Quotes
November 30, 2007 | Women's Volleyball
Nov. 30, 2007
2007 NCAA WOMEN'S VOLLEYBALL TOURNAMENT
FIRST ROUND
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 30, 2007
GALEN CENTER - LOS ANGELES, CALIF.
USC Women of Troy
Head Coach Mick Haley
"Good offensive match for us tonight. The passing was good. The first two games were very low error. We did a good job with kills. I was pretty pleased with that effort. I thought because of the weight and the nervousness and that kind of thing we got kind of antsy, drained and then had a nice come back and a run back. Pepperdine competed hard. It may not have looked like that, but they really worked hard to get back into that match. They did a good job in that last game, but I thought we did a really good job."
On second-round opponent Long Beach State:
"I think they present some problems for us. We will have to go to work tonight and watch the video and see how this is going to match up. I expect a heck of a match. They will come and bring their A game and as always we will try to do the same. I think it is a game that will draw a lot of interest because there are a lot of good players. Obviously we saw [Alexis] Crimes get a lot of kills out there today and number nine [Michaela Hasalikova] played very well today. In fact she kept them in the middle of that match. She was very good. We expect very strong competition."
On Pepperdine's loss of their setter Kiah Fiers:
"You see whenever you lose your quarterback like that you have trouble getting into a rhythm when you are a rhythm based team. All the plays that they would run at us from behind like they did two years ago in the second round when we played them and lost at the Lyon Center they tried to do tonight. You can see teams that are focused. They are a team that really plays like an upset team. They have been focused on us for at least a week. When Kiah went down that hurt their timing. I thought their second setter did a whale of a job. She stayed in there, she never really panicked, gave them good swings all night. I think the other problem they had was Lucca Roberts. She has an ankle injury. They said she was ok but we watched here in warm ups and she did not have the explosion that she normally has. We respect her too. She is a senior and wanted to go out getting after us. You have to do the best when you are injured. We know that. We played injured all season.
Diane [Copenhagen] is back in here now but she had to sit out for six-seven weeks. Bethany [Johansen] stayed strong and Asia [Kaczor] has had all kinds of things wrong with her but she stays in there and battles. We thought Pepperdine was a very good opponent. They had an awfully good offensive game at the end there. They pushed us real hard."
On what was said in the third game to push them to win:
"I really did not say much at the end. That was really them. We have talked to them about owning their team, not the coaches providing the energy and the spark. I think they are getting it. They really took charge there at the end. We had that drain there and that happens for a number of reasons, but you can expect it to happen in the tournament, especially in the first and second rounds. Once you get through that drain, we really looked like we focused and got really good swings. Taylor did a really good job of feeding Asia there late and becoming an offensive threat herself because she had not used it all game. Those are mature things that you do when you get into critical situations and you have got a couple of tricks up your back pocket. I liked when they were slapping hands and yelling at each other to go out and get it. I did not say anything, it just all came from the team."
Senior Outside Hitter Diane Copenhagen
On playing in the NCAA tournament at home as a senior:
"It is great having a crowd out there gets us excited. We had a really big crowd out there tonight which was exciting to see. Just having the home advantage, being comfortable here and being able to go through our usual pre-game routine helps get our team settled before the match. We are thankful that we get to host."
On second-round opponent Long Beach State:
"Long Beach played a great match. They came out and had a big crowd here. They are a great team, coming off some big wins late in the season. They are definitely going to put up a fight. We need to come in focused and play hard because they are going to come here ready to play."
Senior MB Bethany Johansen
On getting to play in the NCAA tournament at home:
"Playing at home is really a blessing. I know that we had fight to get to get them to come here, but it is a lot of fun and a great facility to be in. It was really nice to be at home, seeing the crowd and having a lot of people on both sides of the court supporting us."
Senior OPP/MB Asia Kaczor
On having the opportunity to play at home for the NCAA tournament:
"I think it is just fun to play here. We had our fans supporting us throughout the entire Pac-10 season and I think that they deserved it as much as we did to play here the first and second rounds so it is definitely fun."
Pepperdine Waves
Head Coach Nina Matthies
"I just told my team that I thought we had a little bizarre ending to a really good year. I am really proud of them. It is really hard to loose your quarterback so to speak the day before you go into the NCAA tournament. I thought this team has played all year with a lot of enthusiasm and fierceness. We have had some ups and downs, but we have been a tremendous group. We kind of got the wind taken out of our sails on Wednesday, but I thought we regrouped and practiced relaxed but a little different coming into the match tonight. USC is a great team and I told the team that we put ourselves in the position to perhaps make the tournament but to not be in the seed that I felt we could have earned. When you put yourself in the position to play the fifth seed, you are in a pretty tough spot, and USC has earned that spot and played pretty well. That is kind of how the night went."
Loss of Setter Kiah Fiers to injury:
"She is our setter. She started every game this year except for one when she was sick. She has started every game for the last two years. My setter tonight is a senior who has played three games this year in her career at Pepperdine and not that she has not had a great people ahead of her, but she has been our second setter, so it obviously effects your timing. It affects everything. Kiah is a tremendous athlete. She is a lefty, she is a great player, brings a lot to our team and runs our offense so without her tonight we were a little short handed."
On playing USC earlier in the season:
"I think we played them our third match of the season. In volleyball we don't have a preseason, so our third match, I can't even remember. I do not think we played very well here at that point in time. It was early and we had a couple of young kids, freshmen and sophomores starting, so we did not really look back too much on that match. USC has changed and we have changed, so you don't really go backwards too much. It is too far away."
Junior Outside Hitter Julie Rubenstein
On the team not being able to close out the third game:
"I think maybe USC had a little more heart than us. I think they focused on finishing a little more than we did. We did not really take advantage of those points at the end there that we could have won."
