Postgame: LSU WBB gives thoughts after Sweet 16 win over Utah

LSU women’s basketball advanced to the Elite Eight for the first time since 2008 with a 66-63 win over Utah on Friday evening. Here’s what Angel Reese, LaDahzia Williams, and Kim Mulkey had to say after the victory.

Players

Q. Angel, how dramatic was that finish? How did you handle your emotions going forward and fighting to the end?

Reese: “Just trying to keep my emotions together. It was tough. When I got that fifth foul, I was upset with myself for sure, but I trusted my teammates. My teammates have been in situations, especially in practice, where I’m not on the court, and they have to do last-minute situations, so I’m super proud of the team. Alexis and LaDazhia stepped up as seniors, so I’m just super happy for the leadership that we had tonight.”

Q. Would you say this was your best game you’ve ever had?

Williams: “Yeah, I would say that it was my best game I’ve had, and being a senior, I’m not ready to go home. We already know where we want to go, and Angel getting in early foul trouble, I felt like I needed to step up as a senior and just be a leader on the court and just do what I can for my team.”

Q. What worked so well for you?

Williams: “My confidence was an all-time high tonight, I believe. And Coach Mulkey she always tells me that high post shot is my shot and to take it, and I work on that every day in practice. So I was just shooting the ball with confidence tonight.”

Q. When you transferred to LSU, could you have imagined this, the Elite 8, 31 wins, all that?

Williams: “I mean, I knew playing for a Hall of Fame coach, we were going to get something done. We work hard every day in practice, and we listen to what she’s got to say, and we put in the work. I’m not really too surprised. This is year two, and we’re making a statement. We just want to keep making statements.”

Kim Mulkey

Q. What did you see from Da and also when Alexis had the ball at the end, what’s going “Seniors. I complimented them in the locker room afterwards. I said it in the previous press conference. Seniors. I can’t describe it to you. They don’t want to take that jersey off for the last time. It’s the worst feeling in the world. That includes those that get to play pro ball.

There’s something about a college atmosphere. There’s something about a college team. The greatest years of your life. Those two kids played big time. Alexis didn’t shoot it particularly well early, but big-shot Alexis, she hit the big three. We didn’t shoot it particularly well. One was 0 for 3, 0 for 3, 0 for 7, three starters sitting over there by me.

I just thought it was two heavyweights going at it, and that’s what I told their coach after the game. I said, somebody had to win and somebody had to lose. We just made a few more plays. But so much respect because that team guards you. We will guard you. Everybody thought it was going to be this track meet. They average this, we average that.

At the end of the day, if you’re a basketball junkie, you had to enjoy some of that going on tonight because neither team turned it over a lot. We were pushing, we were shoving, they were pushing — you’re just battling. You’re trying to win a ball game.

Q. Was it hard controlling the emotions there at the end? 

“I’ve been, gosh, doing this so many years. I’ve seen so many endings. I’ve lost National Championships with seven-tenths of a second on the clock. I’ve watched offensive fouls called that take the ball out of your hands. I did not see Angel’s block. I thought it was a block. I didn’t see it, and I can’t find the video. They took off with it.

So yeah, you go from a high to what did you just call? Sure. But I’ve been a part of those for more than I care to write about.”

Q. Kim, you said a lot of times this is not a Final Four team. I know you’re not in the Final Four, but what do you say right now?

“We’re still building. We’re still overachieving. We’ve only won games. We haven’t won championships. I didn’t come to LSU to win games. I want to win a championship some day. Is that going to take away from the excitement of our fans and our institution and our players who have never been to an Elite 8? Are you kidding me? No.

I’m going to celebrate with them because it is a big deal. LSU program has been to Final Fours. To do it again as quickly as we’ve done it is ridiculous, really. It’s not my great coaching that got us there. Honestly, it’s the transfer portal. The transfer portal affects everything in basketball now.

I said this to some selection committee people. We got a 3 seed because of our non-conference schedule. Let’s just lay it out there. Okay? Did anybody on that committee realize that when I put that schedule together I didn’t have Angel Reese and I didn’t have Kateri Poole and I didn’t have the pieces?

Well, they’d better start thinking like that now because a lot of teams that had all the pieces got hurt from the portal. They lost starters. And they went and overscheduled. Darned if you do, darned if you don’t. Don’t penalize teams — back in my day, you wouldn’t watch games. I hadn’t seen a committee member at one of our games this year. Costs money, I guess.

But I’m saying all this to tell you, the transfer portal affects everybody, good, bad, decisions that are made. It’s here to stay, whether we like it or not. But that has helped us reach this point. We’ve got nine new pieces including freshmen that have helped us jump-start this program fast.”

Q. You had three players foul out tonight. Did you feel like this game was called tighter than maybe you saw during SEC play, or was it just extra physical?

“I think both — I said it. Both teams, heavyweights. They’re out there, we’re getting after it, they’re getting after it. I just have so much respect when I leave the floor, when I win or lose, when I see people teach defense. I learned from the best in the business, Leon Barmore, Pat Summitt. You didn’t get on the floor if you didn’t guard people.

And we want to become better defensively. I thought they guarded us, I thought we guarded them. I thought it was — I’m not going to tell you an entertaining game, but if you’re a basketball junkie, there was some good stuff done in that game from a coaching standpoint on stressing defense, rebounding, play within yourself. You had some different players step up. It was two heavyweights going at it.

I thought our bench, even though we didn’t hit shots, our bench helped us. I thought Poa — you have to talk about Poa. She didn’t get many minutes the previous game, but Poa goes in and Sa’Myah Smith got a few more minutes tonight. I think we need to acknowledge their play, as well.”

Q. Angel has talked about LaDazhia’s footwork in the past. Could you kind of tell me what you see there?

“Well, LaDazhia, she has tremendous — she does, her footwork is good. She’s going to bait you. She’s going to look around. Then when she sees an opportunity to give you that up-and-under move or give you a move where she can take that extra step, she can do it one-on-one.

I think the high post shot, she hasn’t shot that enough all year, and the reason she hasn’t is because we’ve been able to get it to Angel all year.

But tonight, they wouldn’t let us get it in there to Angel, and they can shoot that shot. It’s a beautiful shot. I’d like to take credit for those things, but LaDazhia, this is her only year with me, so I can’t take credit for it. I don’t know if it goes back to the previous institutions that coached her or high school or summer ball. But her stock is rising. If the WNBA hasn’t noticed what she’s done in big-time games, then I don’t know what they’re looking for.”