball so well, so it could only get better.”

On coming back from being 17 points down in the first half…
“ It’s our house. This is where we have to win our games. They just got there points real quick and we just knew that it’s a long game, it’s 40 minutes. We just work hard, and we continue to work hard, and that’s what we did tonight. Coach said to do what we do and that’s what got us back into it instead of playing their game.”

On what the team does when the shots aren’t falling from long-range…
“ Coach tells us to try not to think about them, and when they are doubling, tripling Connie we are going to have to step out from the outside and hit a shot. It’s basically mental.”

Brittany Winner

On the challenge from Coach Winstel to step up on defense…
“ I was getting really frustrated, and I knew and she knew that I could play better and I wasn’t playing my best game. When she challenged me to work on my defense and take better care of the ball, I tried to step up to the challenge.

I think it’s starting getting there. I still have some improvements to make, but I think it’s getting there.”

On what was learned by playing quick teams…
“ I think what we learned from this team especially is that we need to be ready for a team that is going to come right out at us. They jumped out at us, and they had an 18-3 lead in the first half. We just need to be ready at the beginning of the game and take better care of the ball and know that they are going to be all over us. I think that will prepare us later to just be ready at the start of the game.”

On what turned the game around…
“ I think what we’ve learned from our other games is that we can’t look at the game as one half and then another half. We have to play each possession, and you can only do so much each possession. You can only get one stop at a time, and you can only make one basket at a time. Coach said at halftime when we were down by nine that there is no such thing as a nine-point field goal, so you just have to chip away and chip away and just build confidence as you go. It’s little steps, just do one thing at a time and just play it one possession at a time.”

On guarding the point guard…
“ I played point guard in high school, but I haven’t done that here, so it’s not something that I’ve never done. I look at it as a challenge. I look at it as a vote of confidence from coach because she has faith in me that I can do it. I take it as a compliment from coach.”